Up to bat: Divorced dad with custody of his 17 yr old. He is waiting until his son finishes his school year in his district before moving (wants to move 3rd week in July--yes there will be a holding deposit if accepted). Has been cooperative and seemingly open about any issues.

He is rebuilding his credit after the divorce. He has another younger child (13 yr old) out of state living with his ex. He has not yet informed his current apartment complex that he wants to move--he would cut his commute in half if he moved into my unit. His son is thinking of joining the military after school.

He has quite a high end job/education so has lived in many states and has at times worked remotely. He drives a 15 yr old Kia. Has two italian greyhound dogs (non ESA).

Thoughts?

He didn't include his, what I can only infer, "interim" address on his application (housing between his house he sold in the divorce and current apartment complex) which shows on his drivers license.

In other words, very little rental history on application although he is getting into his late forties. I will be checking out the address on his drivers license. Already know who owns that property from the web.

Viewing this from the applicants perspective, Not to many folks are happy or proud about being homeless. Most of America doesn't know how close they are to being homeless.

Instead we can make it sound fashionable and call it couch surfing or being in between homes. Other times, the Hotel Honda doesn't have an address.

It seems like you have a constant stream of these folks wanting your house. I am sorry that you wasting so much time in getting a place filled. I commend you for having such a great screening program. My question is what about the marketing systems that are feeding your application funnel? You have said your rental pool in the area that you have selected to invest in isn't that deep. I say change your bait. I am sure though, people responding to your marketing will get blamed.

His credit is so so but actually not that bad for someone who is recovering as a male from divorce. My husband had to file bankruptcy and was left penniless, then impoverished for the next almost 21 years (child support goes to 21 in NY but they can vote at age 18-go figure).

Plenty,

1. He hinted that if I send over a current LL reference form that will let the cat out of the bag.

2. I see that his rent is paid in portions over the month. Not sure if it's a weekly pay scheme or what

3. Not a prize--he reminds me of my first ex to tell you the truth. Extremely intelligent with very few people skills

4. They are italian greyhounds which top out at about 20 lbs so two small dogs.

5. Will definitely be doing an in home visit (for the dogs--wink)

Never use the word deposit where the word fee would be more effective, deposits are charged for car batteries, you take the old one to the store for a deposit refund. When you buy a care tire you are charged a disposal fee on the old one.

I Learned this from my friend Sid --> Sid-MO – To hold a place, I require a non-refundable Holding Fee usually equal to $400. Once the fee is received, they have 24 hours to move in at no cost. If that expires, I deduct one day's prorated rent from the holding fee and give them another 24 hours. I will do this for up to a maximum of 7 days. After that, the balance of the Holding Fee is forfeit to me and I move on to the next approved application.

"Hold it for me" is fine if they're willing to pay me to do so.

"Let me piddle around doing stuff while you get no rent" is not fine. I have others who are ready and able to sign a lease and pay NOW. There is no reason for me to wait.

I do ask on my application "Are you able and willing to pay the first rent payment and full deposit immediately if your application is approved?" If they do not answer 'Yes', that app goes to the bottom of the pile where I might reach out later if I'm not getting much activity to see if it has been changed.

Vee... yep, thanks for reposting my standard response.

There's no reason to agree to hold a place vacant when there are qualified tenants ABLE and WILLING to pay TODAY. I commend people for planning ahead, but I also have a business to run. Taxes, insurance, mowing, and other basic upkeep tasks cost money, and when I'm holding vacant I'm eating those COSTS in addition to having no income.

One last nitpick, if you take money to hold the unit, do NOT call it a deposit. Deposits are refundable, by definition, unless you can PROVE you had a loss. What that means is you have to demonstrate that you had a backup willing and able tenant ready to pay and move in during that same time period and you LOST that income while waiting around for this person. How would you prove that such a person existed and would have actually paid you if they don't pay you?

Call the money what it is: a Holding FEE. Fees are not refundable, by definition. The tenant is paying the FEE in exchange for TIME reserving the place. Value is exchanged, so there is no refund due. You can credit some or all of it toward the move-in costs if you wish, but I've not had anyone refuse my general practice of deducting prorated daily rent from it and applying the balance remaining to their move-in costs.

Regarding lawn grass, I had an interesting 'experiment'. Lawn had been weedy and pale, pale green before tenant moved in. The first year, bare patches appeared in doggo's favorite pee spots. Tenant was very worried about how it looked, but I said I wasn't; grass seed is cheap and when the dog is gone a ten dollar bag of seed from the security deposit was all I'd need. Well, two years later, apparently the grass adapted to the higher nitrogen. Area is now very lush and dark green. Thickest, greenest area of the yard.

Does he meet your criteria? Yes/No

That will give you your answer.

Why mid to late July? Why not the 1st? It's May... so if he gives notice "in May" he can get out June 30.

Does he give you a reason for not the 1st of July? Also... when is he planning on giving them the notice? If he hasn't now... think about the fact that he is one that will do the same to you when he wants to move again.... notice at the very last opportunity (if that).

