Guidelines For Tenant Verification

Tenant verification ensures a landlord that his tenants are capable of paying rent on time and  are not troublesome or having any criminal background. Tenant Verification plays an important and vital role in finding the best tenants for your rental property. Successful landlords know that tenant verification is the most important task when letting property. Tenant Verification can be either done by the landlord himself or by a hired professional service provider. Today, renting a property is one of the important sources of income for landlords, and tenant verification ensures that tenants are of a good background .

Tips for Tenant Verification

Tenant verification plays a vital role in finding the best tenants for your rental property. You can eliminate about 90 per cent of your tenant problems by Tenant Verification. The following tips help you to know important things you need to consider in  the tenant verification process.

• Background check: Background check is the first and most important step in tenant verification. If your potential tenant has a history of skipping rent or destroying property, you may be able to find this out through a background check.

• Credit check: Check credit references to determine each applicant’s credit history. If you do not have anybody to conduct credit screening for your tenant, or for some reasons it is impossible to do it yourself, you can opt for a private agency to do it for you.

• Police verification: Nowadays it is mandatory for landlords to get police verification while accommodating a tenant. You need to duly fill the police verification form with particulars of the tenant whom you intend to let out your premises. Police uses information provided by you to verify  the background of your tenant. This helps you to ensure that the  prospective tenants are not criminals or of troublesome nature. You can collect Police verification form manually from the nearest police station or download it from the website.

• Previous landlord: You can ask for character references or contact details of the previous landlord to know more about your prospective tenants. This helps you to ensure that your prospective tenants will keep your premises and property clean. It will also ensure that they don’t undertake any destructive actions in your property which may end up damaging your property.

• Agents:In case you are not able to find a prospective tenant, appoint a real estate agent or service provider to find a good tenant for your property. The real estate agent will assess your property and set a rental price based on its size, location and quality. Talk to two or three agents and compare their level of service and fees before appointing them. You must also inform your building’s insurance provider that the property is let out and update the contents of your insurance policy accordingly.

Tenant Verification Service

In case you cannot undertake tenant verification process your own, there are many different agencies or service providers that provide credit checks for landlords. They also offer background and criminal history reports. If you have a large rental complex or a large number of applicants, you may be able to save money by selecting a membership service that offers bulk discounts. Fees or service charges vary as some require only a membership fee, while others charge per report. Tenant verification companies collect pertinent information from credit reports, court records of evictions, bad check reports, state courts, utility companies etc for information about potential tenants.

Tenant Verification is not a difficult task but you need to check references, reason for moving and background before renting out your property. If you’re a new landlord and are unsure of how to verify potential tenants, there are a few guidelines. Always ask for references, especially from the last place the person lived. Ensure that the aspiring tenants are not criminals or troublesome. It’s also a good idea to know in advance how the tenant will be paying the rent. If the potential tenant has poor credit or is not making enough to afford rent comfortably, you should consider finding a different tenant.

Disclaimer: The article  contains data collected from various sources and the use of same is at readers discretion.