The trouble in this recesssion is that even people with good credit are having a hard time paying their bills.   A credit report is only as good as the moment it was taken.  Insisting on proof of employment is a valuable way to make sure you tenant can at least pay next months rent.  But what about four months from now? after your tenant has moved in.  Are you noticing signs of problems?  Have the checks been arriving later and later in the month?  Are you charging late fees?  Is your tenant dating their checks for later in the month?  Are you feeling squeezed?  It’s difficult to know the right thing to do.  Always adhere to the local, state, and nationals laws about housing.  It is worth maintaining a line of communication with your tenant.  Maintain accurate and current contact information for your tenant.  Should they decide to skip town without paying rent, contact information will assist with locating and collecting any judgments you obtain.

Landlords need to realize they will save money in the long run by investing in tenant background checks.   A properly screened tenant is about as good a testament of future behavior is you can get.  You can’t always predict if someone is going to lose your job and get divorced and lose their source of income, but at least you will know that up to that point their credit has not been affected.  At least with a tenant like that, they will work with you to pay a rent.   You can avoid the repeat offenders with a simple credit report.

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Eviction Records
We would also add that checking for Eviction Records is an important aspect of tenant screening.  While anyone could be struck with hard luck during this economic crisis, be aware that a previous pattern of evictions shows how much respect your prospective tenant has for the contract you are about to sign.

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for more information, contact Tenantchecker.com

In addition to discussing low interest loans for property repair, using the Internet to link potential tenants and landlords, they also discussed the important of Tenant Screening.  Large multi-occupancy housing complexes are their own communities and landlords are advised to effectively screen all tenants to protect their communities and their local housing reputation.  All it takes is one bad seed to destroy a neighborhood. Landlords can avoid most negligence lawsuits by conducting a tenant screening program that including credit history report, eviction records, criminal records search, as well as employment verification. 

Predicting future tenant behavior

While you cannot foretell the future, awareness of previous eviction records and horrible credit history are a red flag and shows you how your prospective tenant dealt with financial responsibility in the past.   Unless they have newly discovered financial responsibility and are seeking to turn their lives around, what evidence do you have that they will pay rent ever month and not damage the apartment?

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35,000 housing units are currently in default within the city of Los Angeles, and are at risk of being lost by their owners. A large percentage of those homes are occupied by renters who face eviction as their residences are sold.

California state law requires a 60 day eviction notice for tenant who has paid on time and is in a month to month lease situation.  Some renters are getting evictions notices telling them they need to get out in less than that time.  Some renter are claiming that they have been asked to leave in 3 days.  If you are in this situation, call your local authorities and report the eviction.  Usually you will receive a revised eviction notice given you 60 days.   Then the real problems begin.   As more people are looking for replacment housing, the available rental market is feeling a spike in demand; rents are certainly to rise.

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Saving time and money with Tenant Screening
With a fast tenant screening program, you can run an instant credit report and a nationwide criminal database search and have the results returned instantly.  Further criminal research can require a county researcher, but the instant report is pretty effective in many states.

Keep them renting or abandon the building
This bill addresses a larger strategic issue for urban planners, whether to keep foreclosed buildings with renters inside to maintain the value of the property, or evict them and have an abandoned building on the block, open to vandalism and abuse.

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For example, participants learned one irresponsible or disruptive resident can easily distress an entire building, causing good renters not to renew their leases.

New screening methods, including criminal background and history checks for possible tenants, is something Larry Martz, owner of Heritage Hills mobile home park, says is one of the things he will be using.

Read the full article here:

Kudos for Ludington for promoting a responsible and safe environment for apartment dwellers to live.  It appears that more landlords are becoming aware of the need for tenant background checks, especially criminal records searches.  

 
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Channel 34 news

It was feces all over the place. There was literally millions, not thousand, but millions of roaches. Where I had totally barfed because there’s so much stuff that was going on. Three days ago this sidewalk, from that pole to that tree, was lined with garbage – furniture saturated with urine and infested with roaches, and garbage as high as I am tall.” 

 The final price tag for the clean up was $10,000.  Apparently the tenant paid their rent on time and never called about any problems.  Maybe they should have.

Would a background check help? 
It’s worth wondering whether a tenant background check would have alerted the landlord to the potential problem with this tenant.  As stated in the article, the tenant paid their rent on time and didn’t cause a problem.  It’s possible this tenant would have decent credit and no criminal record.  This is why it’s worth it to check for possible previous evictions.  Evictions occur according to the local, state and federal laws applicable in the area, adn are usually along financial lines, but sometimes the tenant can be evicted for other reasons, such as trashing the apartment.  If this happened before, it good to check again. 

Another thing to consider is make sure someone is doing walkthrough on your building.  If you don’t have a full time maintenance personnel, make sure someone is aware of the problems in the building and communicate with your tenants from time to time to be aware of any problems.  The complaints about the smells would have been a first warning. 

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Under the program, police would provide background checks and recommendations on prospective tenants.

Hopefully this program will work to the benefit of the community. We are a little skeptical about the efficacy of the police running background checks giving recommendations on prospective tenants, not because they aren’t informed or effective, only that this is exactly the sort of labor intensive work that boggs down police departments and creates a huge backlog of background research for police officers and non-sworns to do.

To speed up your screening, we recommend you run county criminal records searches in all counties where your prospective tenant has resided. The searches take approximately 1 to 3 business days, depending on your area, and will provide you with a powerful history of your tenants criminal past.

Landlords who attended the meeting in Millsboro shared horror stories:

Ted LaMantia said he has multiple clients that owe him thousands of dollars, including one tenant who declared bankruptcy twice to avoid paying him $6,000 she owed.

Tenant Financial Responsibility
So your prospective tenant does not have a criminal history. Now what? Make sure they can pay you. Also run your tenant credit history and also check for previous evictions, and bankruptcies, liens and judgments. You should also verify their current ability to pay for verifying their employment, either through a pay stub or employment verification search.

Read the entire article here:

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