Property Managers: What do you do with one good prospect, one not

[Chris Lounsbury]

This is something I come across quite often as a PM, and I'd love to hear how others handle it.  I see it a lot with couples, but also with roommates.  Something that worries me is lets say wife never puts things in her name, but husband does. Husband has below threshold credit, but wifes credit is much better, mainly because she only has small revolving credits. Today though, it is fairly common for the wife to be making just as much money, and she technically could qualify on her own.  How would you handle this? (Our company requires all persons over 18 be on the lease as a financially responsible party, but I do often understand hypothetical wifes point: "If I didnt have husband I could qualify without him, so why with him contributing income does it not just make my application stronger."  For brevity I only used this one example, but like I said, also very common with 1 or 2 roommates having strong credit and finances, but other roommate having very poor credit that would never qualify. 

For arguments sake, let's say none of the debts are medical or student loans.  They are unpaid credit cards, lOC's, etc.  Lets also say that their resident history is fair, not overly strong, but no evictions or foreclosures. 

Let me know what everyone thinks!