All Forum Posts by: Jim T.

 Did your buddies sources happen to mention the federal housing law? 

You are likely a BiggerPockets hero where people here accept your word on things. And you accept brokers and lawyers with a gazillion years experience word. My problem is I accept neither. I asked for proof, that is all. You are clearly not going to provide it. 

David, I don't really want to pursue this. We disagree and that is quite OK. You run things your way and I will run things mine. OK? Peace

 re: If I can get you the specific citation, I will, but I'm not going make it a priority. Since you raised the question, I'll leave that as an exercise for you to complete.

Are you suggesting I find a law that I don't believe exists? How is that done? It seems more logical that the one that claims something exist proves that it exists. (your buddy saying it is the law is not really proof, is it?)

There could be a de facto standard adopted in Illinois that requires a landlord to accept the first qualified tenant. It may be that all judges in Illinois look for that as a standard. I don't think so, but I suppose it is possible. Even it were, it does not mean it is required.

If you find this the best method for you, great, use it.  I don't think there is any law that prevents you from using it. However, there is some bias in this generally adopted method. It favors candidates that can apply earlier. Maybe you are discriminating against people that don't drive and require public transportation. How is the guy that takes public transportation ever going to be first to respond? (bias against the poor)  Maybe you are biased against parents of toddlers that need to find a sitter before looking. (bias against young children) Maybe you are biased against people that don't live in the immediate area. (bias in favor of the race in your neighborhood) You may think these are stretches but all the existing non-discrimination rules started this way.     

Why don't you put one ping-pong ball representing each qualified tenant in a hat and have a non-interested party draw a ball? That is less discriminating than first-applied.

That is not what I do. I take all qualified applications and pick from them. As an example, if two applications are similar but one has a credit score of 800 and one has a credit score of 760, I will take the 800. I did not select it based on any protected class and I have a very good explanation on the criterion I used.    

Landlords that use the "first applied" method run into other problems. The ad must include all of your filtering criteria. If the ad is too tight, you may not get any applicants. If it is too loose, you may be accepting a substandard tenant. What do you feel about renting to felons? If you put "no felons" in your ad, you violated the last administration's HUD policy of "ban the box". So you leave "no felons" off your ad. Now you get a convicted felon that was the first to apply. The second was a guy with a clean record and, as it turns out, has a better credit score, better employment record, earns more money, etc. You have prevented yourself from using non-protected class discrimination in selecting the best tenant. I don't have these problems because I don't list qualifications at all. The only thing that could be construed as a selection filter is the price. Because I list the price on the ad, I do not negotiate on the price at all.

For the people that use property managers, the selection is even easier. Have the PM prepare a summary of each applicant and leave off any of the protected class  items, even leave off the name. Then you as the landlord pick from that list.  You can easily demonstrate that ,you showed no discrimination of a protected class because you had no access to any of that info.  

 I don't intend this to be argumentative and the only reason I am pursuing it is because I happen to think selecting applicants based on the sequence you received the applications is a poor way to get the best tenant. I think your study group is wrong but am willing to be corrected if you can cite the statute. It isn't so important to me personally as my properties are in California and it certainly is not the law here. They do suggest it as a method to avoid discrimination but it isn't the law. A landlord can choose whatever method he feels is appropriate as long as it does not discriminate a protected class.  I think this is true in all 50 states. Seattle has an ordinance (CB 118755 - see CB118755  and Amendment 5) and like I said earlier, they are being sued and it will be interesting to see how that develops.  

A tip to you; don't take unsupported claims as the truth. An appropriate question to ask the facilitator is which Illinois statute indicates you must choose the first qualified applicant. Do not run your business based upon the hearsay of others.  If it is indeed the law in Illinois, someone should be able to easily cite the statute and then you can read it to see exactly what it says. Now, I will admit, by using  the method you prescribed, it gives you a good response if a discrimination case is charged. However, I do believe you are free to choose your own method of tenant selection and you should. An analogy: do employers choose the first candidate that meets the minimum qualifications? Probably not but they are required to follow similar anti-discrimination practices.  If an employer does not know how to treat people equally, perhaps they should use a method that does it for him. Same with a landlord.  

 Which Illinois statute indicates what you claim? 

 There are no states where that is required. There are some states that recommend it but it isn't backed by any law. Seattle is the first city to enact such legislation and they are currently being sued.   

Make sure there is an understanding of the security deposit and any other provisions that may have been on the current lease. The best thing to do is end the current lease and start a new one that indicates it supersedes all past leases. There is another process called tenant estoppel that can be used where the tenant signs agreeing that your copy of the lease is valid. 

Depends on the market. These days, I would offer a 2-year at the same rate as a 1-year. I can see even a 2-year being slightly more than a 1-year in some markets, such as San Francisco. But, as I said, if someone wanted to lock in a 2-year rate and everything else checked out, I would accommodate it. I don't normally raise much on existing tenants anyway.   

Depending on your situation, the SHST (Safe Harbor Small Taxpayer) may come into play

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/small-taxpa...

Vannessa, I am not familiar with MA law so I can't really address this but it seems like you could ask them for copies of the credit reports indicating evictions. In CA it is required and I assume it would be in MA too. Since she will not be able to furnish those reports, she should stop the harassment. In any case, she is a bad landlord so the objective should be to move on anyway

p.s. I love Quincy (when I lived there we pronounced it Quinzy) 

Ben, if you provide furnished units (or would consider it) I would provide staged units with what you are offering. 

Otherwise I think printed floorpans with typical furniture placements would suffice. I am going to start doing that. I don't have any direct feedback yet but I have new tenants that asked for a floorplan  before move-in and I thought that was a terrific idea and gladly provided it.