As I shared some months back, I've switched my model strictly to using open houses to market my apartment vacancies. Anyone who wants to schedule a showing outside of the open house schedule needs to either complete a pre-screener or an application.

I had someone reach out today from out of state today looking to relocate into this area. She was wanting to know about basic qualifications to rent and my response to her was to attend one of the open house showings where all that would be explained. Even though I have open houses, I'm still not going to waste a lot of time answering phones or deal with any questions regarding qualifications. In my experience, the persons who ask about qualifications generally are not qualified anyway. Once I told her that she had to attend one of the open houses, she then wanted a virtual showing. I declined that as well unless I got an application or pre-screener.

It's one thing if I had a video already attached to the ad which I may do at some point. It's quite another to make a special trip to do a virtual showing for someone who I'm uncertain is qualified to begin with.

Now I have suuuuper detailed video tours linked in the ad - which is basically a virtual tour. I do talk on the phone with the prospective applicant to see if they have any questions after viewing it. Of course, I ask a few questions, too.

FWIW:

In the past (not too long ago), once someone was pre-qualified I would send them an offer for a viewing and ask if they would like in-person or virtual (for those out-of-state folks).

I thought it worked fine - we would "meet" each other as well as look around the house. I could also see their dog demonstrate obedience on the video call.

This was before MTR, & I got a great young, LTR couple with a sweet dog this way. Military coming from New Mexico. No way they could attend an open house.

I don't know about everyone else here, but I've personally found that people who ask about "requirements" don't have them.

Although many folk who ask such a question may have burned people here in the past, I have learned that"sometimes" my assumptions are wrong. A simple, 3-letter question can often bring clarification:

Why?

Example: I have some self-employed people who wanted to know if that would be a problem / how they need to prove their income. So they knew what documents they had to gather to go with the application.

Once, long ago, I had a couple inquire who were moving to the area, he was self employed & had no local job yet. Would I even consider them, or would they be wasting everybody's time & money to apply?

I can hear you from here, yelling "DQ" and "NEXT"! LOL but....

I quickly learned that he was a "legit" contractor, moving to be near child/grandkids. Because when you have your own business like that, you (we) can - the freedom is there. AND they had sold their house where they were, had $$$$$$$$$ in the bank & paid 6 months upfront - they just needed some time to find their own home locally.

They were great tenants.

So, I'm just saying...you never know...don't be too quick to judge without at least a little more information.

A lot of deadbeats ask about requirements so they know how to answer questions on the app. That said, prospects want to see if the property fits their needs before providing personal information is these scammy days. I’d do the same if I was in that spot.

I provide a short, edited walkthrough video of each property and I try to keep them whittled down to under 3 minutes. I rent to a lot of out of towners (military) and I’ve had numerous people comment how helpful the walkthrough was.

DJ-good points and my approach with a MTR would be different mainly because the pool of people would be predominantly from out of area. You would need either a virtual tour or a video attached to the ad. I think a video ad is also good for LTR but I don't happen to have one.

This person was leading with the qualifications questions and wanting a virtual tour while there are plenty of locals who can tour and possibly qualify. I'm not inclined to do anything special for her unless I have an upfront app or pre-screener.

I'm lucky to have decent pictures.

A walkthrough would be good at times. I guess I need to put something else on the to-do list.