Want to Know the Secret Behind Stress-Free Tenant Screening?

Being a landlord is a great way to earn a living, or even some extra side cash, but it definitely comes with its challenges — one of the biggest being bad clients. It can be tricky to find individuals, couples, friend groups, or families who will pay you on time and treat your home well. Thankfully, the following tips can make a huge difference.

Keep Tenant Screening a Top Priority

You can’t judge a book by its cover, and you can’t judge a person’s ability or willingness to pay their rent by their outer appearance, either. But of course, you need to know who’s living in your home and what their past finances look like to ensure you’ll keep receiving their monthly dues.

There’s a good chance you already search for these answers by:

Requesting pay stubs
Running background reports
Checking tenant references
A history of financial stability

Spot Undesirable Tenants

The tenants that don’t pay are often the ones that don’t pass the requirements listed above — but you let them in anyway. They may call you after submitting their application and appeal to your sympathies – which many times can be true circumstances, but there’s always a chance that they’re not.

Some additional steps to protect yourself from these types of tenants can include:

Checking employment history and personally speaking to employers to get a feel for who the applicant is as a person.
Taking the time to verify and chat with the landlords they list on their rental application.
Schedule an in-person meeting or Zoom call to actually meet the person. If there’s a chance they are being untruthful, it’ll be much more difficult to act that way “in-person.” Plus, you can make an educated decision on whether you think you’ll have a positive landlord-tenant relationship.

These steps will take your efforts beyond what you can ask for on paper, showing you who the potential tenant truly is and how they’ll likely treat you and your home.

Avoid the Stress Altogether with a Broker

Unfortunately, as much as the tips above can help in your search for the perfect tenant(s), the process is still going to take a lot of time and effort. By bringing a broker into the picture, you can do away with the difficult steps and enjoy having high-quality, consistently paying renters come right to you.

At the end of the day, having a renter who pays on time is paramount. However, you are also introducing a new relationship into your life and it’s important that this is done with care. Do they have similar values as you in respect to the apartment? Do they have the same expectations as you in terms of a landlord-tenant relationship?

These are all questions that have to be answered as best as possible before a lease is signed. And a broker can communicate your expectations – more directly than you might be willing to – in order to ensure the best match possible.

A good broker will make sure to screen tenants who will pay rent on time. A great broker will give you tenants that you’ll have a long-term, beneficial relationship with.

If you’re ready to get yourself tenants who check all your boxes, get in touch. We’ll happily take this task off your plate – and leave you with some of the best renters Brooklyn has to offer.