Real Estate Investor Blog
Current articles to help landlords, realtors, and property managers screen, select, and retain reliable renters.
Perform Your Tenant Onboarding Process from the Beach
If you’re looking to automate your tenant on-boarding process, here are some great tips to bring that dream to life. Now you can find and move in great tenants while you’re bringing your daughter to college or taking that vacation. So, first a primer on the tenant...
3 Quick Ways to Know if a Lease is Comprehensive
Every landlord wants to use a rock-solid rental lease agreement. But finding or creating one can be tricky and expensive - no less really understanding some of the language we skip over that we wish was written in plain English. Let's cover essentials of a lease and...
Three Questions Background & Credit Reports are Great at Answering
Many of you know that running background and credit checks are essential steps to vet your applicants, but do you really know what this step is good at -- and not? Background checks are great at 3 things that you, as a landlord, want to know about your applicants: Are...
Lease Renewal Strategies for Landlords
Strategies to Lower Vacancies and Keep Options Open 1. Keep the initial lease term to a year If this is a new relationship, don’t lock into a multi-year agreement. Maybe after a terrific initial year you both decide to renew for another year or longer period of time...
Getting Started as a Landlord: 4 Skills to Hone
Essential Skills for Landlords Don’t be overwhelmed! You can find your "landlord legs" -- and confidence -- by focusing on developing 4 key skills. Let's list these skills first and then dive deeper: Be an excellent and compliant screener (Move In Phase) Use...
How To Tenant Screen Like the Pro’s: Part 3
Creating Acceptance Criteria to Tenant Screen Like the Pro's This is the last installment of our 3-part blog series to help you screen like the pros, and here we will learn how to create excellent tenant screening acceptance criteria. As a quick refresher, this...
How To Tenant Screen Like the Pro’s — Part 2: Process Tips
Sound Tenant Screening Leads To Great Tenants Since great tenants are the foundation of great properties, we are diving into how to tenant screen like a professional. This 3-part blog series is designed to help build your confidence and enhance your screening...
How To Tenant Screen Like the Pro’s – Part 1: Benchmark Metrics
Ever thought about trusting your gut on an applicant, wondered how professionals screen their applicants, or wanted help to create or enhance your screening criteria? You’re not alone. Although we probably universally agree that great tenants are the foundation of...
Using Online Tenant Screening for Better Informed Leasing Decisions
Landlords need new tenants to fill rental vacancies, but each new tenant comes with multiple risks and uncertainties: Will they pay their rent on time? Are they employed? Do they have any prior evictions? Before tenant screening solutions existed, landlords were left...
Don’t Assume: A Criminal Report Lists Any and All Criminal Activity
Landlords Should Make Sure Tenant Criminal Background Checks are Comprehensive Only convictions are displayed in a criminal report, rightly so - innocent until proven guilty. Arrests are not listed, so beware of someone who may have recently been arrested and is now...
Don’t Assume: A Credit Report Can Help me Understand if my Applicant Pays His/Her Rent
Standard Credit Reports May Not Reflect Renter Payment History Universally most landlords don’t want to rent to someone who owes a prior landlord - but this type of debt is rarely on a standard credit report (read more blogs to understand why). Call the current...
Don’t Assume: The Credit Bureau Definitively Confirms my Applicant’s Identity
Credit Reports Don't Necessarily Verify Renters' Identities One fact that many don’t understand is that the tenant background report does not definitively say whether a Social Security Number belongs to an individual, confirming his/her identity. What the report can...
Tenant Background Checks: Are you Worthy of This Asset, This Neighborhood, These Neighbors?
Is Your Rental Applicant a Good Fit for Your Rental Property and the Neighborhood? It goes without saying you desire a resident that won’t disturb the peace and will leave the rental property in good shape. This is where the tenant criminal report comes in - does your...
Tenant Background Checks: What Does Your History Reveal?
Verifying Tenant Payment and Financial History The tenant credit report is a useful tool for determining what types of debt your applicant uses, how much debt is outstanding, and how the debt is paid and managed. Don’t just look at the tenant credit score, that is a...
Tenant Background Checks: Are You Who You Say You Are?
Verifying Rental Applicant Identities In this digital age, pretending to be someone that you aren’t is all too easy. The number of reported identity theft victims rose to about 490,000 in 2015, up 47% over 2014 [source Marketwatch, “Identity Theft Complaints Soar”,...