Podcasts about rentprep

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, chats about fair housing testing and its role in uncovering evidence of racial discrimination in rental housing. Ready to digitize your rent payment system? We'll give you tips on how to set up rent payments for tenants digitally. Last, but not least, what's the purpose of a property manager and when should you consider hiring one for your rental property? Find out in our latest podcast.

We are back with another episode of the RentPrep for Landlords Podcast with your host, Andrew Schultz. In this podcast, we'll explore tenant insurance and what exactly a tenant needs to include in their policy in order to protect themselves and the property. We'll also go over your typical wear and tear damages and what that means for your rental property including what is considered "normal." Last, but not least, are appliances warranties a good idea? Find out all this and more in our latest podcast.

We're diving deep into the world on property management on this podcast! Community Manager and RentPrep For Landlords podcast host, Andrew Schultz, explores the topic of property management and what exactly that entails. From start a management business to hiring one, check out these top tips from a property manager himself. Find out if your tenant should be getting renters insurance and what that means. It's time to get to know the pros and cons of this type of insurance. Does a lease start on move in day? Find out the answer in today's podcast!

RentPrep Community Manager, Andrew Schultz, chats with Co-Founder & CMO, David Bitton, of DoorLoop about how landlords can market themselves to find new tenants. We'll even touch on the possibility of creating a website for your investment properties to find better tenants and gain more visibility. Plus, find out how Bitton started in the industry and became a visionary behind a well-known rental property management software.

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, chats about what to do when you unexpectedly find a pet that your tenant snuck into the rental when your lease specifically says no pets. Should tenants pay the utility bills or should a landlord? It depends. Find out what to do when your tenant forgets to pay the rental utility bills. Last, but not least, we'll tell you how collection agencies work with landlords to get any unpaid rent and more! Listen to the latest podcast today.

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, sits down with FCRA-Certified Screener, Chelsea Kline, of RentPrep to review what it takes to verify a renter's income. We'll also go over our income verification product here at RentPrep. Tis the season for landscape maintenance. In this episode, we'll also go over who maintains a rental property lawn. Last, but not least, we'll chat about renting out to students and how to go about tenant screening for low-income renters and more! Listen to the podcast below.  

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, chats with Katie Brosch of RentPrep about tenant credit reports. In this specific episode, Katie teaches us how to read a tenant's credit report from beginning to end. If you're a landlord who has ever felt lost when reading a credit report, this podcast is for you. To learn more about tenant credit reports, including how to read them, listen below!  

In this episode, Podcast Host & Community Manager at RentPrep, Andrew Schultz, chats about a landlord that was fined over $10,000 for having too many tenants occupying a rental property. How do you handle an unresponsive tenant? We'll go over the process for managing a tenant that just won't respond to your messages and you now have to initiate the eviction process. Last, but not least, how do you go about verifying the income of someone that was a former military member? Find out this and more in our latest episode.

In this episode, Podcast Host & Community Manager at RentPrep, Andrew Schultz, interviews Devin Redmond of Roofstock. Redmond currently serves as the Director of Content Strategy. Find out more about 1031 exchanges, what to pay for cash for keys, how to return security deposits, 1099-MISCs and so much more.  Listen in to the latest episode below!

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, chats with RentPrep Founder, Stephen M. White. In this exclusive interview, we celebrate the 400th edition of the RentPrep for Landlords podcast with none other than RentPrep's driving force, Stephen M. White. White discusses how he got started in the industry, what it took to get RentPrep to where it is today and what the future looks like for the tenant screening company. Don't miss this special edition of the podcast today!  

In this week's episode, Podcast Host, Property Manager & Business Owner, Andrew Schultz, chats with Real Estate Investor, Vitaly Volpov about his journey into property investing and the growth of his portfolio of over 110+ units! In addition to being an active real estate investor, Vitaliy is a licensed attorney and part owner of a real estate brokerage specializing in investment properties  For over 10 years, Vitaliy has successfully scaled his business from a single duplex to over $10 million-worth of income-producing real estate. Find out how Vitaliy got started and his secrets for success in this latest podcast.

Jim Barnish is back in the host seat on this episode of The DIRT Podcast, where he invites a fellow grit-weathered entrepreneur to the table: former US marine and founder/CEO of RentPrep, Stephen White. Their discussion is all about community, specifically how to build an effective and safe space for your members, by securing operational systems and spending more time on the business instead of in the business. Plus, get the raw truth about entrepreneurs, smooth seas, and skilled sailors (Sound familiar?).3 Key TakeawaysHow RentPrep adds value in a way most other businesses don'tHow Stephen's bustling company community came from a failed business ideaWhy Stephen turns down three times more applicants than he accepts into their communityResourcesWebsite: RentPrep (Check them out as a fellow entrepreneur!)Connect with Stephen: steve@rentprep.com (Steve is always happy to keep the comradery going)Stephen's LinkedinTraction by Gino WickmanOutwitting the Devil by Napoleon HillAboutFounder and CEO of RentPrep, the leading tenant screening solution for busy landlords• Former United States Marine • 20 years of experience in the credit industry and entrepreneurship • Frequent presenter and keynote speaker for real estate/investor events • Avid reader, life long learner, and lover of nature 

Steve White is the Founder and CEO of RentPrep, the leading tenant screening solution for busy landlords.Stephen brings 20 years of experience in the credit industry and entrepreneurship to his role leading a growing team of executives determined to make renting easier for all. Here's some of the topics we covered: Having a good pool of potential tenants Trusting your gut 2 parts data, one part gut Background checks Judging character Credit score Inspection cycle  Making residents feel wanted ADA disabilities Retain vs retrain  To find out more about partnering or investing in a multifamily deal: Text Partner to 72345 or email Partner@RodKhleif.com  Please Review and Subscribe

Selecting high-quality tenants for your rental property can help you save time, money, and stress in the future. In this episode of the Smart Real Estate Coach, Stephen M. White of RentPrep shares the information that landlords need to discover red flags and properly judge the character of potential tenants before signing a lease. Resources: Website: https://smartrealestatecoach.com/rentprep Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/RentPrep Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rentprep-for-landlords/id851540886 Affiliate Program: https://rentprep.com/tenant-screening/affiliate-program/ Additional resources: Follow Chris and Zach on Club House to learn even more about deal structures and how to get 3 paydays from your real estate investments. If looking to secure some lines of credit for your business, check out Fund and Grow – Visit our Resource page at https://www.smartrealestatecoach.com/resources Schedule a FREE Strategy Call: SmartRealEstateCoach.com/action Register for our free masterclass: www.SmartRealEstateCoach.com/mastersclass Real Estate on Your Terms by Chris Prefontaine SmartRealEstateCoachPodcast.com/webinar SmartRealEstateCoachPodcast.com/ebook SmartRealEstateCoach.com/QLS Smart Real Estate Coach Podcast Sponsor: Paul G. Dion CPA, CTC

The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent eviction moratoriums have left many landlords confused and out of options this past year. Steve White, founder and CEO of RentPrep , is an expert in tenant screening and simplifying the landlording process. In this episode he shares his insights on screening high quality tenants and how landlords can build better relationships to keep good tenants longer. 0:00 Introduction 1:30 Tenant landlord relationships & current evictions moratorium 3:55 Tenant screening and importance of credit scores 8:36 Advertising a property 13:48 How individuals can compete with institutional landlords 16:34 Single family rental boom 20:55 Getting on the phone to screen tenants ??23:40 Tenant priority laws and the future of renal laws 31:00 Ihe landlord process after tenants move in 37:08 Importance of leases and using a professional 38:28 Early signs of a difficult tenant 40:40 Advice for landlords when a tenant wants to break their lease 43:20 How to keep great tenants long term 46:16 Increase in adoption of automated services and payments 47:42 Thoughts on the ending of the eviction moratorium 49:40 What's next for RentPrep 

Steve White, CEO of RentPrep, discusses specifics regarding credit scores, how to evaluate credit reports, criminal and eviction background checks, as well as how to approach bankruptcies and previous evictions in relation to filling new vacancies.

