Co-signer Credit Check

[Ken D.]

Situation: I am renting a 4 bedroom apartment in a duplex in a college area and have 4 college students interested in renting it. The apartment is not available till June 1st because the previous tenants trashed the place so bad that we had to do a full renovation. Anyways, the 4 college kids don’t bring in enough income so I’m requiring them to have co-signers but one of the co-signers refuses to give me his social security number and refuses to give me a copy of his driver’s license or the driver’s license number. He says he will have his bank do a credit check and have them notarize it for the credit check portion. His situation with the driver’s license he says he’ll let me take a peek at his driver’s license but I can’t have a copy of it or have the license number off of it. He also said he’d bring a couple pieces of mail with his name and address on it as proof of his residence.

note: *He refuses to do any sort of online background check whether I submit the information or if he submits it- he had his identity stolen twice so now he’s super paranoid of it happening again.

Question: Is there another way of doing this? Is it crucial to have a copy of his driver’s license to make the co-signer form more concrete? Is there a substitution for a driver’s license?

Additional note: I understand that he’s worried about protecting himself. I’m running a very small business and can’t afford to get screwed over by anymore bad tenants. I need to make sure I’m doing everything in the most proper way that would hold up in court and not cause me any more headache than necessary.