Liza Cristol-Deman is a partner at Brancart & Brancart, a San Francisco Bay Area law firm that represents plaintiffs in housing discrimination cases in federal and state courts throughout the United States. She joined the firm in 1997 after graduating from Stanford Law School. Since then, she has successfully litigated hundreds of fair housing cases involving discrimination based on race, national origin, gender (including sexual harassment), sexual orientation, disability, familial status, and other protected characteristics. Through litigation, advocacy, and training, she has helped strengthen fair housing protections in cases involving a range of important issues, including sexual harassment in housing, housing discrimination against people who are undocumented, neighbor versus neighbor harassment, and racially-biased home appraisals.

In 2014, she was lead trial counsel in a certified class action involving violations of California’s residential security deposit statute. The jury found in favor of the class and awarded over $2.25 million in damages. She has also served as counsel of record in hundreds of significant fair housing settlements and trial victories, and in many published decisions illuminating rights under the fair housing laws.

Liza has been honored by the State of California Department of Fair Employment and Housing with the “Civil Rights Hero Award,” and by local fair housing agencies throughout California. She is a frequent speaker at fair housing conferences, law schools, and state bar trainings, and served as one of the contributing authors of the Rutter Group deskbook entitled California Fair Housing and Public Accommodations (The Rutter Group 2014). She was also a co-author of the fair housing chapter of the recently published Nevada Real Property Practice and Procedure Manual (Nevada Bar 2021).