Winning a judgment on a tenant that has trashed your property is one thing, collecting on that judgement is entirely another story. Did you know that only about 10% of judgments are actually collected? In this episode, Steve White from RentPrep drops some serious wisdom on what you can do on the front end to increase your chances of being in that 10% of landlords that actually collect! Website: https://rentprep.com/?utm_source=roofstock&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=steve-media-outreach-2021 The "RentPrep for Landlords" Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rentprep-for-landlords/id851540886 The "RentPrep for Landlords" Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/RentPrep --- Transcript   Michael: Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of remote real estate investor. I'm Michael album, and today I'm joined by Steve White, who is the founder and CEO of rent prep. And on this weekend wisdom, Steve's going to be giving us some insider tips as to better ways to collect judgments that we have against former tenants. So let's get into it.   Hey, Steve, thanks so much for joining us on today's weekend, wisdom. Really appreciate you taking the time.   Steve Yeah, thanks for having me on.   Michael: Steve, we had you on another episode of the real estate investor, where we're talking about rent prep your company and some things that landlords can do to screen tenants. So stay tuned for that one, but wanted to give everybody a little nugget. And you've got some experience in collecting judgments, or winning judgment awards that landlords have put on tenant. So can you talk to us a little bit about some things, tips tricks landlords can do?   Steve Yeah. So winning judgments is a lot easier than executing and collecting judgments, as you know,   Michael: Yes, I know. I am all too familiar with that.   Steve: Yeah, I hear landlords get excited all the time and say like, Yeah, we got to judgment. Oh, my God.   Michael: Good luck.   Steve: Yeah, the struggle has just begun,   Michael: Right, really the best way to handle it. And  I'm gonna say that your strategy needs to start way earlier than you would imagine the strategy needs to start at the rental application process. I know, a lot of landlords are okay with applicants skipping information on their application. And there's a lot of information that you wouldn't think is super useful in the application process, like for example, their references, like who's going to call a reference and expect that they're going to give you a truthful, objective perspective of if this person's a good tenant or not, you know, their mom is gonna say they're lovely, and they're great. They want them out of the basement anyway. So they're just gonna be like, yeah, they're awesome. But, you know, that rental application has a future life well beyond that screening process.   So when you think about obtaining a judgment, or even executing judgment, some of the pieces of information that you might need are going to be hidden in that rental application. So for example, they were just evicted or abandoned, or whatever your property, where are they living now? Well, if they're short on money, they may not have a new apartment, they're probably living with whoever they listed as their next of kin or personal reference. So now, you know, now you know where to serve. And now you know where to you know where to find them at least.   So those personal references are absolutely worthless. When it comes to the application process. Don't waste your time calling them and asking if they're going to be a good renter, call the previous landlords, that's worthwhile, but not the references, the references are worthwhile after you've screened them, and you're trying to track them down.   Michael: Interesting.   Steve: Yeah, employment information, right. So you cannot garnish somebody's wages, if you don't know where they work, the court will not do that dirty work for you. So you got to know that going into it, you know, and again, that's something that you'd find on the rental application, right, daycare 30 to list where they work, who their supervisor is, how to get ahold of them. So the best piece of advice I can give you on the rental application side of things, is every single landlord needs to adopt a no Blank Space Policy.   If an applicant fills out the rental application and says, I just don't have some of this information. But here you go, it's 70% complete, you need to kindly push it back across the table and say, I'll wait, I need the rental application to be fully completed. And again, a lot of that information may be useful to you into the future.   Wage garnishments again, you need the employers information, if you're going to do any kind of garnishment you know, beyond the wages or freeze their bank accounts or anything like that, you're going to need their bank information if they're not paying you with rent checks. And they're, you know, they're paying you through some online system, you're not going to have access to their bank information as easily as you would if you had a check in front of you. So if your application or your leases including information on you know, bank information as a reference and things like that, that's going to be useful for you as well during the the judgment collection process.   Okay, so a couple of easy tips on the front end, no Blank Space Policy collected information, it could be hugely valuable to you in the future and on collecting on a judgment. Now, let's assume that you have the judgment I'm already I'm going to give you the really ugly truth, the rental industry as the lowest collection rate of any other industry below if you can imagine below dentists, these poor dentist can't seem to get paid on stuff. And the reason is because there's no blacklist for dentists. If I go to a dentist and I leave owing a balance, I can go to the dentist on the street and have him continue or fix whatever my problem is. Mm hmm. And he's going to take me as a new patient. There is no dentist blacklists that says hey, this guy owes me money, so don't do business with him. So Dentists have a notoriously low collection rate when it comes to their receivables or past due bills. And if you can imagine the rent All industry is even lower than dentists.   Michael: And we have a blacklist what a bunch of baloney.   Steve: I know. I know we Yeah. Right. So first and foremost, don't get your hopes up that because you got a judgment that it's money in the bank. And don't spend it before you have it, the chances of you getting it are slim. And when I say slim, I mean, at best 10%. So our recovery rates that we were normally seeing were about eight to 10%. In the rental industry.   And the reasons are obvious. If somebody falls behind on things, and they can't make their payments, it's really hard to catch up on big chunks, like rent payments, and still keep up with other things. Right? really tough.     So, you know, they're really, really difficult to collect on the best advice I can give in terms of what do you do after you have a judgment in your hands, don't spend another Penny trying to collect on it. A lot of landlords make that mistake, I would use a third party collection agency that operates on a contingency basis, do not pay them anything upfront to place the debt with them, if they're insisting that that's how it works, find a different agency, there are a ton of them out there, including a lot of attorneys that may not even advertise that they do debt collections, but a lot of attorneys do. So it may even be worthwhile asking your own attorney. And if they're working on contingency, they've got a little skin in the game, they're not going to get paid unless they get paid. So that's one, you know, potentially useful way to do it and take it off of your plate and not have to think about it and let a third party agency or a third party, you know, Attorney try to collect on it   Michael: Like Dog the Bounty Hunter.   Steve: Exactly right. Don't you wish like that would happen? Like dog showed up and says like, Hey,   Michael: you owe me money.   Steve: Right, right. Like every landlord wants that. So, of course, like I said, you know, you could try some of the traditional ways which are not very effective, like wage garnishments, if they're job hoppers, and they don't have a job or don't keep a job for a long stretch of time, you're not going to be able to garnish wages. And even if you do what garnish your wages, it's regulated by the state that you're in how much of a percentage of that wage you can actually take at a time. And I think the highest percentage is Ohio, which is about 10%.   So it's not much going to take you a long time. I think you mentioned you had a $10,000 judgment and take you a long time to collect a $10,000 judgment small bites at a time.   Michael: Yep.   Steve: Freezing bank accounts. That's another one varies by state. But in most states, they require a minimum balance before you can freeze it. In New York, it's 20 $500. I don't know about your confidence level that your previous tenant has just an extra 2500 cash laying in their bank account, right? They did, they probably wouldn't be in bad financial shape.   Michael: Right.   Steve: So that's not super effective. What I've seen the most effective is tax refund, garnishments Hmm. And these need to be filed every year, you can get lucky if they have a huge refund coming, you might be able to grab your past two in one clean swoop. But there's a more likely that you're going to have to do this in over a period of several years, you got to check with your county that you filed your judgment and when that deadline is for filing refund garnishments, because it's usually December, each county is a little different. So you want to be prepared, make sure you get it within the filing deadline. And there may be a filing fee. And we're talking most places, it's 10 or 15 bucks, it's like the same fee, you pay for a marriage license or you know, to get a permit to build a fence in your yard or something like that. So it shouldn't be a super expensive fee. But you file these at the courts.   And you're basically standing in line waiting for that refund that tax refund. And it's based on order filing priority meaning first come first serve. So if you're doing this and five other people are doing it, you got to get there first. And the only person that can supersede you is the government. So if the government is going to garnish their tax refund for whatever purposes, maybe they would pass due taxes. The government's first no matter what, okay, they're going to get through money before you do.   Michael: Big shock there.   Steve: Yeah, right. But anything that's left or if they don't have any other garnishments, that is a really useful way to take large chunks at a time and get your money back. So in my opinion, that's probably the most effective strategy. If you have an old judgment laying around, and you want to blow the dust off and try to go after it again, that might be your best bet.   Keep in mind that judgments are only good for seven years, they expire. They're like milk, and the differences they get chunky, but here's the difference. You can file extensions, ah landlord should do. Again, it's a filing fee. So it's well worth 10 or 15 bucks to file an extension and have that thing live on for an additional seven years then to just let it die because it will just die after seven years and then blow away like dust and it says if it never happened. So if you're getting close to that timeline, you want to refile. Also if you can get them to pay anything, it restarts the time   Michael: That's seven years of no payment,   Steve: Seven years no payment, no activity. It's it's dead after that time. So if you can grab something on a garnishment or something like that, or get them to make a payment on it, then it starts that time clock back over again.   Michael: Okay. And can landlords double dip or use multiple of these tactics? Get a wage garnishment and a tax refiling garnishment? Or is it one or the other?   Steve: It's one or the other? I've never heard of anyone double dipping, although I'm sure plenty I'm sure it's been tried. I think it's one or the other. And I think the issue that you would potentially run into, which would end up being more of a headache for you as landlord would be. Let's say you got two things operating at the same time, and you get lucky and you collect all the money on the tax refund. And now you're in some sort of situation where you're collecting,   Michael: Wage garnishments.   Steve: Yeah, so I would say I would do one at a time,   Michael: Pick one and stick to it,   Steve: Pick one stick to it. If you already have an existing judgment, check out the tax refund, if it's really early in the process, and you just got that judgment filed or you're about to I would look into, again, a collection agency or an attorney that's willing to work on contingency to try and collect that so you don't have to worry about it. Think about it. stress about it if they collect something great. If not,   Michael: Didn't cost you anything.   Steve: In it wasn't probably a good collected either way. So yeah, yeah.   Michael: Oh, man. See, these were great. These are super, super cheap. I wish we had had this conversation seven, eight years ago when I needed this more.   Steve: Yeah, I know. I know. I   Michael: That's okay.   Steve: Well, I talked to landlords all the time that are in that same situation and a lot of landlords that have that mindset of like, cool. I got the judgment and it was a couple of hoops to jump through. But it was worth it. And now when I get it collected, and that was   Michael: Easy sailing.   Steve: Yeah, that day never comes.   Michael: No, it doesn't. It has it. But you know, I've gotten a lot of mileage out of this story. So you know, it's all good. It's all good.   Steve: Well, that's that's what it counts for, right? Like life lessons. And usually don't make those kind of mistakes twice or, you know, high aspirations that something's going to happen if you learn like, no, that'll never happen, and I'm probably not going to get that money. So, Yeah, I hate to tell you that to let it go. But that's the best. You're gonna sleep better at night.   Michael: It's the best thing you can do.   Steve: Yeah, yeah.   Michael: Yeah. Awesome. Thanks Steve. Again. really a pleasure having you on and we'll have to do this again sometime soon. Take care. Yeah. Great. Thanks. Alrighty, everybody. That was our episode. Wow. A huge thank you to Steve really, really great stuff. I wish I had known years ago when I was trying to collect a $10,000 judgment from a tenant that trashed a property on the way out of my house. So again, if you liked this episode, please feel free to leave us a rating or review. They are really helpful for us. And as always, if you have a specific episode, topic or idea or something you'd like to hear more about on episode, leave us a note in the comment section. We'll make an episode about it. Thanks again for listening. Happy investing.

