subject: Finding Renters For Successful Entrepreneurs [print this page] Many people dream of becoming wealthy, in fact one of the reasons that many people immigrate to the states is because it presents the opportunity to start business ventures and make a lot of money for yourself. One f the most common ways that people earn significant wealth is through real estate investing. This particular type of investing can take a long time to develop but will pay off in the end as real estate is one of the most stable investments that one can participate in. if you are going to invest in real estate however, then chances are at some point you are going to need to rent a property. This can be a scary thing because renters to do not have the same incentives that you do to keep up the property and treat it with respect. This article is going to cover how to find good renters.
First of all you should always do an income check. This is simply just asking the applicant for documentation that they make what they say they make. This can be in the form of pay stubs or bank statements but what you should see is an income that you deem enough to make the payment every month. A good standard is that someone's rent should not exceed roughly a quarter of their income. If the person cannot document income then you should not rent the property to them. No questions asked.
The second step in screening potential residents is to perform a credit check. This will allow you to look at things like their credit histories as well as if they have ever been evicted and how much debt they currently have. The actual credit score will not actually be much help to you unless it comes down to picking between two very similar candidates.
Third, you should get contact information for previous landlords. Often time you will have a renter who is just plain hard on a house. They will not do enough damage to warrant an eviction but they will just cause enough damage that repairing it once they move away will eat at your profits. This information will not show up on a credit report and therefore the only way that you can find this info out is usually through calling previous landlords. They will most likely be eager to tell you if they had to spend a lot of time and money after the renter moved out.
