One of the keys to successfully renting out a property is finding and qualifying a great tenant. If you have a good tenant, you’ll have a great experience as a landlord. But, if you have a bad tenant, you could have a truly awful experience. It’s important to do your due diligence at the beginning of the tenancy, and qualify tenants to create a better long term relationship.
Today, we’re going to share some of the things to think about with your tenant screening process, and then tell you what we do at Keyrenter Premier Property Management.
Cast a Wide Net into the Rental Pool
First, don’t have a specific type of person in mind when you go to market. Owners come to us and say they want a single older woman or a couple that likes to entertain. This limits your market and limits the way you think about your potential applicants. It can extend out your process for finding high quality tenants if you pass up potential applicants who don’t meet your specific criteria.
Avoid Desperation While Screening
Don’t be desperate and accept the first applicant who comes in the door just because you need the rental income. If you’re not doing your due diligence at the onset of this process, it will cost you in the long run. Take your time. Make sure you’re comfortable with your applicants before you turn them into tenants.
Understand the Fair Housing Laws
Brush up on fair housing laws, rules, and regulations. You don’t want to get into trouble because you denied an applicant based on a criteria that covers a protected class. Go online and read up on fair housing rules so you don’t come into conflict with the law.
Keyrenter Premier’s 14-Point Tenant Screening Process
At Keyrenter, we do a thorough 14-point check to ensure our owners have a good landlord experience. We start with a credit check, but you can only learn so much, so we dig deeper. We also do a criminal background check, a sex offender check, an eviction search, and then a debt to income ratio. We also do a rent to income ratio to make sure the tenants have the necessary cash to afford the rental property.
The most important thing we do is to verify all the information we receive. We do a rental background check and call past landlords to ask a series of questions. We want to make sure the applicants didn’t damage the property or leave owing rent. We ask if the landlord would rent to those tenants again. We also call the employer to make sure the information on the application is accurate and the income meets our standards.
Everything we do goes back to the point of whether these are the people we want to trust with our owners’ rental properties.
Make sure you have the necessary resources before you begin the screening process. If you have any questions about Phoenix property management or Scottsdale property management, please contact us at Keyrenter Premier Property Management.
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