Selecting strong renters can be the difference between a cash-flowing property or an alligator. Even if you can get a judgment on a tenant that owes you big, collecting on that judgment is not a guarantee.    On this episode, Steve White From RentPrep gives us the scoop on how you, as a landlord, can do the proper due diligence on your applicants to save you time, money, and headaches.  Website: https://rentprep.com/?utm_source=roofstock&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=steve-media-outreach-2021 The "RentPrep for Landlords" Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rentprep-for-landlords/id851540886 The "RentPrep for Landlords" Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/RentPrep --- Transcript   Michael: Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of remote real estate investor. I'm Michael Albaum and today I'm joined by Steve White, founder and CEO of rent prep. And today Steve and I are going to be talking about all things tenant background check related. And we're also going to delve into some things that you can do personally to boost your credit score. So there's a lot of fun information in here. Let's jump into it.   Well, Steve White, thanks so much for joining us today, man. Really appreciate you taking the time.   Steve: Yeah. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.   Michael: Absolutely. So you're the founder and CEO of rent prep, right practice? Yes, I really want to want to dive into what that is. But I would love to get a little bit about your background first, and how you got into the space?   Steve: Sure, yeah, I'm totally on accident. I never intended to be doing background checks at all. So I, I got out of the Marine Corps, I served eight years took an opposite direction. And most of the guys that I knew that were getting out and becoming police officers, or getting into law enforcement in some way, and I sort of went the corporate america route, and I worked for a company that played a really niche role in a legal process called a replevin order. Nobody's probably ever heard of that. But…   Michael: No, what is that?   Steve: So if you can imagine, as you're driving down the road, and you see these really big, like, street paving machines, that, you know, like construction equipment that are usually like a million dollar piece of equipment, the company, if the company stops paying for it, and the bank wants that piece of equipment back, you can't just go and pick something like that up. And so if you   Michael: Take a put on a tow truck,   Steven: Right, no, it's a huge process, you usually got to break it down into pieces and ship it in on multiple vehicles. So what we were doing was arranging those replevin orders that were that had to be organized in the local municipality. So we would have to coordinate with the sheriff's department and local attorneys and, and get all this stuff organized. So I was doing that, you know, on the corporate side, kind of in the banking world and decided I could do it on my own and started a company that did exactly that. And I started it in 07, which was perfect timing for the big financial recession that happened two years later.   Michael: Right!   Steve: And, yeah, that definitely put a damper on things and made us get really creative for looking outside of the box with different business ideas. And we had a client that that basically came to us and said, hey, I've got rental properties. And you guys are using software to track down pieces of equipment and figure out where you know, where job sites are, where people might be where people might be hiding things, do you think you can tap into that or use some of that same, you know, access that you have to let me know if somebody would be a good tenant or not. And like any good entrepreneur, I said, we can absolutely do that for you before I knew how to do it.   So the business started there really what it is today, and we ended up within about two years selling, we split it up into different divisions, sold the replevin side and put everything into the background screening side. And that's really where we got our start working for usually, at that time, large property management companies, large apartment communities, mostly local, I was, you know, going around knocking on doors and trying to set businesses up.   It wasn't until we started doing, I started doing a lot of speaking engagements at like landlord associations or real estate investor associations, as I started to really see this need for these smaller market landlords to have access to really good screening. And we didn't provide any screening for them at that time. We were just doing this for bigger businesses and larger property management companies. And it seemed crazy to turn away all that business and so we created rent prep as a brand, specifically to give landlords access to really good high-quality screening that typically only the large property management companies are getting.   Michael: Interesting. And so what what type of services reports background checks, can rent prep run?   Michael: Anything that you can imagine in terms of what you would think you would normally get so we're talking credit reports, criminal records, judgments, liens, bankruptcies, eviction records, obviously, address histories, income verifications. So we can reach right into a bank account and get a an average or a summary of data to tell you what their average monthly income is so that you can do a proper income to rent ratio.   And really what makes rent prep different is that we are not always trusting the the courts or the databases to get things correct. So we will live in an age now where if you're somebody like me, my name is Steve White. There are 2600 Steve whites around the country. And in fact, probably somewhere near near you. In California, there's a middle school named Steven M White, which is my exact name. So common names are very common. What we realized was there was a piece missing when you're talking about automating data in that piece is really a human element that you need someone who's trained, who understands the FCRA, which is the compliance arm that that manages our industry, and somebody who can make decisions beyond what, you know, simple filtering can do, and really get better access to data.   So with with the way that we do our screening, we are typically able to find about 50% more eviction records that are filed than what the, you know, what can be found in, let's say, the National eviction database. And so we're in a lot of cases, going directly to the courts in searching, you know, for information, especially if it's a common name, making sure that it is the correct person, anyone that's ever ran a background check for John Smith knows that you're going to spend a good amount of time trying to, you know, determine if it is your john smith, that's a sex offender, or if it's some other john smith, that's a sex offender. So we're taking that responsibility off of the landlord's hands and saying, we'll do that we'll make those determinations, and use our trained eyes to to make sure that you're getting the correct and accurate information.   Michael: Awesome. So this sounds like a service that would be great for somebody that's looking to self manage a small time landlord. But if let's say that's me, I'm I've I have properties and professional property management. And I want to do my own property management now for local properties I own. I've never seen a background check. I've never seen what those reports look like, Is it pretty easy to decipher, and understand and digest that information? Or do I need a technical degree degree to read and digest it?     Steve: Sometimes you feel like you need a technical degree, depending on the person you're running the information on, right?   Michael: How much background they have to show.   Steve: Yeah, yeah, you know, it's funny, because if you get a good tenant, it's really counterintuitive, right? Like, our reports should be super boring.   Michael: Show nothing.   Steve: Yeah, right. Right. A lot of times we get calls from landlords, they're like, yeah, we ran this and nothing came up. Well, that's good. That's, that's what you want. Right? Yeah. Right. But you know, the nice thing is, again, I really my intention is not to come on, and like sell rent Reprep.     Michael: This is this great.   Steve: Yeah, this is really what what I believe separates us from a lot of our competitors in this industry is that for landlords, if they run a background check, and they just say, Hey, I don't know what this means, or I don't look at a lot of credit reports, what, you know, what is this section here? Or really, what is a good credit score, right, so we can offer interpretation. So the landlord can call and speak to the exact screener that built the report and compiled it. So that screener has intimate knowledge of exactly what's on there and helped go through the information with them. We can tell them what the average credit score is for a tenant, which is 650.   Michael: And was that nationwide?   Steve: Yeah, across the country at 649. So, and we can also dive in a little deeper and see, you know, because for one landlord and one property, you know, asking for a minimum credit score of 700 might not be unreasonable. And, and for another landlord and a different property, asking for a 700 might be very unreasonable. And so we want to know, what's the property? Like? What are your you know, what are you getting for rent? What type of tenants are you looking for? and help them try to make a good decision based on what their criteria is.   And every landlords different? Sometimes they know really well with that criteria should be sometimes they know they don't, so we can help kind of guide them in that right direction as well.   Micheal: Oh, that's really interesting. So do you guys collect then, kind of the reverse feed of data with regard to property type and locale and average rent, to then be able to offer that to landlords that come ask you that question?   Steve: It's not something that we're automating. And we're not building that into our reports, although, I feel like you just came up with a really good idea.   Michael: So that one's on me, Steve!   Steve: Right, right. suture idea? They're not, you know, it's really, you know, it's, it's in the moment when they're asking us because we're walking a very clear black and white line, when it comes to report interpretation, we've got to be very careful on our end, we can never make a decision on you know, for landlord. You should or you shouldn't rent to this person, we can only give them based on our experience and based on what their criteria is. So, you know, if a landlord says, you know, I've got this bar and it's pretty high and you know, this, this rental property means a lot to me. I raised my kids in this place, and we moved on and now we're renting it out. And, you know, there's a little bit of an emotional attachment there, and maybe they've got some higher end fixtures that you'd normally see in a rental unit. And so they want to make sure that the quality of tenant they're getting is very high quality.   We'll take that information. And that's how that's exactly how we're interpreting that report for them and saying, either this looks good, or, you know, I look at 200 reports a day. And there's a lot of red flags or risks here and this person doesn't seem to meet the criteria that you're reaching for. So usually, it's it's based on, you know, what the landlord is telling us in that moment, what they're looking for.   Michael: What would be interesting to chasing this rabbit further down this new idea hole is if you collected then eviction records from landlords based on tenants that you had screened, to be able to kind of look at the big data. And if somebody says, what are the most influential characteristics or criteria for a tenant who's going to be evicted? You can have predictive analytics.   Steve: So we do reduce sort of do that right now. There's a feature that, yeah, there's a feature that we have on our credit report, to TransUnion credit report that we're giving a score to that's called a resident score versus a traditional FICO score. And it's taking into consideration exactly like what you just said, there is there are, there are certain patterns and characteristics that people tend to follow who are either good renters and good, good paying renters or not. And so we're waiting, we're weighting those that data a bit different to to generate a little bit of a different score based on knowing that it's built for a rental.   Michael: Interesting. Very interesting. So, Steve, I got to ask the question that might be on everybody's mind. And I mean, all this information sounds really helpful and powerful. And it also sounds expensive. What is it going to cost the landlord to run some of these reports get some of this information?   Steve: Well, again, I feel like you're putting me in the sales man mode. So my sales answer is it's a lot less expensive than an eviction why, right?   Michael: The classic answer!   