helpdesk Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 Hi, I have rented my house to private tenants over a number of years and unfortunately have just encountered my first bad tenant. The references supplied from previous landlord & employer have since been found to be false. After finding out the tenant smoked in the property, owned a dog & a cat in house, didnt maintain house and garden, tried to have cable installed plus breaking several other terms of contracts I had to give her notice but stupidly out of fairness gave her over 2 months notice to find alternative accomodation & vacate my property. The tenant decided not to pay the final months rent & has just vacated the premises in a shocking state plus dumping a number of her own very old appliances at property. I am very upset by the whole experience and annoyed at myself for not making more thorough checks on this individual prior to renting the property to her. Are there any web sites in which other landlords can be warned about this individual as a number of final warning letters have since arrived at the property for unpaid bills relating to previous addresses she has rented? Thank you for any advise and assistance you can offer Kind regards Wendy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richlist Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 NO it can't be done. For the future you could include the following actions,,,,some you may aready do. * Take detailed refs......bank, employer, previous landlord + * Get a home owwning guarantor. * Take rent guarantee insurance. * Write a detailed tenant specification of what you will & will not accept ......and stick to it. * Personaly interview tenants and judge their suitability by asking specific questions. * etc etc Here's my tenant selection criteria as an example.......of course none of this offers any guaranntees: TENANT SELECTION CRITERIA Applications from thefollowing people are not acceptable under any circumstances Smokers. Pet owners (specifically dogs, cats or reptiles). Non English speakers. Those with resident children. Anyone in receipt of housing benefit or LHA. Those wanting Company lettings. Any letting that would results in overcrowding (eg parents with children in a 1 bedroom flat). Anyone running a business or commercial operation directly from the property. Applicants who have long lead times to moving in. Applications from thefollowing people will depend on circumstances Non working tenants…..including part time workers, unemployed, those looking for work, university students with/ without working partner are each considered on their own merits. Non resident children…..eg single, divorced, separated parent who looks after a child every other weekend may be OK. Would depend primarily on age of children. Lettings for less than 6 months…..normally requires higher rent to cover fixed costs. Poor references or no references or don't qualify for RGI…..may require a home owning guarantor or rent period in advance. Age under 25......depends on the person, circumstances, maturity, job etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melboy Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 Natasha....in my experience the person always like to be called "Tasha" or "Tash" Look on the bright side if you can that is........at least you have not had to go through the expensive and rental income loss and time consuming process of a court eviction and all that entails. I think you have have provided your own solution to any future tenant by your own sentence: "I am very upset by the whole experience and annoyed at myself for not making more thorough checks on this individual prior to renting the property to her". What Richlist has added as an answer to you should be your new reference criteria for your next tenant. "A Landlord has no friends......It's a business transanction". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kerbut Posted August 1, 2012 Report Share Posted August 1, 2012 There is a service called LRS who do this, I used to get an update daily from them with a list of bad tenants , but deleted their site as it got to much if I was away for a couple of weeks and came back to a stack of emails , they are based in Weston super Mare and their phone number is 01934 645237 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lettings Pro Posted August 9, 2012 Report Share Posted August 9, 2012 There is also a company called TenantID - they offer a full, comprehesive report that tells you everything you need to know about a future tenant. You can call them on 0113 244 1555. They are part of Callcredit Group so they are very well known and it's free to join, use and upload your tenants. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rising Damp Posted August 9, 2012 Report Share Posted August 9, 2012 Here's TenantID's website http://www.tenantid.co.uk/index.php?q=welcome-tenantid worth a look Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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