<p>I have a couple of questions to you fellow landlords who might be more experienced than I. Last week we had a couple apply to rent a house we own. He is a self-employed commercial landscaper and he claims to have an annual income of $250-$300K. Since I can’t verify his income with an employer, I asked him to supply a couple of years of tax returns and a couple months of bank statements. He balked at that and said that he wasn’t comfortable disclosing that information but offered to submit copies of the monthly checks that his company took in for December and January. I told him that I was more interested in his net income, since his business obviously has expenses. He has employees, vehicles, equipment, insurance, etc., so I have no way of knowing how much of this revenue went to him personally.</p>
<p>I also ran a tenant screening report on him. As an individual landlord, I’m not able to get a complete credit report anymore due to new consumer information protection requirements. But I can get a “renter reliability index” that includes a statewide eviction records search, a criminal and sex offender search, an address search and a SSN fraud search. It came back as “serious credit risk” due to a “severe level of judgments or suits” and there were two records in the eviction search listed as “Filing Type: Forcible Detainer” - one in 2008 and one in 2010. Is “forcible detainer” the same thing as eviction? Apparently the landlord in the 2010 case lives out of the country so I’m unable to contact him about the tenant. </p>
<p>Do you know of any other way to verify his income or should I run the other way based on the forcible detainer records? I’m disinclined to rent to him but I want to make sure that I’m allowed to require tax returns from the guy. This is the first time I’ve had to verify self-employment income so I’m not sure of what I should ask for.</p>
<p>Contact your state government’s landlord-tenant office. They will tell you exactly what you can and cannot request, and whether you can turn down a tenant whose reports are “iffy”.</p>
<p>The first question that popped into my head is why would someone with an income of $250-300K want to rent a house? He could easily buy a property unless he has credit problems. I agree that you shouldn’t rent to him based on the previous evictions.</p>
<p>A lot of reasons why a person with high income would legitmately want to rent. That isn’t the issue. The OP has his/her answer. Thiis is a high risk, I would not rent to that person. Forcible evictions can be very nasty. You don’t need the details about it and you also have enough info from the credit check to know this is not a good candidate. Look for someone else unless you want to risk problems.</p>
<p>We don’t rent to people who have been evicted in the past.</p>
<p>Period. End of discussion.</p>
<p>We have a question on our application that asks if they have been evicted before. Most lie about it, which is also grounds for rejecting an application.</p>
<p>This guy appears to be a serial offender. If you know how to work the system, once you get into a place and stop paying rent, it can take a long time to get you out - 6-12 months is not uncommon in my state.</p>
<p>No, I will turn him down for sure. I just wanted to make certain that forcible detainer and eviction were the same thing. And besides, I can’t verify his income if he’s unwilling to provide tax returns.</p>
<p>Good plan.
There are quite a few rentals in our area, & while we have lived here for almost 30 years, I don’t remember anyone ever getting evicted.
To do that twice makes this guy pretty “special”.</p>
<p>I won’t tell Op what to do, but here’s what I’d do if I had the info the Op has: continue looking at other people.
Finding what public records are avail., plus the applicant won’t verify income would be plenty enough for me to move on. Verifiication of income is a very standard question. Of course you can seek any info that is public record without permission, because it’s public record. Evictions and other court actions are public record.</p>
<p>The question I’d ask Op is: after knowing what you know, why would you feel you still need more info to make a smart decision?</p>
<p>As a LL, I’ve found it is cheaper to let a house sit empty than to choose a bad tenant.</p>
<p>I’ll add that of course you can turn down a prospective tenant that has an iffy credit report. You cannot turn down tenants for the housing laws that most know- gender, national origin, religion, etc.</p>
<p>Younghoss, I was hoping you’d chime in on this thread-- you have a lot of wisdom to share on the subject :). </p>
<p>I had already decided to pass on this applicant but really just wanted to be absolutely sure about the meaning of “forcible detainer” before I cut him loose. If it wasn’t the same thing as an eviction, then I wanted to know if there was another way of verifying the income of a self-employed businessperson. </p>
<p>And you’re absolutely right about it being cheaper to have a house sit empty for a while than to rent to a bad tenant. I’ve had my share of rotten ones in the past :eek:.</p>
<p>I hope have some degree of wisdom, I’ve sure learned much over the last 20 yrs through trial and error. For me, if a guy chose to hide his income verification, I’d not seek other ways to verify it. I’d just move on elsewhere. If asked for an explanation, I’d say that I “would not feel comfortable” trusting someone I didn’t know that would not verify income.</p>