Steve: Right? Well, listen, you know, in our, our mantra here is always that an ounce of prevention is certainly worth a pound of cure. If you, you know, for landlords, you know, the kiss of death for any landlord is having a bad tenant, I mean, that's the difference between cash flowing positive or not, or having to put a ton of money into repairs, or having to just deal with the headache and nightmare of a bad tenant. You know, we've, we've all heard the horror stories, and a lot of us have seen the pictures that accompany those horror stories, and no, like, I don't ever want that I don't ever want to be in that situation.   So that front end, you know, due diligence that they're doing really is their best chance, especially in today's era, where evictions are next to impossible, if not impossible, depending on what the reasoning is right now. You know, this is the only chance that they have to really, really mitigate that risk is to make a good decision or the best informed decision that they can on the front end. So the cost is relatively inexpensive, and in most states, it's going to probably be less than what they're allowed to charge for application fees. Some states like California and New York, of course, it's going to be potentially outside of what you can charge for an application fee.   So it can range from 1895, for some real basic information, to $38 for a kind of, you know, the full boat of information, and then, and then you can add all kinds of things on there, like the income verification for an extra $10. And those sort of pieces, which are super helpful, because again, you're not you're, especially with the income verification, the last thing you ever want to do is take someone's word for it, or take their information and assume that it is accurate or truthful, and I'm not, I swear to you, I'm not that type of person that has trust issues and doesn't trust them.   But having having done this for a long time, I will tell you that it is far more common than you would probably think, to see doctored credit reports we've seen where the font is slightly different for the score, or you can tell that certain things have been omitted or deleted out paychecks that we've seen that are just completely fabricated. So, you know, with all of our products, we're taking that trust element out and we're you know, we're gathering that data outside of the tenants ability to interfere. So even with our income verification, we're getting that information straight from their bank, not not even their employers because a lot of employers nowadays too are trying to protect their employees information and they won't release salary information to you.   So the only way the only way around that is to go straight to the banks and and start taking a look at how much money is being deposited on a monthly basis. And we can, you know, share all that information with the landlords and tell them exactly what their income is, which may include, you know, we're also in the age of the side hustle. So a lot of people have their job plus their side hustle job and gathering some extra money. And so we want to look at the whole thing, you know, in as a as a, as a total or as a full picture versus, you know, gathering information from one employer and then trusting that they're, they're giving us accurate information about their 1099 side hustle money that's not really trackable, and you just sort of have to take them at their word what they're making on it.   Michael: Sure. Oh, that makes sense. Well, I experienced the horror story with my first tenant $10,000 in damage on the way out and small claims court eviction, the whole nine yards. So I do have trust issues. So I get it. It just, it kills me when people don't go to that level of due diligence, or they cheap out and get the basic and, again, not not promoting Rentprep or any other service, but like, just don't get the cheapest package you can. It's the equivalent of getting a property inspection, we do so much work on the diligence on the physical property, inspecting it, looking through it with a fine tooth comb. Why aren't we doing the same thing with tenants, this is the equivalent. So don't skimp on it, folks. Just pay the 10 bucks the extra 20 bucks and get it run.   Steve: Yeah do it now in a lot of times, that information that you may be skipping out on may hold the key to exactly what you want to avoid. So if you're looking at, for example, you know, property damage, and let's say that tenant that you were talking about that did $10,000 worth of damage. I'm assuming did you end up getting a judgment on them?   Micheal: We did. But collecting on that judgment is a whole nother story.   Steve: I guess I yeah, I could spend an hour talking about just collecting now. And I'll give landlord. I'll give landlord some good tips. And I'll give you a good tip too that might help you collect on that. But you know, that's a good example, like credit reports omitted judgments about three years ago. So judging is no longer included on a credit report at all.   Michael: Wow.   Steve: And it's we can thank our court system for that because no two courts are alike in the country. The courts are like the what courts are like the Wild West, it's the craziest thing you've ever seen. So you can have neighboring counties and different courts. And let's say you and I both owe money to Old Navy, we both got an Old Navy card. And we wanted to spend a ton of money on jeans and T shirts. And we just said let's do a   Michael: They've gpt great, great deals.   Steve: Right? So and then we both defaulted on the same day. And Old Navy Old Navy took us both to court on the same day. And we both got a judgment against us on the same day. And my my county court filed the judgment in your county court one county over not even in a different state, but just one county over filed that exact same judgment, same amount, same creditor all the same information, there was a very high chance that my record would end up being reported on my credit and yours would not. So only about 50% of judgments were being recorded on two credit reports which created a really unfair system, because why should I be punished for it right? In New nappy or vice versa. So right, so the credit bureaus decision was okay, the only we can't fix the courts, nobody can seem to do that.   Michael: That's a whole nother issue.   Steve: It is a whole nother issue. But since we can't fix the courts, then the only real fair thing to do here is just leave that information out omit it. And for landlords, you know, that became super dangerous, for obvious reasons of you're not going to be able to see that information, the other dangerous reasons because literally overnight, 22 million people saw almost a 10% increase in their credit score, just because of a you know, back end office move. That doesn't doesn't mean that they're trying to improve because of credit behaviors. But because we eliminated a an adverse piece of information that wasn't going to affect them negatively. So everybody's scores went up.   Michael: Wow. So in a kind of just real world example to paraphrase and make sure I understand this, if I'm I find this Navy Old Navy, credit card user and I went really crazy, like really crazy and I owe a let's say eight grand a month to old neighbor. And my income shows five grand a month getting deposited into my bank account, which is the income verification part of that I have a negative $3,000 a month habit burning a hole in my pocket, but you as the landlord or end user of that report will not see that.   Steve: You will not see any judgments just like the judgment that you have on that that tenant that did $10,000 of damage. Now obviously, as a landlord, you want to tell other landlords like, hey, beware, like, right? Don't let this guy do what he did to me. I wouldn't wish that on anybody. Most landlords have that mindset of, You know, I don't want someone else to have to suffer. But unless that landlord, that new landlord is doing a judgment search specifically, they'll never know about that judgment that you got on that tenant that that judgment will not haunt them, like every tenant, or every landlord wishes that it would in your mind, in your mind when you're going through all the steps to issue that judgment and get it and you finally have in your guess, this is a moral victory. It's a principle win! It's not unless it's unless someone else is looking it up. Otherwise, it's, you know, does it exist? Does a tree fall in the woods? if no one's around to hear it? It's like, you know, is that does that judgment even really exist? If the landlord's not looking for it?     Michael: But so this is a searchable thing that that rent prep can do?   Steve: Yeah, these are civil court record searches that are now emitted from credit reports. But we can reach into the courts and pull those those records out. So yeah, so a deeper dive is certainly worth it, especially in cases like yours.   Michael: Oh, yeah. So Steve, curious to know, in your experience, what are some of those major red flags that somebody who's looking at a red prep or some kind of other background check information report, could see and look to glean and say, Okay, if I'm seeing these four things, are these three things I either need to stop and pause? Or this is a definite non starter for me?   Steve: Well, I'll start right from the application process, because I feel like almost every landlord has run into this situation where somebody doesn't want to give their information. And they're going to claim that it's because they don't want to put their social security number down because they want to keep that private.   Michael: Yep. I've done that as a renter.   Steve: Okay, so now that one or two things are happening here, and it's important that landlords understand this, too. And I'm not saying you were wrong to do that. And you may have been very reasonable to do it. And so   Michael: I'm great renter.   Steve: Yeah, right. Okay, so, perfect point. Great renters want great landlords, right? If you don't trust this person that you're giving your information to, you're not going to give all your information. So part of the what we're doing like with our private Facebook community, or even a lot of our educational content, on rent prep calm, is really talking about how to be a good landlord, because good, the best tenants want good landlords. And if you're, if you're not presenting yourself, well, you're going to run into that more often than you want to where people are closed and don't want to give you the information because they, to be quite honest, they just don't trust you with it.   So that's one thing. The other thing is, what we have seen here and learned here and processing, as many reports, as we do is that more often than not, if somebody does not want to get the information, or if they intentionally give the wrong information, which we see a lot of somebody's flip flops a social security number, or adds a zero where it should be an eight. More often than not, they're they're trying to hide something that they're doing that knowing like, I don't want them to find this information. And it's better to have a no result or can't find the result versus seeing the negative result that would come up.   So I would say, you know, for a landlord, that first red flag is going to be if you start seeing a lot of generic information on a on an application. And, you know, first thing might be check yourself, make sure you're you're not the problem is the landlord like am I am I presenting myself well, and this thing, well, my, my professional and my handling this thing properly? Or do I seem like the type of person that somebody is not going to be comfortable sharing their information with, after the after that I would say, you know, for looking at the actual reports, what those red flags might be, I would set the obvious ones first, if they have a judgment from a previous landlord on their, or a property management company. And the tip I would give landlords is property management companies are obvious, right? It'll be ABC property management or, you know, ABC apartment community or whatever. But if you just see a person's name on there, you know, if it's just a Steven White as the creditor, or the plaintiff, there's a good chance that that's probably a landlord and it's definitely worth either calling the screening company to get a little bit further information, maybe they can help and tell you what it is. But it's not going to show up always as super obvious, like a judgment from Old Navy, or a judgment from ABC property management company.   So keep an eye out when you see individual names like that a lot of times it's it's from a landlord.   Michael: Okay.   Steve: The other one is going to be their their payment history. So if you're looking at a credit report, understand that most people pay things based on priority. If I, you know, that I'm going to collect a late fee, and maybe even have my vehicle repossessed if I don't make the payments on it promptly. I'm going to make sure that I pay that car payment ahead of some other payments, like my dentist bill who, maybe he hits me with a little late fee, maybe not, maybe I can call him and talk to Nancy, you know, the office manager and talk her out of a payment, you know, late fee or something.   