Fellow Landlord:
_______________________ has applied to rent from us and has identified you as a current or former landlord or rental property manager having first-hand experience with him/her as a tenant.
We are trying to determine what this person was like when living at _________________
_______________________________ as your tenant and would appreciate your answering the following questions about him/her:
How long was this person your tenant?
Less than six months ( ) Six months to a year ( )
One to two years ( ) More than two years ( )
When did this tenant move out?________________
How much was the rent when he/she moved out? $________________
Was the tenantŐs rent subsidized (government, relative, etc) Yes ( ) No ( )
Comment______________________________________________________________
How many other people were living with this tenant?
None ( ) One ( ) Two ( ) Three ( ) Four ( ) Five ( )
Six or more( )
How many times did the tenant fail to pay the rent on time?
Zero ( ) Once ( ) Two times ( ) More than two times ( )
Did you ever have to serve the tenant with a notice to pay rent or quit? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments_______________________________________________________________
Did you ever have to serve the tenant with any other notice?
Yes ( ) No ( ) If so, what kind?__________________________________
Did you have to evict this tenant? Yes ( ) No ( )
Was this tenant reasonably quiet? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments_______________________________________________________________
Did tenant get along with neighbors? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments ______________________________________________________________
Are you aware of any police reports against tenant? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments ______________________________________________________________
How would you describe the tenantŐs housekeeping:
( ) Neat, clean, and well organized
( ) Somewhat clean and organized
( ) Somewhat cluttered and disorganized, lower cleanliness standard
( ) Very cluttered and disorganized, dirty
Comments_______________________________________________________________
Did the tenant give enough notice that he/she was moving? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments ______________________________________________________________
Did the tenant leave the premises clean and undamaged? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments ______________________________________________________________
If you withheld any of the tenantŐs cleaning/security deposit, why did you withhold it?
______________________________________________________________________
Did the tenant leave owing you money? Yes ( ) No ( ) If so, how much? $________
Did the tenant have any pets?
Yes ( ) No ( ) If so, what kind? _______________
On a scale of one to five, with five being the most cooperative and one being the least cooperative, how would you rate this tenant in terms of his/her cooperating with you?
5 4 3 2 1 (circle only one number)
How would you describe the tenant on maintenance issues:
( ) Handyman, fixed everything professionally with little landlord involvement
( ) Handled minor issues themselves with little landlord involvement, notified landlord in a timely fashion of major issues
( ) Notified landlord of all minor and major issues in a timely fashion, took no initiative to handle minor issues themselves
( ) Did not notify landlord of maintenance issues, ignored them or performed unprofessional work in correcting them.
Comments _____________________________________________________________
If you had the opportunity, would you rent to this tenant again? Yes ( ) No ( )
Comments ______________________________________________________________
Are you related to this tenant? Yes ( ) No ( )
Thank you very much for answering these questions.
Sincerely,
The above form was provided by one a contributor to the MrLandlord.com Q&A Forum, Ed(PA). He developed the above form that he faxes or emails to an applicant's current landlord. According to Ed, he has had good success with responsiveness. Landlords don't always answer all questions but they answer enough that he gets a good feel for a tenant. He has had questions with some of the answers given and after filling out the form and they are more than willing to talk to him on the phone about the tenant. For small landlords like himself, he finds it more useful as a guide while talking to them on the phone.
There are many additional rental forms available in the The Landlord's Kit,. For samples of over 150 rental forms for less than twenty bucks, check out the offer for one of the most requested resources, The Landlord's Kit, from our website catalog.