I think I made a mistake today and am not sure how to handle it

[Jon S.]

I am just finishing renovation of a triplex near a college and am beginning to list it and take tenant applications. College students are the most obvious market. Two college students looked at it today, and decided they want to rent a unit. On a yellow pad, they both provided their own info as well as their parents' names phone numbers and email addresses; the parents will be co-signers, guarantors.  These students seem like the perfect applicants so there is no problem there. The problem is that when they asked about move in costs, deposits, I said one month rent and one month security deposit. Only later tonight did I read posts on BP about the inability to get a judgement on parents who live out of state.  So I checked and sure enough, both of their co-signer parents are out of state. So even if I were to have all the info on who they are, the BP posts indicate that there is no way to collect out of state. Besides, out of state collections sounds very expensive, but also , according to the BP post, these kind of judgments would not apply across state lines into other states, so even getting a judgement would be useless. So what do I do? Get a bigger deposit? If I change my mind about the size of the deposit, am IO going to alienate my first potential tenant to this property? I'd hate to do that because they really seem perfect for the property. On the other hand, out of state co-signers, combined with college students and just the first month rent and one month security deposit - is that taking too much risk? I just renovated this into a nice property and don't want to see it get messed up. Any advice on how to rectify this without seeming like a landlord who is bait and switch on the deposits? Thanks 

[Jon S.]

Originally posted by @Isaac Blocher:

I have had rentals for a very long time and you are always taking a risk when you rent your property. Make sure they can pay the rent is my suggestion. If they have Jobs, verify there jobs, if they stop paying then evict them ASAP. If you live close by then make sure to go and pick up the rent on the same day of the month. Make sure to do a back ground check on them. If they are freshmen then they might not have history but if not then they might have rent history. Good luck, but understand its always a risk. 

Fortunately, one is a junior and one is a senior. They both have rental history from a nearby apartment complex. The senior has plans to continue on locally in grad school at the same university, so this is potentially a multi year lease. I've looked them both up on the web, they are honor students, one of them is even graduating a year early, and there isn't anything online that indicates they are partiers. Everything they told me about themselves is corrobberated by everything found online. This combined with their very pleasant demeanor and my gut instinct, tells me that I should stick to the original agreement with them on requiring one month rent and one month security deposit. It's a little light on security deposit, but they seem more responsible than your average student. I'm also getting co-signing parents, even if they are out of state, as they are still parents, and they probably would want to keep their credit history clean.