But really, it comes to a prioritization. So if you start seeing late payments and a shaky payment history, and it's even for things that I would consider to be high priorities, such as housing, rent, those types of things, that's usually a red flag, too, because if these are high priority items that they can't make timely payments on. That's usually a sign of distress, and not that they're creatively trying to manage their finances and choosing, okay, well, maybe I can pay this thing late this month. But this one's a priority, I need to pay it. So good. renters always prioritize the rent payment, above all else, you know, that's their housing, that's the thing that needs to get paid above their Old Navy bill or buying, you know, beer and smokes for the weekend. So you want to make sure that rent payment is its top priority.   So you're looking for somebody that knows how to prioritize, and evictions, evictions are obvious. You know, that's that probably the single most important piece of data that you can gather to show somebody prior history with renting. Now, the issue with that is, obviously have an eviction moratorium, right now that's going on. You have some states like the wonderful state of New York that I'm in that eliminated evictions from being viewed at all. So landlords cannot even look at an eviction when they're considering or doing their screener in considering a new tenant makes it really tough. It's like, you know, tying one hand behind your pack and trying to trying to fight.   So, but that eviction data is super critical, because evictions don't always you know, what the media or people sometimes portray as sort of a victim situation where somebody, you know, their kid got sick, and they lost their job, and they can't pay their rent, and now they got evicted, you're evicted. And it's tragic. Those are not the typical scenarios, you know, the typical scenario is the guy who has parties and kicked holes in the wall or flushed his socks down the toilet, and, and you don't want to rent to this person or in New York's case, they're in their mind, they're trying to protect tenants. But it's, it's so counterproductive. Because if you if you evicted somebody for being aggressive to a neighbor, or another tenant in a building, and that was the basis for the eviction, now you're eliminating the next landlord to be able to see that information and make that decision and, and putting all the other tenants at risk. So the eviction data is critical. And I would say more often than not, the evictions are not some really sad, tragic story about somebody whose circumstances were well beyond their control and they're, they're a victim of, you know, a broken system. Most of the evictions that we see are certainly well deserved. And landlords need to be aware.   Michael: Yeah. So are we entering now, a new cycle? I mean, whenever evictions, the the moratorium gets lifted, the fact that that information from this stretch of time is not going to be able to be viewed by landlords. Do you? Do you foresee a really tough next rental cycle where landlords are going to be dealing with a lot of crummy tenants because they didn't have access to the full picture?   Steve: For sure. And I would say, you know, the mindset for the terrible mindset in a lot of ways, but I know a lot of businesses have had the mindset of, this pandemic has been rough on business, obviously, some more than others. But I heard somebody say, never let a good pandemic go to waste. Like if you're going to, if you're going to try to make lemonade out of being handed a couple of lemons, you're going to take that opportunity and don't think that tenants aren't going to do the same. So anything that would have been maybe just bad, you know, bad character or bad payment history or being irresponsible now has the easy go to pandemic blame to say like, Well, that was related to the pandemic. And so, you know, you can't count that. So I think a lot of people are going to abuse that, you know, and especially when it comes to evictions, or even just simply their own personal finances. You know, we're seeing that here, pretty much on a daily basis where somebody never lost her employment never took a pay decrease throughout the entire pandemic, but as using the pandemic as a legitimate reason to be able to get out of paying things on time or taking full advantage of it, and so that's gonna, that's gonna take a while to work its way through the system for sure, unfortunately.   Michael: So how can landlords combat that or what is rent prep doing to help landlords combat that?   Steve: Well, one of the things that landlords are going to need to be aware of his credit bureaus themselves are working really hard to hide information. That was pandemic related. And again, you're not going to avoid people who abuse the system, if they're going to be out there. And it's going to happen, unfortunately, but at least you're not putting on putting it on the landlord to have to make that decision.   So the idea is, if we just hide that information, and you don't see it, the landlord can't make a mistake, and, and use a piece of information against somebody that they shouldn't have.   Michael: Got it.   Steve: So at least at least it's holding them, you know, less liable in terms of a compliance error or discriminating against somebody who they shouldn't be. But beyond that, I would say the landlord's like, like always, nothing's really changed, have really good communication, ask a lot of questions. If you see something come up on a report, or credit report or, you know, criminal record or anything, start asking questions.   It's not always a black and white thing, when you're looking at this type of data, it's not always as simple as well, they've got a criminal record. So they must be bad, we're not going to run through them. You know, people change and a lot of times, you know, they don't need to suffer endlessly for a mistake that they made. And a lot of times, they come out a lot better afterwards. And so those conversations are critical for a landlord to be able to say, does this criminal record, really truly impact whether or not this person is going to be a good renter for me or not? And a lot of times, even a criminal record with with some clarity around it may not be as concerning as it as it seems, initially. So good communications to key there.   Michael: Yeah, it's such a great point. And I know for I know, for me, too, as someone who, when I was first looking at credit background checks, that was a big scary one for me, but the fact that you could chat with an account rep at RentPrep and start to have those conversations with the tenant, it doesn't necessarily need to be a non starter, it can be Oh, let's try to understand what's going on. Because you're right, it shouldn't. People's past doesn't need to haunt them for eternity.   Steve: Right. And I'll say this, too, especially when it comes to evictions, we know that the data shows that somebody is three times more likely to be evicted again, once they've been evicted once, hmm, the reason for that is because that fear of the unknown is gone. Right? Like, if you've never gone through an eviction, you don't know what's gonna happen, like, are the police gonna come and throw me out what, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to think have, you know what the potentials are, because I don't know it. And it's scary. Once it's happened, and they know the ins and outs of it, it becomes a lot less scary.   So if you see somebody that had an eviction, five years ago, four years ago, it may not be as big of a red flag, as you might think, you know, number one, they've only had one and not three. So that's, that's a positive, right? But it's always it's always worth the conversation. If you're on the fence, if everything else looks good, and it's this one piece that you're like, I just don't feel great about this. Don't be afraid to call that person up and say, Hey, I saw that you had an eviction on here, talk me through that, what what happened there? And you might find that it was a, something that happened, that's not going to happen again, or something that they learn from and doesn't seem like, you know, it's it's a it's a pattern or something that is going to creep up again.   And so it's always worth having good communication. Background checks are great conversation starters. You know, so rank that way. Yeah.   Michael: Great point. Steve. I'm curious because we were chatting about it a little bit ago that I was someone that never liked when I was renter putting my social security number on on applications. What is the impact for a renter of getting a background check or a credit check? I mean, does that does that affect their credit score? Does that show up as a true inquiry like if you get a new Old Navy credit card for instance?   Steve: Yeah, so thank god TransUnion, who is the In my opinion, the best credit bureau the best one to work with certainly, and I think the ones who really have had their stuff together, you know, working with the all three different credit bureaus TransUnion, as has been the best one for us to work with. And about two, maybe three months ago, they passed, sweeping changes that in the housing industry for rentals that Inquiries were no longer going to be hard inquiries or affect their credit. And this was a huge, huge change, right?   Because if you live in an area like Portland, OR San Francisco or, you know, there seems to be a million of them now, even even if you have perfect credit, the chances of you applying to someplace and getting it on the first shot are almost slim to none like, most people, most people are applying to 10 different places. So and hoping that one of them hits and one of them lands, you know, so Long gone are the days where you put in a rental application with a solid background and you're guaranteed going to get it there's a real high chance that you're going to end up submitting multiple and having multiple background checks ran on you. So TransUnion saw this and and i think handled the issue correctly, which was make it a non issue, it no longer affects anyone's credit to pull their credit for rental purposes.   The way it used to be, was the same rules that applied for anything they want to do eliminate credit fishing. So if you go to Old Navy, and I'm trying to think of some tribal colloquia here and get this local stuff where so you got an Old Navy, and you get a card and Trader Joe's and I don't know, can't think of another one here, but some other, you know, department store or wherever that they're offering you, you know, credit, the Bureau's would see that as this is not good, if this person's applying for all of these things in a short window of time, it's usually an abuse of credit, it's usually what they call fishing. So if you get denied for one credit card, and then the next thing you do is apply for another one, and then another one until you get the credit limit that you want or the line that you want. That was something that they would punish people for. But in the rental industry, obviously, that's not the case, like you could very well apply 5-10 different places and doesn't mean that you're fishing, or you're doing anything weird, it just means you live in a really competitive area that there's more applicants than there is housing.   Michael: Well, that's great. And that's great information to know both as a renter, someone who's going to be potentially renting and also as a landlord to have those conversations with folks that don't want to give your social security number for fear that that that's no longer an issue.   Steve: Yeah, that was a huge deal for us. Because we would deal with a lot of inquiry disputes, which was a real, a real administrative pain for us on the compliance end of things because somebody would say, Hey, you know, I applied to this place, but I didn't think they'd actually pull my credit. And I want to get this credit inquiry off my credit report. And we'd have to go through this really lengthy process with them. And so now that doesn't even exist. It's been Yeah, it was like a real smart, one of those rare times where you're like, Man, that made sense. And in every logical way, and everyone did the right thing. I feel like that just doesn't happen all the time where you're like, we solve the problem efficiently.   Michael: And now it's working.   Steve: Yeah, right. Right. Right. But in that case, TransUnion really did get it right. Beyond that, I would think most people that their reason for not wanting to share their social security number is, you know, they're afraid of who's looking at it, what's going to happen, does this mean that my information is going to get stolen? Right, and the ugly truth that nobody wants to hear, but I see it from a different point of view working on the data side is your information has probably already been stolen. And your your information is far easier to access than anybody would ever wish or hope. That's that's the that's the unfortunate ugly reality that we pretty.   Micheal: It's pretty scary what you can find when just by googling stuff.   Steve: Yeah, yeah, for sure.   Michael: I've got a question, Steve. And then I want to wrap this up. And I don't know if there's a quick answer for this. You tell me if we need to do a homebuyer episode around this. But why in the heck, are there three separate credit agencies to begin with? Why can't we just have one?   