Please don't take this as a personal criticism, but after hearing that you invest in an area where there are few qualified, good tenants, I have to ask: did you invest in there on purpose or by default?

In other words, let's not think about real estate for a minute... let's pick on the stock market. If you had two choices: Stock A and Stock B, and Stock A returned 10%-12% reliably year over year and Stock B returned 3% one year, -5% the next year, 1% the next year, -8% the next year, etc.... which one would you invest in?

I'm hoping Stock A would be your obvious choice.

Back to real estate: keeping a poorly performing house is the same as buying it each day, because you have alternatives. Why keep your investing dollars in a poor market? There are other excellent markets, and you don't have to live somewhere to invest there. A good property in a good market will return higher profits even after the expense of paying a good property manager.

What'cha waiting for? Do you have other reasons for accepting a sub-par return that haven't been revealed? If not, then it's time to sell and redeploy your capital elsewhere and earn better returns. Inertia is not a good reason for staying put.

Sid, We invested here b/c it was in our price range. Plain and simple. All cash sales, no loans, all paid for. We pay rehab costs as we go.

The stock analogy is interesting however not really apropos.

We don't have a lot of capital. Husband believes in "hold the land" similar to "The Good Earth" by Pearl Buck.

We would like to be a part of a gentrification effort. We are however, fighting an uphill battle. As I have stated before, this particular town is seen as "low rent" and most of the landlords here are churn and burn. Will rent to anyone with a pulse. The new, younger town board is getting sick of this churn and burn attitude and I can hardly blame them.

Getting back to the subject at hand, the applicant had a gap in their residence history which I filled in by looking at his DL. I found the place and apparently, he owned it after the divorce but let tires, windows and other sundry items accumulate on the grounds which irritated the new owner, whom I talked to. She had to spend $1,500 to get the lot cleared out after the sale. She did not complain about the interior of the house.

I just get the feeling that this guy is so intelligent that he thinks he is smarter than everyone else and comes across as a tad disingenuous.

jonny, he makes about 8X gross a month than the rent. The reason he gives is he expects his son to graduate HS and enter the military. That would mean he'd give his current complex 30 days notice which would be end of June. There are a lot of missing pieces to the puzzle however. These are the "mediocre" applicants. I usually get people who MEGA don't qualify. About 90% of the inquiries are in the "you've got to be kidding" category.

In two of my units I have mediocre tenants and the other two right now are stellar.

One of my mediocre families I wasn't going to rent to because he got referred to me by the soured tenants I had (Senior mother and adult daughter with checkered past). I took a leap of faith and they've turned out to be good--touch wood.

Any prospect looking to ditch their current LL before their agreement ends is a red flag to me. Other flag is anyone who can afford to rent a nicer apt and is seeking a lower-end unit. Surely there must be a nicer place closer to work for this prospect? Why isn't he applying there? Not sure I understand the statement about his housing. If he was a homeowner, then he has little rental history. If he was able to buy another property after the divorce that's a good sign, no? Why is he not looking to buy now? Dogs are irrelevant if you accept dogs. Old car non-issue unless it dies and he can't afford a newer one to get to work.

I think you are over-exposing your applicant/tenant’s details on a very public forum. Even if your exact tenants don’t happen to come across this, and many, many other threads, others in your town have likely already identified you. It only takes little bits and pieces of information, leaked out slowly over time, before you have a reputation as a gossip. I wouldn’t want my landlord discussing my kid’s plans, or my divorce, or my …. on any public forum.

Tenants KNOW they do not have perfect lives. They don’t want to be gossiped about for your pleasure. Probably why we have been getting the troll posts on this forum lately. If you have no respect for people’s privacy, then let a property manager deal with your tenants. This gossiping about current applicants/ tenant’s choices situations is unprofessional. I can almost guarantee that some people in your community have identified you from these posts.

Regarding divorce = not paying your bills:

There is no correlation between the two. When someone fails to keep their obligations, it is their fault. If they owe a credit card, or an auto loan that their spouse has, clearly they promised to pay. The loan documents don’t have a provision for non payment in case of divorce.

Small potatoes, his job is in the middle of nowhere. There are no luxury apartments 19 minutes away from his job or any closer at that. The area we're talking about has a population of 252! Next town to that area has a population of 2,093. The town my rentals are in population 3,313... the only small town in the area where the population actually increased by 14.64%. Just checked the census and the town our rentals are in has an increasing household income...something that cannot be said for most of the rustbelt towns/cities in the perimeter.

Mapleleaf, we have discussed this before. Its not his details that matter, at all. You could be totally making up a fictitious scenario, and it would have the same effect.

Enough of YOUR information has been posted on this forum that any nerdy person with a few minutes of time could suss out what town, what properties YOU own. And then, they might say to themselves, 'Gee, I don't want Mapleleaf to put all of my info out on the internet. They don't need to know that the person is pretend. They just take their rental business elsewhere.

My latest opening was open for 4 days before someone put money down on it. They places a total of three months rent and the lease starts on June 1st.

Source of that person was a referral. I will owe the existing tenant, a $75 gift card for that lead on the first. Normally I would still be showing, but why with that much money down - why

Referrals work.