All Forum Posts by: Bob H.

An entire month's rent seems excessive. When the tenants move in, you hope the screening predicts the future, but you really don't know if they will pay on time and take good care of the property and stay for a long time. You can advertise the property yourself and screen at low cost, at the applicants' expense, through one of many services. If you don't want to do that, fair enough. Then think of an hourly rate that might be fair and the number of hours the agent really has to spend on your behalf.

This discussion is a little off track. The city of Maryville is in northwest Missouri and is the home of Northwest Missouri State University. Maryville University is in the St. Louis area, hundreds of miles away.

Asking if someone has an attorney in the family is going overboard, I think. On our application, we do ask, among other things:

"Have you ever been a party in a court action?" 

"Have you ever been convicted of a crime?"

"Is there any criminal matter pending against you?"

"Do you or any other person who will occupy the premises have a gun?"

A "yes" to any of these doesn't automatically disqualify an applicant, but it's worth knowing about, and any further explanation tells you something.

In general, I try not to ask those "harsh" questions in an initial phone conversation, because they might discourage a perfectly good tenant who has other choices. I find that a good way to avoid wasting time showing a property to tenants who won't qualify is to email them an application and a copy of our acceptance criteria -- including the minimum score necessary from a screening service. Then they have a chance to see what you are looking for, and in my experience those who are less qualified tend not to call back.

I seldom schedule a showing after an initial phone conversation, because I usually am trying to find new tenants while the previous ones are still there. I tell the callers I need to arrange a convenient time with the current tenants, and that allows the callers to review the application and acceptance criteria before scheduling an appointment.

Yes, I stand corrected. I see that the requirement was changed in 2013. I think the requirement used to include a four-year degree (or maybe a two-year degree), but now it must be a degree with a major or minor in real estate.

It's one more licensing requirement to restrict entry into the business and protect commissions of existing brokers. No doubt the change was pushed by the industry purportedly to help consumers but actually to limit competition and further monopolize the MLS. I'm guessing that an MBA from Stanford or UCLA who took all the required real estate broker courses later is likely to be more qualified than somebody who only got a real estate associate's degree from a community college.

I suggest that you continue taking courses so you can get a broker's license and be independent. California, unlike Texas and probably most other states, allows you to get a broker's license entirely through education, so you aren't stuck working for a broker for a period of years. It is a rare break in favor of individuals in an overly regulated state. I used to have a broker's license in California and found it helpful for MLS access and selling my own property without paying a listing broker. At least in the East Bay, as a broker you also are allowed to pay for MLS access without also paying to join the Realtors association.

Perhaps your fiance, when contacted by the prospective landlord, could give a variation of this old job reference line: "You would be lucky to have this man work for you."

The message is all in the interpretation. :)

Glen, your thoughts on those 1% assurances are correct. I own and manage four homes meeting your criteria in Cedar Park and Leander. I try to keep my rents at market rates, and I would not be willing to sell for 100 times the rent. The ratio is more like 0.9%.

Keep in mind that property taxes are quite high to compensate for the lack of a state income tax.

Short of banning guns, you could require that they be kept in a safe, which you would need to see. You also could require that the tenant show evidence of some kind of gun-safety training. These requirements might not deter a criminal or even an irresponsible person from having a gun, but it could give you additional leverage to terminate a lease or limit your liability if a problem occurred and you could show that the tenant was violating the lease.

At a minimum you can add to your rental application the questions: "Do you own or possess guns? If so, how many." Then consider the answers and other information when deciding whether to rent to the applicant.

I would not put much stock in legal advice from non-lawyers here.

The water shortage in California will remain as long as voters continue to elect politicians who, bowing to the environmental lobby, reject any plan to build large-scale dams to collect the snow melt in the Sierra. Based on voters' recent track record, that will be a long, long time.