Q: My daughter lives in a large apartment building in a western suburb of Chicago. She is allowed to have her emotional support animal as long as she has documentation from her doctor.

Now she is shopping around for a condominium. There is a unit she really likes; however, the owner told her that no pets are allowed. We told her it is an emotional support animal. But she said the condo association will not allow it. Is that right?

A: There are pets and there are service animals. Emotional support animals fall into a category of their own.

There are laws in place under the Americans with Disabilities Act to protect people with disabilities and to prevent discrimination against them. The ADA provides some guidance on service animals. When it comes to emotional support animals, it is less clear whether these animals would rise to the level of a service animal and afford the owner the protections of the ADA.

The ADA defines a service animal as “a dog that has been individually trained to do work or perform tasks for an individual with a disability. The task(s) performed by the dog must be directly related to the person’s disability.”

Under this same guidance, an emotional support animal is one that provides comfort to an owner but is not considered a service animal. There has also been quite a bit of pushback against some people who have emotional support animals of a more exotic nature, such as a peacock.

Condominium association board members can set the rules governing how the property is managed. Those rules can limit resident noise, smoking (tobacco and non- tobacco products) and pets. Pets can be regulated by size, quantity and type.

Years ago, an owner of a potbellied pig living in a high-rise condo in Chicago battled with their condo association on whether the rules allowed the pig to live in the building. This battle led to many condo associations updating or changing their rules to specifically list the kind of animals that would be allowed as pets in the building.

Around the same time, many buildings also instituted rules relating to service animals. In some instances, these rules also referred to emotional support animals. From the association’s point of view, if they allow pets in the building, the issue of service and emotional support animals doesn’t matter.

However, in buildings that don’t allow pets, or restrict the type of pets allowed, the issue can be problematic. With service animals, those owners have the backing of the ADA. We believe that most condo buildings have allowed service animals.

Service animals are trained to work or perform certain tasks to specifically assist a person with a disability. The training of true service animals is extensive and often takes years.

Your state laws, along with local ordinances, may provide some guidance on this issue. If not, know that a condo association can restrict which pets, if any, are allowed to reside in their building.

Has your daughter reached out to her doctor to see if she can get a note? Perhaps, with this information, the building she wants to move into may reconsider.

You can check online to see if the town or city she is moving to has an ordinance that covers emotional support animals. If it does, she can see if the building would reconsider their no-pet policy to allow her and her emotional support animal to move in.

Ilyce Glink is the CEO of Best Money Moves and Samuel J. Tamkin is a real estate attorney. Contact them through the website ThinkGlink.com.