All Forum Posts by: Mary Smith

@Scott Scoville This looks amazing! Congratulations!

@Curtis Mears I do not know of any international credit bureau that does background checks on international renters. If you do happen to learn of any, please let me know!

What we've personally done in the past to ask them for proof of funds, a bank statement from their US bank account would work just fine. I have not really had any bad experiences with international renters, they've been quite reliable and they always pay rent on time. 

@Jack Psooy Hey Jack! I really do like the idea that you have and if you do happen to find a way to implement this, then that would be great. However, I don't think that this appears to be that big of a problem just like @Jevon Shaw stated.

Every applicant has different scenarios tied to their background check, credit score, etc. A tenant with a high credit score isn't necessarily equivalent to a good tenant. There's so many other factors that come in to play that it would be really hard to code that all into an application that does it for you. TransUnion already has a similar score, called the 'Resident Score' that is tied to applications, giving a fuller view of the applicant rather than just the applicant's credit score. Even if technology like this did exist, I think I would still go the route of going through all my applications to ascertain the best tenant for my property, vs having a software that ranks them only based on a few parameters. Just my two cents!

@Greg Raymer Really helpful advice Greg!

@Conner Hitchcock Is the applicant aware that when you run their credit check, this would be a soft pull and not a hard pull for them? By screening your tenant, you are in no way affecting their credit score. I would explain this to them and let them know that it's protocol for you to run your own credit checks on every applicant that applies to your property.

@Greg Raymer These tips are extremely helpful for someone that is just starting out, thanks for sharing!

@Benjamin Barnard Hey Benjamin, I came across a blog post that very nicely summarized all Minnesota laws in one place. I'm not sure if we're allowed to post links here, so shoot me a DM and I'll send it over to you!

@Bruce Woodruff This was really helpful, thanks for sharing!

@Ahmer Khan This should not be an issue at all. We have several units that have a similar setup and have not had any complaints regarding this so far!

So the 'Resident Score' is a score that is specific to TransUnion's tenant screening service. It analyzes key pieces of credit data that lead to evictions and is pretty widely used in our industry. We use Innago to screen our tenants and the software does return a resident score, along with a detailed credit report. We do not solely judge applicants based on this resident score, but take a good look at all their credit, criminal and eviction reports before arriving at a decision.