Potential Tenants

[invst4profit]

QUOTE (Rebecca Bryan @ Jun 11 2009, 10:57 PM) Out of your three choices in the original post the three young men were your best bet. I have rented to many young men that get together and come here to work in Alberta. These kids are chasing a dream of making big money and they are organized enough to leave home and take responsibility for their own lives. All the kids that are living off Mommy and Daddy are still at home. While I agree that sometimes one tenant changes their mind and the spot gets filled with another tenant, the rent gets paid and the property gets looked after. They are rental `virgins`and they are not likely to be professional tenants. If you do your due diligence you will find that many of these kids come from good families and are young integral citizens. They are easy to teach and they usually follow the rules if you take the time to explain what is expected of them. Explanation of expectations are what wards off your foreseeable problems. I do not hesitate to rent to them as long as their stories check out, their credit check shows responsibility and I have a good feeling.


Unfortunately, because we are in Ontario, LL can not take these risks as readily as LL in other provinces. In Ontario where the RTA and LTB are so heavily pro tenant LL have a very difficult time evicting bad tenants. It is not uncommon for a LL to go 3 months or more, without rental income, before a tenant is evicted without much hope of ever receiving back rent.
In addition, because we are not allowed to collect damage deposits, the damage inflicted by those evicted tenants is also at the LLs expense.

Also in Ontario we do not have a lot of young people chasing a dream. Too many of them are sitting around waiting to receive there entitlement.

 

[EdRenkema]

QUOTE (RebeccaBryan @ Jun 11 2009, 07:57 PM) Out of your three choices in the original post the three young men were your best bet. I have rented to many young men that get together and come here to work in Alberta. These kids are chasing a dream of making big money and they are organized enough to leave home and take responsibility for their own lives. All the kids that are living off Mommy and Daddy are still at home. While I agree that sometimes one tenant changes their mind and the spot gets filled with another tenant, the rent gets paid and the property gets looked after. They are rental `virgins`and they are not likely to be professional tenants. If you do your due dilligence you will find that many of these kids come from good families and are young integral citizens. They are easy to teach and they usually follow the rules if you take the time to explain what is expected of them. Explanation of expectations are what wards off your foreseeable problems. I do not hesitate to rent to them as long as their stories check out, their credit check shows responsibility and I have a good feeling.

Rebecca I don`t know if you read my reply to Adam but the 3 young guys gave me a bad gut feeling, the principal who called to make the appointment just seemed careless. I rent to students and am getting out of it. I simply don`t want to go down the road of teaching responsibility. My students will bounce a cheque or pay late and its always a story which while legitimate simply overlooks the point that they need to learn there are real life repercussions for actions or inactions.
That said not all the student tenants are like that, the ones that are become a drain on my energy and I have little patience for those who will not take resposibility for their actions.

 

[RebeccaBryan]

I agree with you Ed. I was not renting to students but rather working young men that get together to work in the "grass is greener" Alberta and I have had much luck however there`s a lot of other due dilligence that goes along with the decision making.

 

[AndyLuchies]

Hey guys, I`m getting kinda worried here. Are people suddenly second-guessing themselves?

In my mind there is only 2 options. Either you believe she was telling the truth the WHOLE time, with her purse getting stolen, getting money from dad, and everything else she talked about. OR you believe she was lying about one or more things. If you think she was lying, call her on it and don`t rent to someone who can`t even tell you the truth. If you believe she was telling the truth, it would make sense that she`s now towing the line with everything and being as helpful as possible. My only concern here is that someone might think she was lying before and STILL rent to her now that she`s behaving herself. If she`s quick to lie, you can`t trust her. If you can`t trust her word, i certainly wouldn`t trust her with a property.

its neat to have this on the public part of the forum so that everyone can see what REIN is about.

best of luck with your choice Ed. hope it goes well.

 

[EdRenkema]

QUOTE (jessandy @ Jun 13 2009, 08:32 AM) Hey guys, I`m getting kinda worried here. Are people suddenly second-guessing themselves?

In my mind there is only 2 options. Either you believe she was telling the truth the WHOLE time, with her purse getting stolen, getting money from dad, and everything else she talked about. OR you believe she was lying about one or more things. If you think she was lying, call her on it and don`t rent to someone who can`t even tell you the truth. If you believe she was telling the truth, it would make sense that she`s now towing the line with everything and being as helpful as possible. My only concern here is that someone might think she was lying before and STILL rent to her now that she`s behaving herself. If she`s quick to lie, you can`t trust her. If you can`t trust her word, i certainly wouldn`t trust her with a property.

its neat to have this on the public part of the forum so that everyone can see what REIN is about.

best of luck with your choice Ed. hope it goes well.

I have not heard back from her, likely all a story.

 

[GaryMcGowan]

Who needs reality TV when you have myreinspace !!!

Some great posts here, you can really tell the there are some experienced RE Investors on this forum. We can/should all learn from their experiences. 

Thanks ED for being humble and asking for advice and realizing that you needed a second opinion!!

 

[koop]

Does everyone put this much energy and time into checking out sketchy potential tenants?
It just seems like the story was sketchy from the start, and you still put in the effort to see if she was for real. I would have dismissed her as soon as she started to try to play on my emotions.

 

[ShariAnn]

I agree with Todor - this thread is gold. It is very educational - especially for newcomers like myself. Thanks to everyone who posted and special thanks to Ed for asking the question.

Shari-Ann

 

[NeilUttamsingh]

QUOTE (ShariAnn @ Jun 15 2009, 07:05 PM) I agree with Todor - this thread is gold. It is very educational - especially for newcomers like myself. Thanks to everyone who posted and special thanks to Ed for asking the question.

Shari-Ann

Another good learning from this thread is to always be cautious when you have prospective tenants that are `desperate` to move.

A note to the newer landlords...

You may get excited first at the prospect of having your unit filled.

However, do not forget to exercise your due diligence with each and every applicant.

With the ones that are desperate to move in, usually there is more than meets the eye.

Do not skip any steps with your screening process!

 

[EdRenkema]

QUOTE (NeilUttamsingh @ Jun 15 2009, 05:06 PM) .

With the ones that are desperate to move in, usually there is more than meets the eye.

Do not skip any steps with your screening process!

I had a call tonight from someone that wanted to move in tomorrow - that was the condition!
Sorry, I don`t want a tenant that bad.

 

[NeilUttamsingh]

QUOTE (EdRenkema @ Jun 15 2009, 11:01 PM) I had a call tonight from someone that wanted to move in tomorrow - that was the condition!
Sorry, I don`t want a tenant that bad.

Ed,

I think I declined this same guy this past Sunday!