Steve: Good question, I think so I can tell you maybe a little bit of the, the genesis of it and the reason why there's three bureaus and why the three bureaus have different scores. That's something that we hear we hear a lot like my TransUnion scores 600 but my Equifax score is 650. Like, why the discrepancy? So So first off, when it comes to scores, those are, especially if we're talking about FIFO. Everyone knows FIFO or is from the word, but FIFO is an actual accounting company. That's fair. Isaac's Fair, Isaac's companies with FIFO stands for. They're a privately held company, and they don't share their algorithm for scoring even with the credit bureaus. So nobody knows the secret sauce of what it is that that goes into it.   So the issue with so many different scores really comes from who's doing the who's doing the algorithms? And what are the what are the scores being based on? So after the big financial crisis in oh eight, the A lot of companies responses to how do we, how do we get back, you know, economically from a recession? And unfortunately, the answer was, well, we should create like a bell curve for credit scores. And so there's different FICO models that have, you could take the exact same information and put it into the model. And depending on the, which version of the FICO model that you're using, if it's an old four model, that would be from 2004, that's what they would consider to be the classic model, then there's an 08 model, which is like the recession model, so you're gonna have a much more inflated number.   And so the answer is that because there's a lot of different industries, so that's the same reason why you have a lot of different scoring models. And the same reason that you have three different credit bureaus is because at one point in time, the credit bureaus, each sort of specialized in an industry. And it's a lot less of that now, they're pretty broad. Some of them might specialize more, that's why sometimes you might have like a Verizon bill that shows up on TransUnion, but not Equifax or something like that. Or some sort of utility bill is usually what we see that shows up on some and not others. So that's the real reason, the reason that there's only three? I don't know. Those became sort of the accepted standard, and anyone else who's created anything, has not had the adoption rate that you would need to legitimize that type of information. And we've seen it over the years.   Michael: A true rating agency.   Steve: Yeah, exactly. So, you know, they've become the standard, they've they carry credibility. Lenders trust them, obviously, landlords trust them, you know, all different industries are trusting them. And so for anyone else to sort of step into the arena and want to create the same thing, it's a really, really high, high barrier to climb over because they're missing all of that credibility that the three bureaus have.   Micheal: sure they're already the three 800 pound gorillas in the room.   Steve: That's it? Yeah. Okay. You know, the one thing that I would say landlords need to be aware of, too, is, you know, I know the government right now has been talking about creating a centralized Bureau, that's something that we're keeping an eye on really, really closely in our industry, and I, I don't necessarily hate the idea, right. Like, I love the idea of standardizing as much as possible, it makes things a lot more accurate. My concern there, especially for landlords is, you know, be really interesting to see how the government achieves that or what their plan is for it. But again, I feel like there's, you know, there's a lot of missed information when you start talking about those types of things.   So what's going to be included? What's not included? Who's actually determining what information is fair or not fair. And again, you know, using New York as an example, the best example I can come up with is those evictions, you know, where New York determines that it's not fair to use them and talk to any landlord here in New York? And they'll tell you, it's absolutely insane. And why shouldn't we use that. So, you know, when you lose that type of control, then you start losing your grip on that type of information that you might be able to make a really well informed decision on. So that would be my concern with with having one central credit, credit bureau is who's determining what gets reported and what's not.   Michael: Makes total sense. And I've got one final question to kind of reward all the listeners who stuck through with us till the very end and understanding fully that we don't know what the secret sauce is, but a question I get all the time, just in life in the Roofstock Academy. How do I boost my credit score? What are some things I can do? Do you have any insight, any tips?   Steve: I do? I do. And it's it's funny, we some, you know, all the screeners here pretty much every employee here at Red prep, we look at so many credit reports we really do where it is our own badge of honor, we probably talked about our own personal credit scores more than the employees normally what. It is like bragging rights, like, Oh, I got my score up over 800 because you sort of see you see how the game is played and what you're trying to do?   So first and foremost, if you are not automating every payment that affects your score, you need to stop what you're doing and do that right now. Go set it up in your bank, or with the with the creditor, whoever it is, whether it be a car payment, whatever, if it affected their reporting, your payments, you need to make sure that you automate those payments so you can never miss a payment even accidentally. That would be first and foremost. Payment History. Bears so much weight on a score, that if you screw it up and you miss a payment, even if it's accidental, even if you have a legitimate reason, even if it's a great reason, it's going to impact your score in ways that you don't want it to. So first and foremost, automate your payments that impact your score and then prioritize from there.   Second would be careful what you apply for, don't think that you can go to five different auto dealerships and apply at five different places. And that's not going to affect your score negatively it will, the rental industry, like we just talked about is about the only industry that you can do that now, sort of fish for credit, anything else, if you do that, that's going to negatively impact your score, even if you get the credit. So, you know, if you apply for three credit cards over a stretch of three months, and you get every credit card that you apply for, that still has the chance to negatively impact your credit score, because too many inquiries for a specific industry.   So if you apply for an auto loan, a mortgage and a credit card all in the same month, it's not going to impact you, that's three inquiries. But if you apply for three credit cards in a month, that's going to impact your credit, because they're all they're all from the same industry. And then I would say, the other thing is carry, depending on your depending on your credit, if you don't have any debts, it's not always a good idea to just pay things off and close them out. So if you don't have a lot of credit bearing accounts, and you just happen to pay everything off, it's for sure a good idea to keep one or two cards, buy some stuff, pay it off monthly, just just so you can generate payment information because no information is not always good either, you know, a lack of information, lack of payment details, what we hear in our, in our industry, we call that a thin file, somebody who just doesn't have a lot of payment information seems like it would be not bad, right? Like, well, it's not bad information. So it must be good. It's not, you know, no information, sometimes it's you know, can damage your score almost as much as bad information.   So keep something you know, keep a credit card, have a low balance, pay it off, but show that you're making payments on it, so that at least it can tick that box every month showing that you're making consistent payments, if you just pay everything off, and there's no record of anything, it won't take long before your score starts slipping.   Michael: Okay. And something that I've heard is to increase credit limits. So that way you end and continue spending the same amount. So your available credit goes up. But the amount you're utilizing stays small.   Steve: Your debt to limit ratio, right, like what you actually owe, and what your limit or ability is to borrow. That is calculated. So if you can, because what you don't want to do is you don't want to be maxed out, or even close to or above 80%. Because that does start to impact your score because they're looking at it as if things go bad. What's your ability to pull yourself out of that situation? If you don't have the available credit to erase that debt that you have? Then you're you're in a bad spot? So yeah, that's a really good point. If you can get a line increase or limit increase, do it worth it. You got to be responsible. I mean, it's like a load.   Oh man I feel dangerous like giving this advice. But yeah, if you're going to be responsible, and you're doing it with that intention, not a bad idea. If you can't be trusted with credit, and you're trying to really repair your your credit, your credit score, you know, then you're good. But for some people, I feel like they, you know, they shouldn't be trusted with a two year limit. It's just yeah, it's bad idea.   Michael: That's, that's that's playing with fire.   Okay, awesome. Well, Steve, I want to be very conscientious of your time. Thank you so much for hanging out with us today and talking to us about RentPrep and just landlord screening in general, what's the best way for folks to either get ahold of you or rent prep or utilize any of the services that that you offer?   Steve: Everything's at RentPrep.com it's a super good resource for landlords to look anything up from tips on how to turn over a property tips for good showings, tips for screening, obviously, and finding the best tenants. And then we've got a private Facebook community that we're really proud of. It's about 12,000 landlords, we will actually not allow landlords, more landlords are not allowed in the group that are allowed in the group we are super picky with who gets in the group and who doesn't. Because we want to try to keep the streets clean and keep it a really safe place for landlords to go and, and share knowledge and help each other out. So there's no no selling in there. You can't be a guru and sell your latest course and that kind of stuff. We want to make sure real landlords and helping each other we see a lot of really great you know, interactions in there, like, you know, somebody has a house fire in their rental property and they're scared to death and don't know what, what's next what to do and, and you'll, you'll see, you know a handful of landlords three or five of them that say, you know this happened to me within the past year, here's what you can expect, here's what you need to do. And so it's filling in those gaps for those landlords and erasing some of that fear of the unknown for them.   So that's our Facebook community, rent prep for landlords, and then also our podcast, which is the rent prep podcast, which I'm sure you can find on iTunes and Stitcher. And we're about 300 plus episodes in tons of great knowledge there. Obviously, you should be listening to Roofstock's podcasts as well. So I'm not trying to steal your audience or anything. But our podcast is, is hosted by Andrew Schultz, who is a professional property manager. And this guy has seen it all and shares a ton of really, really useful information. And it's a it's a good podcast, if you're a landlord, who is looking for, you know, ways to manage your property better or looking to you know, what's going on in the industry currently.   So that's a good way to connect with us there and live chat call in mean, we're a real company. got real real here. seems crazy nowadays, like many people call us and say like, oh, it caught me off guard, like somebody actually answered the phone. But yeah, we're, you know, we're an old school company, you can call us and talk to somebody, you can reach us on email and live chat and all that sort of stuff. You know, we're here to answer questions. And I would even say, there's no such thing as a crazy question. Here. We get it all.   Michael: So just just crazy people, right?   Steve: Plenty of those.     Michael: Thank you so much for hanging out with us. Really appreciate it. We'll have to have you back on a future episode and take care man.   Steve: Yeah. Thank you. Appreciate you having me on.   Michael: All right, everybody. That was our episode a big, big, big thank you to Steve. This was a lot of fun. I learned a ton. I'm going to be definitely putting a lot of this into practice and look forward to using a lot of these features as I look to self manage a few properties. So again, thank you everybody. If you enjoyed this episode, feel free to leave us a rating or review wherever it is listening to episodes. We love Comments, feedback, additional episodes, ideas on the things that you all want to hear about. We look forward to seeing on the next one. Happy investing.   

