Landlord P.I. (Private Investigator)

Landlord P.I. (Private Investigator)

Landlords are generalists in an age of increasing specialization. You might be showing units one moment or cleaning dryer vents the next. You are a Jack or Jill of many trades: cleaner, marketer, screener, accountant, painter, and more.

One of the more interesting parts of the job description is unraveling minor mysteries of all sorts (for example, will this person be a good tenant? where is the noise coming from? how did this water get in the basement?).

This is what I would call the less talked about Landlord P.I. part of the job description. So it was no surprise when I recently saw landlord and best selling landlord author, Leigh Robinson (of Landlording fame), also authored a mystery (Clear of Clouds, 2007). Haven't read it, but it makes sense as the two (landlording and solving mysteries) are "of a piece" ...

Whether you grew up with Columbo, Murder She Wrote or Monk, here are just of few times you channel your inner amateur sleuth as a landlord...(a fun post here, but also some substance and tips coming, too, and you can add your own detective work below in comments, too).....

Is the Contractor Legit? Landlords use contractors of all sorts (alot), but when it comes time to find out about their background, you have to go hard boiled detective and check for proper licensure, insurance, bond, as well reviews, references, and also do some meet and greet to find out about payment terms and billing policies (see my fixed price versus cost plus blog post for more). Even then, for a large project, you may want to dial up past clients for questioning or see if you can get in your Magnum P.I. Ferrari or have your driver (a la Foyle's War) take you by a few projects, at least for drive bys...

Unauthorized Occupants: Tenants may have multiplied in your units due to love connections or simply economics. Love or money, you have to go Jim Rockford and take the case and head over in the gold Pontiac Firebird ala Rockford Files. These can be hard cases. A good landlord does not just drop by or peak in, like Mr Furley (from Three's Company, not a mystery but Don Knotts as a landlord is worth seeing)... so you look for the clues and deduce like Sherlock from the unknown car out front all month. Pets, too, I am seeing on Bigger Pockets can also be unauthorized occupants, and in this case you have to track like one of Tony Hillerman's heros, Jim Chee or Charlie Leaphorn, to verify the secret pet by sound, sign or track...

Applicant's Stories: While you use your legal, neutral criteria (like credit or criminal history) and set standards to screen tenants, each application is like another episode (be it X Files or Law and Order) and sometimes the application information, past rental or even current employment history just does not add up. There are often clues, like a missing rental reference (like maybe the current one that is about to evict the applicant!), an income that is not verified or even a falsehood you can sleuth out. This can be old fashion Joe Friday (Dragnet) just the facts ma'am detective work, or you may even see a smoking gun (literally) like my applicant that checked "non-smoking" despite me catching a glance of her lighting up in the parking lot pre-showing...

Random Whodunnits: There are also a range of random who dunnits to discern, be it a damaged mailbox, parking lot messes, a thump noise in the night, or a random leak. And while it is not an Agatha Christie murder mystery (hopefully), landlords are True Detective(s) across North America (kudos to Canadian BP posters) solving the little daily mysteries that help them successfully house others...