All Forum Posts by: Thomas Hopkins

@Stephen White Thanks for the offer of the first round and the NAPBS conference recommendation. I look forward hopefully meeting you there in the years to come. Again, sorry about the earlier comment.

@Ariel Ozick Not the best start in the community, but a start none-the-less. We are taking every precaution to be 100% compliant with the FCRA. Regarding your subletbuster site. I really like it. It is crazy how many tenants are subletting illegally. Great product and technology.

Thanks, Thomas

@StephenWhite and @ArielOzick, I am extremely sorry for my comment earlier. I will do more research before I make any comments in the future. After I received the response I took a look at the Rent Prep site further and I have to say that I am impressed with the fact that they do actually do the phone calls to verify employment and rental history. This is a service that is extremely hard to make work from a profitability standpoint. I commend you on your product. 

Regarding Spokeo, you don't have to worry about the FCRA at all. The FCRA only has to do with credit report and information. Spokeo actually has a statement on their site regarding the FCRA. More importantly, make sure you are following the FHA. However, Jackie, you don't sound like you own more than 3 properties and are actively managing them, which means that you would be held to a different standard under the FHA. Anyway, here is the language regarding to Spokeo - † All data offered is derived from public sources. Spokeo does not verify or evaluate each piece of data, and makes no warranties or guarantees about any of the information offered. Spokeo does not possess or have access to secure or private financial information. Spokeo is not a credit reporting agency and does not offer consumer reports. None of the information offered by Spokeo is to be considered for purposes of determining any entity or person's eligibility for credit, insurance, employment, housing, or for any other purposes covered under the FCRA.

Hope this helps,

Thomas

Rob, No, they do not call the landlords or employer to verify income and rental history. They are a credit report reseller that provides the information that is available on a credit report provided by one of the three credit bureaus. It looks like they are using either experian or transunion. If you use their screening software you still need to check the tenant's references - employment and rental history. Keep in mind that if the current landlord wants to get the tenant out of their unit, they are bound to tell you whatever you want to hear to accept them. Hope this helps. Also, make sure you have a fax machine to do the rental history check, a lot of property management companies and apartment complexes are still using such methods to verify that you have proper authorization to request such information about their past or current tenant.

I am a landlord in San Francisco, and the creator of an online application and tenant screening software and I am writing to ask fellow landlords and property managers what their biggest pains are. Is it listing your property, generating leads, deciding on an adequate listing price, tenant screening, uncertainty / fear of selecting a bad tenant, rent collection, etc.? How do you mitigate this pain? Have you ever considered using an online software? If not, why not? I am not using this information to sell my particular solution, I am reaching out to this community of landlords and property managers for help determining if there is a big enough pain for landlords and property managers that is worth solving. And if there is a big enough pain, are there good software solutions are out there that are being used?

Thank you in advance for your responses,

Thomas

Chris, I am simply answering Jackie's question. This is the spirit of a forum. You post questions and you receive answers and opinions. To Jackie, I hope that I was able to help her. Chris, To answer your question, I just became a biggerpockets member today so I haven't had a chance to fully explore the site. Pro marketplace is something that I might consider, so thank you for the advice, I will definitely check it out. Along the same lines, please let me know if you have other recommendations. Thank you in advance for your help.  

Hi Bill, I consider myself somewhat of a FHA expert. How many investment properties do you own? The reason I ask is because the number of units that you own and manage determine your requirements under the FHA. If you do not own more than 3 units and do not have more than i believe 5 transactions a year then you are held at a much different standard than property managers or landlords who own more properties or have more properties in their control. The main thing you need to do is stay consistent with your decisions. If you reject this couple because of the income to rent ratio than you will not be able to accept anyone with a lower income to rent ratio. Unless, you reject that couple for another reason. The one that you should be more concerned about is the FCRA - fair credit reporting act. This one requires any landlord or property manager to inform the tenant for the exact reason they were not declined if the reason had to do with any of the information found on the tenant's credit report or score. Hope this helps.

Here is a link to the Fair housing act if you would like to take a deeper dive. 

http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/hce/title8.php