Bidding on a Rental Property

[Darshil Parikh]

Is it legal to ask for highest and best rent if there are multiple qualified applicants for a rental property? I’ve been seeing bidding on rental properties and wanted to check if this is a new norm. Any thoughts? If it’s acceptable - how should I go about? Based in Austin, Texas.

[Stephen Stokes]

@Darshil Parikh Always do what your gut is telling you is the right (honesty & integrity) thing to do. If you have to ask "is what I am doing or planning to do even legal", you should probably not do it. My take is this is unethical and you will set the tone of being a greedy landlord at the outset. We (landlords) serve as investors to benefit for our own selfish gains but have to balance that with the role as a public service provider, housing the community. If you do your market analysis correctly, you should be able to set rents at reasonable figures when you advertise. Just remember, pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered, and do onto others as you wish to be done onto you. Heck, you may even send all of your applicants away by even trying to pull a stunt like this. Then you will be back to the drawing board and you will incur the cost of lost rent. You bare full responsibility for how you decide to run your business and it takes a lifetime to build a reputation and seconds to destroy it. I never want to see anyone saying I act in a manner that is not defensible especially in a court of law should it ever come to that, as we operate in this litigious society of ours.