My question is for anyone who rents in blue collar neighborhoods.

Not bad neighborhoods, just low income.

Here's my predicament. I need a vacant apartment rented yesterday.

I've got an older couple willing to do it, who are super nice. The woman is on disability (she was in a car accident and has a bad arm). The husband is a work-from-home handyman. He worked 10 years in Alaska in a fishery, she had a house in North Carolina, history history. Now they're together living in this state with family, and want an apartment.

I'm usually skeptical about self employed people, but this guy was an exception. He keeps reciepts from all his customers, and gave me a list of his clients to call. All of them gave glowing reviews, I mean spectacular.

They LOVE his work. So, dual income right?

Now this is the problem.

Both of them have no rental history from a landlord/business. She's rented houses from her mom, and currently they're living in a house with his mother.

So they would be essentially first time renters.

Well, everybody deserves a chance and has to start somewhere right.

They came and put down the Security deposit on the apartment to hold it. But also said they won't have first month's rent until October 3rd, when she gets her disability check. Fair enough, that's their move-in date.

Is that normal, or a red flag?

Her monthly disability check is $1300/mo. He is self employed, so must be making money off that.

They say they're renting from "mom" for $400/mo where they're at now.

They had $695 in cash to put down on the spot to hold the apartment. But need to wait till the next disability check for the rent.

Now, the apartment will run an average of $900/mo with utilities. So her disability alone would cover that, with some left over but not much.

He has a LINK card, and all the income from whatever handyman work he does.

They pretty much say, yes, her disability will cover the bills and they'll use his income for fun, etc. They say they can do it.

Is it realistic, that with the $1300/mo disablity and his income, that they would only have the $695 to put down now living with mom, and still have to wait till the 3rd to get 1st month's rent? Or does that point to some kind of problem with money.

Is it realistic to give these people a chance, or am I hanging myself out to dry?

Honestly its not a matter of picking what you want, its a matter of settling for the least amount of red flags. And I've already been at this two weeks.

They want a decision or they're taking back their Security deposit tomorrow, and I don't blame them. They don't really know me and I'm holding $695 of theirs in cash.

They seem like good people, but the math has me a bit spooked.

Thoughts????

Run a complete background check, credit (at least two agencies), eviction, criminal background, tele check, social security, etc. Get several months bank statements. On the credit reports you will see if they are deep in debt and their minimum money they need to cover their debt.

"I need a vacant apartment rented yesterday"

Duplexer, don't do this to yourself!

Many here, Ken(NY) included have given you great advice though multiple posts, but you aren't listening. Pretty soon, people will stop responding to your posts.

We want you to succeed! We want you to have a successful business without crazy people texts coming at you all hours of the day and night ruining your peace of mind and your health to boot.

If we can be successful in real estate so can you, but you are going to have to realize that what you are continuing to do simply has not worked in the past and will not work in the present nor in the future.

You are making a poor decision based on being desperate.

If you don't have funds to cover expenses while this unit is empty, imagine trying to cover the cost of an eviction while they are using your utilities and then having to clean up after them.

"They pretty much say, yes, her disability will cover the bills and they'll use his income for fun, etc. They say they can do it."

Of course they say they can do it! You don't let the prospect tell you they can afford it- you are setting them up for failure.

Do they make 3 x the rent in verifiable income? (or whatever your written screening criteria says?) If no, then that is the end of the screening.

People who are desperate will tell you all kinds of things just to get into your place. We will pay 1/2 now and 1/2 later, we are planning of giving away our 2 pit bulls so they won't be coming with us, we will get part time jobs to make up the difference, when my income tax refund comes in I'll get caught up, etc...

One of our jobs is to be a bouncer and ensure problems don't end up in our places. We go through at least 100 e-mails and our documented, written screening criteria before finding a suitable applicant.

"and still have to wait till the 3rd to get 1st month's rent? Or does that point to some kind of problem with money." Yes, this is a problem- they have zero dollars to spare when a tire needs to be replaced, or he falls at work and has a hospital bill.

"I've already been at this two weeks" Much wiser posters than I have said it is better to have an empty unit rather than a poorly chosen tenant.

Take it off the market a bit, take new pictures, freshen it up, then re-list and market again.

There is no shame in needing help. You have received much excellent advice in your previous posts.

I wish you much success in your future.

If your rent is 900 I am looking for 2700 in NET income. This is a rule you should not violate.