Stephen M. White is the Founder and CEO of RentPrep, the leading tenant screening solution for busy landlords. His company website has millions of views every year and his company has over 90,000 clients! He brings 20 years of experience in the credit industry and entrepreneurship to his role leading a growing team of executives determined to make renting easier for all. Prior to founding RentPrep, Stephen honed and tested his leadership skills while serving as a Non-Commissioned Officer in the United States Marines Corps, where he received two Certificates of Commendation for exceptional demonstration of duty. Stephen is a sought after expert and frequent keynote speaker and presenter at industry events around the country.

Would having a company do your tenant screening for you free up some time? Brad’s guest today is Andrew Schultz, the broker/owner of Own Buffalo Inc., a real estate and property management company in New York. Andrew is also the host of the RentPrep for Landlords Podcast in addition to having his own show. Listen as they discuss property management and RentPrep for the landlords plus much more on this episode of The Property Management Mastermind Show.   Andrew shares about his business and how it is doing during this pandemic. He speaks about the classes his properties fall under, and the time it takes to get a property approved for section 8 housing benefits, which is why he charges a fee to the owners. Andrew also talks about a program his company has that has been working really well so far.   Do you have in-depth screening criteria? Brad and Andrew discuss how important it is to screen well if you want to have a low percentage of late payments and foreclosures. Andrew shares how he got involved with RentPrep and the screening process they use that works well for Own Buffalo, Inc.   If you haven’t listened to the RentPrep for Landlords Podcast, you should, and if you are a property manager, landlord, or investor, want to connect, share, learn, collaborate, and sign up for the RentPrep for Landlords Facebook group. You will be glad you did.   In this episode: [02:30] Welcome back to the show, Andrew! [02:34] Andrew shares a little about himself. [03:32] What is going on in your company during this pandemic? [05:22] Andrew describes what he means by A, B, and C class properties. [07:15] Andrew speaks about his section 8 housing and the time it takes to get through the section 8 paperwork process. [09:25] Do you see section 8 housing authority expanding into your B class properties? [11:29] Brad speaks about charging owners of the Class B properties to start the approval process for housing authority funds for people who can’t pay their rent. [15:18] Andrew shares a program his company does that works well. [17:38] Andrew discusses how they handle their accounts, getting all the funds upfront, and providing a packet that explains everything. [20:08] Brad and Andrew talk about screening criteria they use for single-family and multi-family. [23:28] Brad discusses enormous companies coming in and buying up management companies and not managing them. [26:55] Can you tell us more about how you got involved with Rentprep? [30:11] Andrew speaks about using Rentprep for their tenant screening services. [33:48] Where are you going to take the podcast now that you are the host? [36:21] Andrew shares where you can find him if you want to talk. [38:04] Andrew speaks about some issues he has seen on the Facebook group. [39:45] Thank you for being on the show! Links and Resources: Property Management Mastermind Property Management Mastermind Group on Facebook adisarro@sccombank.com (619) 988-6708 (Allison DiSarro from Seacoast Commerce Bank) Seacoast Commerce Bank Second Nature NARPM Southern States Conference National Apartment Association NARPM Accounting Standards EZ Repair Hotline SureVestor Tenant Turner Citizen Home Solutions Rent Bridge    Find Andrew: Andrew Schultz Rentprep Podcast LinkedIn | Facebook

