Credit and background search each adult tenant that will be living in the unit. 

Is it the male or the female making the money?  

I've told countless groups of roommates: "It's time to be adults, figure this out and I'll be back next week to see how it's going". 

@Rhiannon Then Definitely run a full credit, criminal, eviction check on her and any adult over 18 that will be living there.

The unit is roughly 500 sq ft and has two adults & a child living there.

If somebody didn't qualify on their own, as a grown adult with their own income and their own references - I didn't want the job of teaching them how to be an adult or to give them their grown-up consequences for being a grown-up adult who didn't act like one in my building.Just say no.  

Whatever your tenant is spending his money on as a priority other than rent - which is always my personal #1 priority - is his big adult boy lesson to learn and not your problem. 

Had I done so I would have save a great deal of anxiety, money, and time because I would have known that he had several federal tax liens and was sued by creditors for skipping out on bills, hires undocumented workers, and sexually harasses female tenants. 

Sometimes I guess it's scary being a young female in a predominately male community.

I look at my own adult life starting 1997 (post college), the fed has embarked on 2 rate cycle increases.