When you purchase a rental property you want to make sure you find reliable tenants. But what can landlords do to make sure their tenants meet their criteria?
How to Find Reliable Tenants
When buying a rental property you may inherit tenants who have been living in the unit prior to the sale or you may have to find new tenants to move in.
If you have purchased a property, and the property needs to be vacated, you’ll have to go through legal processes in order to legally vacate the property.
This will include giving the current tenants notice and strictly following legal procedures. But if you bought a rental property that’s empty you have a different problem, which is finding new tenants. And the search can be a little bit intimidating.
Someone else is going to be occupying a property that you own. Making sure that they will be respectful of you and the property, and their neighbours for that matter is very important. Nobody wants to have to go through an eviction process, so it’s best to start things off immediately on the right foot. To protect your own interests and those of your tenants you should keep these tips in mind.
Confirm their employment and more. You need to know that they are employed and that they can pay the rent. But they need to be able to pay off their utilities, and other debts. You will want to confirm how much they earn a month and what debts they have to pay off on a monthly basis.
Will need to know how long any potential tenant has been working at their place of employment. If they’ve just begun a new job, ask why they left their last position and how long they worked there.
Be sensitive to personal situations. Everyone was thrown a curveball with the COVID-19 situation. Just do your best to differentiate between legitimate reasons and legitimate concerns.
2. Check Their Credit
Next you should also have a credit check performed on them. If this seems too intense for you, ask them to go through a free service like Borrowell, which can provide a credit score report that doesn’t actually affect the credit score of your potential tenant.
3. Follow up with References
Also make sure to check the contact info of previous landlords. Some tenants may give false contact info and get a friend that pretends to be a past landlord in order to give them a glowing testimonial. Do a little googling or Facebook searching to see if they look legitimate.
4. Listen to Your Intuition
And finally, this isn’t meant to be offensive but you do need to have your BS detectors on. Sometimes, things people say, or explanations they give just don’t add up.
But through conversation, you’ll get a good idea of how they’ll be as your tenant. So it’s critical to ask intelligent questions, ask them to respond to hypothetical situations, and get a feel for them as individuals.
You need to have a real conversation with your potential client tenants. Ask lots of questions, and don’t be afraid to be a little skeptical if something seems off.
If you’re looking for a rental property, The Blue Coast Team is here to help you find your first, second or 10th rental property and help it go as smoothly as it possibly can. Going through an experienced Realtor means letting someone else do this work for you, as Realtors are often approached by renters looking for quality properties to rent.