You mention her check but do not mention his income. I base the above rule on the family income.

If he makes 1400 a month NET in his business then I'd rent to them. (assuming all the other criteria is met) Otherwise a polite decline about not meeting our minimum standards and move on to the next candidate.

I used to agonize over evaluating a tenant. I still do but not as much because i use a system to give me an answer. You need a system where if they meet your requirements they are given an opportunity to prove your standards work.

If they do not work out, you need to modify your standards until most of your choices work out.

In most of the country there is a housing shortage. You shouldn't be having a problem finding someone who qualifies. Yes you will have lots of marginal inquiries but you should be able to quickly discard those by your list of standards.

Do you have a written policy? Some kind of score card to judge the applicant? This isn't the time to guess and wing it.

I have a duplex opening up on the 1st. I advertised early (trying to be like WMH - LOL) saying we are accepting applications. The rent is $750. Almost 200 inquiries in 9 days just from Zillow.

I actually received 4 applications. 1 qualified, 1 had a bad LL reference, 1 had too many family members, and 1 withdrew because I had approved the first one and she wasn't willing to be in a "backup" position.

You only need 1 good application. It will take more work to find qualified people with a cheaper rent price.

Either raise the rent price to weed out more people.

Or accept that you will have to work harder on lower rent properties.

Every application has deficiencies. I have yet to see a perfect application. Pick the one that fits your criteria best.

No, don't rent to them. They don't have the funds. They don't have the funds because they don't have enough income. The fact that they couldn't put aside first, last and security is a no for me. Even if you don't collect F/L/S, how are they going to hook up utilities without deposit money? Too much risk here.

If you do rent to them, you will always be chasing after the rent - or have to evict them. I'm not actually opposed to self-employed tenants like many of the posters here, but they need to be able to prove their income through bank statements and 1099's. I don't rent to anyone without a bank account anyway. So if they say they pay everything in cash, that's an automatic decline. Also the 3x's rent for minimum income is required - they are nowhere near that.

PS: He should be overflowing with work if he is such a good handyman. There is something truly off with the glowing reviews and no money to show for it.

I used to listen to what people like this said to me.

I used to take them at their word, without a lot of supporting evidence.

I used to believe that all they needed was a chance to prove themselves.

You own more than one unit, don't you? Sell everything and 1031 into a nicer part of town.

You can take the money from three units and put it all into one unit and still qualify as a 1031.

For the nicer rentals in a better area, you still get all the losers apply. They don't care how much the rent is if they have no intention of paying the rent. However, once you get out of the cheap housing areas, you will start to get middle class tenants with real jobs and a real paycheck.

I agree with others, too many red flags.

One tip...re: them paying the mom $400. In this case I would not bother, but here's what I've done in the past. Call the mom, and say "I just need to verify some information. They say they've been renting from you for 9 months at $475/mo, is that right?"

If they say "Yes, that's right", it's a red flag that they're lying. If the "mom" corrects you and says "Oh no, they only pay $400"...then either they are REALLY GOOD at making a false contact or they were telling the truth.

Save yourself an eviction and a future head ach, return the

$695 with a signed receipt, showing refund for your documentation, at least this is what I would do.

These folks are looking for someone to pray on and don't let it be you.

Similar low income what was once bedroom community for long fled manufacturing in a BLUE state, Again no. You will end up much more desperate if you rent to them than you think you are now!

These tenants are living in FANTASY land and are hoping to convince YOU to live in that same FANTASY world.

Ex: Ms. Cosplay earns $500 A MONTH costuming at several couple month long theatre stints. Her "roommate" also works in theatre making just over $2K a month. With $27K in STUDENT LOANS (notwithstanding Joe's "forgiveness") They're probably on food stamps/EBT etc but I'm not going to take the time to figure THAT one out.

Umm can't wrap my head around people taking out loans for basically useless degrees! Get into STEM for pete's sake!

But I digress.

Yeah, NO! Rent is $1K a month plus utilities. No way do they qualify income wise and when the depression hits, there will be no theatre jobs because no one will have the budget for theatre (except for the elites).

These two sound like Senior Grifters and the references they have, how do you not know they were all staged? I had my first "staged" reference a couple of years ago when I found out who their REAL LL was and he gave said applicant a terrible review.

>Many here, Ken(NY) included have given you great advice though multiple posts, but you aren't listening.>

Believe me after doing this for six years I am well aware that every applicant that wants an apartment is an unacceptable risk.

