There's a benefit to being diplomatic, but the bottom line is, its now your building, your business. 

If their answers meet our rental criteria, then I will tell them about who we are and tell them our mission statement.

The trick is to stay calm and diplomatic and friendly, but say "I can see that you're not happy, but I'm not able to accommodate you.  

And you can do that in a diplomatic way, while smiling (genuinely).  

You can still look nice and diplomatic, but you just don't engage in any explanations."

So, their mission was to then get rid of all of the desperate funky tenants with dogs, etc., and to then upgrade to better tenants without pets.  

It would be great if your witness could also video record it all.Your mission:  Ignore her completely, as you walk though and write everything down that relates to the walk through, and say it out loud for the camera.  

If you call their bluff, but remain calm and diplomatic, in my experience, they give it up.

No, they weren't very open about the eviction and yes they did try to hide it.Their mission was to shmooze you in person, which they successfully did, or you wouldn't be here asking if you should rent to people with an eviction.This is exactly the scenario I was talking about on another thread about why meeting tenants in person is not always better than renting to out-of-state applicants without meeting them first.Con artists want to meet you in person and gain your "con"fidence.  

src=/hudprogra...http://cotsonline.org/our-mission/cots-housing/http://www.vhcb.org/SharedHousingArticle.htmlSLEs (sober living environments).