If they weren't the banks would have approved them for a house loan.

Its not a matter of 'are there any red flags?'

If you want to survive in this business, and by god I've survived 6 years.....its a matter of how many red flags can you endure. Otherwise you're going to be sitting the entire year 8 hours a day backchecking applicants.

By the time you compile all the lost rent of the vacancy, you may as well have just picked someone, collected SOME rent and endured an eviction you would have come out ahead lol

Welcome Renne. You don't need to lecture duplexer and threaten him with being "canceled". He's been here a long time and generally is the giver of advice. Sometimes we get a little overloaded.

The problem I see, duplexer, is that he really doesn't have a steady income and winter is coming for those who work outdoors. Not sure why they are moving out on mom. That's where they belong. They are older, she is older. They need each other and don't need to be paying for an apartment for some dumb reason.

>>> If your rent is 900 I am looking for 2700 in NET income. >>>

I have only had one person fill out an application this year who made $2700/mo or more.

And they got paid in cash, and had absolutely no verifiable income lol.

Duplexer, but what has CHANGED in those 6 yrs? More gov't intervention, telling LLs they must not evict for non payment of rent, good cause eviction, more crackdowns on LLs, eroding property rights. You HAVE to up your game, not just do the same thing that has worked for the past 6 years.

"By the time you compile all the lost rent of the vacancy, you may as well have just picked someone, collected SOME rent and endured an eviction you would have come out ahead lol"

That thinking is OLD SCHOOL now. And it's because of the gov't especially in BLUE states such as IL, NY, MA, CA, RI.

You have to get your screening/application process AUTOMATED so you don't spend more time than necessary DQing people. And you'll need to realize that maybe 14% if that of the applicants are actually eligible.

Let's just cut to the chase for my next 20 posts.

"Should I rent to this person?"

(everyone in unison) "Hell no! PASS."

My next 20 inquiries to family members:

"Should I rent to this person?"

(all of them in unison) "Just give them a chance. You've got to pick somebody at some point. Don't be so hard on them!

Sure! Fine! Give it a go.

There's only so much background checking you can do.

At some point these people are going to be like wt"

>>> You own more than one unit, don't you? Sell everything and 1031 into a nicer part of town.

You can take the money from three units and put it all into one unit and still qualify as a 1031.>>

What do you mean by '1031 into a nicer part of town'?

Anyway that nicer part of town may have 3x the annual property tax bills. Thats a lot more money to come up with every year just to throw to the IRS!

All of us in unison:

"You'll be sooooooooooorrrrrryyyyyyyyyyyyy!"

Those glowing "references" sound suspicious to me.

Hopefully you won't be back on here Tuesday, November 15th with another thread "So the nice seniors haven't paid a cent of rent yet and Gov Prick-ster has issued yet another six month-1 yr eviction moratorium. Help!"

@mapleleaf18 hahhaha.

God help us if Prikster issues another Moratorium. I think nobody will be left in the state (as there will be no more rentals either).

An update on this one.

I called the wife's mother whose house they lived at in Alaska for 8 years, and they allegedly paid $500/mo rent to.

Per a cue from this forum, I asked her, "And they pay you $600/mo rent?"

She answered, "Well yes around $500 but it was likely raised at the end."

Okay that wasn't so good, but maybe passable.

She said yes they paid their rent.

So then I sprung on her: "I did want to ask. Would you be then willing to Cosign on their lease if we offer them one, since they have no rental history other than family? Even though they are in their 50s, the lack of history basically makes them a first time renter and this is our policy."

Basically the answer was "Hell No".

"What?? COSIGN? I've never heard of any rental place requiring that. I have a fixed income and things happen, I never would have expected the things that happened with them" and on and on.

Geez lady, your daughter gets a guaranteed $1300/mo disability check. And you won't cosign for an apartment for $695/mo, because you don't trust her to pay her rent?

Nobody knows you like mom.

So its tighten the belt, give them their deposit back and trudge on, back to the stack.

I'm sure I've turned down several good renters who thought I was excessive in vetting and the mortgage clock is ticking. Not to mention this is taking all my time day after day. But as we say, better to have an empty apartment than a squatter. And certainly will feel it.

UGH.

"Choose or Perish!"

Today for Duplexer: Perish lol

She turned out to be right in the middle of an eviction. I found her real landlord on the Property Tax Search website, she apparently had been trying to boot her for a long time. She said, "Good Luck."

I think she thought I had already signed a lease with her.

Anyway this couple..... I just met the guy and gave him his deposit back. I said "you guys were close if only you could get a cosign, you'll probably get the next place."

He got all irate and says, "WE DONT NEED A CO-SIGN, WE PAY OUR BILLS!" and drove off in a huff.

Well if you pay your bills, the why won't your mother where you're living cosign? Then she has nothing to worry about!

Good lord....

OMG I spend so much time on my apartments already. I spent two weeks renovating and sprucing up this one and it was hardly damaged.

Anyway tons of inquiries keep rolling in daily, they just all suck lol. Trudge on!

I am really hurting because I won't take dogs. Everyone and their dog has an ESA dog these days.

This unit can't do dogs, due to the yard setup unfortunately.

Cats, maybe.

I need to get one of those concrete lined hose-down apartments and just go full Barn. The public just wants to house hordes of dogs cats babies and smokes........thats all they have. Everybody is loaded down with them!

2700 a month is just about a minimum wage job. Surely you can find someone in IL with a minimum wage job.

$15 x 40 x 52 = $31,200 divided by 12 is $2600 a month (true it's gross but still, the bar is really low).

Is the rental in a slum?

Nope, its by a pretty nice golf course actually. "Blue Collar", if I've said enough. Nice neat lawns, small houses. Its not the Gold Coast but its not the projects either.

Nobody has money anymore in America, apparently.

People have the money they are just not spending it on what you want them to spend it on.

does the unit show well? Do you have nice bright white photos? Is it dated looking? a couple of new high lumen light fixtures and some light grey paint make the place look brand new. Cheap upgrades.

I realize real estate is all local but even in my small town a little 2/1 duplex that used to rent for $550 has gone up to $750 and I am seeing ads for 800-900. the housing crisis is a serious problem and it is not going to get better. LL are going to have increasing rents for the near future. Unless you live in CA (sorry west coasters)

You need to figure out how to attract compliant people with the money to pay their rent.

I find that asking more for the unit weeds out marginal people. A lot less unqualified people apply when you ask $1000 versus $650.

Take it off the market. Take some great pictures or pay to have them done. Raise the rent. Relist on Zillow. Do NOT list on craigs list or facebook. All you get is the desperate dregs of the barrel on those sites who will waste your time.

You dodge a bullet. A lot easier now than later.

Here’s your sign. WE DONT NEED A CO-SIGN, WE PAY OUR BILLS!"

Yep dodged a missle. In this case raise the rent and accept pets with a proper animal policy. Do your due diligence as you have now. Automate, then ghost, PRN.

I code my phone with the DQs so I know not to send them another prequal..Sometimes they get another number and they slide by (possible burner phone). My database of DQs comes in handy.

They usually crap out when they ghost my application or balk at submitting documents. Too bad. We put a LOT of money, sweat and time into making these units brand new yet utilitarian. No way will we settle for the entitled indigent class.

I guess there's something to be said about, "If you have to ask... then don't rent to them."

Still I've never seen a thumbs up from the crowd yet for anybody I've put forward. Unless I mentioned their race, and it was non-white. Then everyone would tell me I better rent to them, they deserve it.

I've been in this long enough to know the drill lol.

Late to the party, non garnishable funds is first area of trouble - add to that unsteady answer from relative who won't co-sign. Next is glowing responses but nobody there can help them find a place - how is that?

Duplexer, I have really nice houses and I get excellent tenants who have credit scores in the 800 range. When I have a vacancy, I will get about 150 inquiries from people that no one would rent to. They are awful applicants.

I just keep going and sort through them until I find the one I want.

We all get the cheats, liars, and deadbeats applying. You are not in some special landlord hell that is only affecting you. We all suffer through it, we all get the bad applicants that have to be rejected.

The rest of us have learned to not believe what any applicant says. We double check on every thing they say. You come in here and say that you think you have found a tenant because the applicant has said this or claimed that. No. You have no information about the tenant until you check it for yourself. if you want to survive, you have to assume that everything an applicant says is a lie until you have proven that it is the truth.

I don't knwo how to help you. it's liek you have some sort of blockage i your ears so that you can not hear what the landlords here are saying to you.

What is the best employer in this area and reach out to these folks for help.

It absolutely sounds like you trying to shot gun the widest spray of bullets in hopes of hitting something and then are not happy with the results of the wide spreading of marketing bullets.