I’m very thankful for RentPrep, the community we serve, and those of you that listen to this podcast. Thank you!

It happens. A former tenant moves out and is upset so they trash the place. This happened to one of our Facebook group members who was shocked when they saw a giant Venn Diagram on the wall of their rental. Listen as this case unfolds in RentPrep court and Judge Rudy Fortune shares his thoughts on the matter.

Resources mentioned in this episode: https://www.rentprep.com/resources/ https://www.texasrealestate.com/for-texas-realtors/legal-faqs/category/landlord-tenant-issues https://www.classaction.org/employment-background-checks Narrator voice This is the plaintiff Jim Jackson he’s a renter from Texas and he says the defendant denied him a rental because he has a large family. He’s suing for $1,000 in statutory damages related to his discrimination claim.Narrator voiceThis is the defendant Wilson Wharton who claims he found better renters and that Jim is just angry he was denied the rental.Bailiff Will all parties please raise their right hand Narrator voice  - What you are about to hear is only real in your imagination. The judgements are fictitious but real life lessons are waiting to unfold. Welcome to RentPrep court.   Bailiff All rise for the honorable Judge Rudy Fortune. Judge Rudy FortuneJim Jackson you are suing Mr. Wilson Wharton for damages of $1,000 dollars because you believe you and your family were discriminated against. What kind of evidence do you have to substantiate your claims.Renter Jim JacksonYour honor. I have six kids and it’s been very difficult for my wife and I to find a place to live. We’ve been denied many rentals so far but with Mr. Wharton it was the only time we felt someone discriminated against us.Judge Rudy What makes you believe that you were discriminated against?   Renter Jim JacksonWhen we looked at the rental he kept asking us prying questions about our family. He started off by making a comment about our mini-van and asked me how many kids we have. He made comments during the showing and said that the rental was ideal for couples and not great for families. But we’re desperate so we filled out an application and paid the $50 fee and we were never told if we were denied.   Judge RudySo how did you find out you were denied the rental?   Renter Jim JacksonI called Mr. Wharton about a week later to ask about the rental and he said he went with another applicant.Judge RudyMr. Wharton… is this true?Landlord Wilson WhartonNot completely your honor. I never made any comments about their mini-van or that the rental is better suited for landlords. That simply did not happen. Jim’s right that I did rent out the space to someone else who is a better fit for the rental.   Judge RudyMmm hmmmm… and how did you make that determination that the other applicant was a better fit for your rental?   Landlord Wilson WhartonThey had a much longer and more stable job history so I ran their background check and everything checked out fine.  Judge RudyMr. Wharton did you provide Mr. Jackson with your tenant-selection criteria when he filled out an application?Landlord Wilson WhartonAhhhh… no your honor.Judge Rudy (cue music)Mmmm your situation reminds me of a friend of mine growing up. A bunch of us use to play baseball down by the quarry at the edge of town. We’d go to Mr. Jenkins grocery store and snag some of his spare cardboard boxes. We’d make some bases and drop em down on the field and have ourselves a day playing until suppa time. Our one friends we called Racing Rick because he’d run so fast round the bases his feet would never touch cardboard until he got to home plate. In school he was the same way. He was always cutting corners to get things done as quickly as possible. Mr. Wharton do you understand why I am bringing up Racing Rick today?Landlord Wilson WhartonAhhh… I’m not sure I’m following your honor.Judge RudyYou mentioned you didn’t provide the applicant with your tenant-selection-criteria. In the state of Texas it is required to make printed notice of the landlord’s tenant-selection criteria available to the applicant. Are you aware of this law? Landlord Wilson WhartonNo I wasn’t your honor.Judge RudyNow, this tells me you’re a landlord who doesn’t touch the bases because you’re too busy thinking bout home plate. You’re racing just like Rick to get that rental filled as fast as possible. My suggestion is that you read up on your state and local municipalities law’s before you start screening tenants.Landlord Wilson WhartonI’m sorry your honor. I’ll do that ASAP.Renter Jim JacksonI bet he didn’t read up on the Fair Housing laws neither!!! I want my money for being discriminated against!   [Gavel noise + crowd murmur]   Judge RudyMr. Jackson. My courtroom is not a place for accusations... but finding the truth of the matter. Do you have any other evidence to present that would suggest you were discriminated against?Renter Jim JacksonNo your honor but it’s obvious he doesn’t follow the law!Judge RudyMr. Jackson as far as your case of discrimination against Mr. Wharton... please tell your wife I said sorry Mrs. Jackson... and I am for real... and I never meant to make your daughter cry... and that I apologize a trillion times. You see a courtroom isn’t a place for anecdotal evidence. I need evidence and not your version of the truth.Landlord Wilson WhartonThank you your honor![gavel noises] Judge RudyI’m not finished Mr. Wharton. Now yes, I am going to dismiss the charges of $1,000 in this claim of discrimination. However, in the state of Texas if you charge a tenant an application fee to run a background check you must present them with a written notice of your tenant-selection-criteria. Since you rejected the applicant and failed to make your criteria known you must refund the application fee to Mr. Jackson. You got off lucky today but my suggestion is that you stop cutting corners and read up on the laws. My verdict is a payment of $50 to the plaintiff.[gavel sound]Narrator: Well.. the honorable judge threw out the discrimination claim in a case of cutting corners but the plaintiff was still awarded $50. We’re going to toss this over to Steve and Eric to see what the guys in the RentPrep office think about this.

On today's episode of the InvestFourMore Real Estate Podcast, I speak with Steve White and Eric Worral of RentPrep. Steve started RentPrep to help large property management companies screen their tenants after working in the debt collection business trying to get bad tenants to pay their bills. I talk with both Eric and Steve about how they screen tenants, how they help landlords find great tenants, what it is like to try to collect debts from tenants, and things landlords need to watch out for when renting their properties. There is a ton of great information on this podcast, and I learned a lot, as I am sure many of you will as well.  

Going to court is stressful and that's why we want to share details of court cases so you have the knowledge ahead of time so you don't end up in court like these landlords. In this episode Judge Rudy Fortune rules on if the landlord should be able to keep the security deposit plus additional damages caused by their renter.

Join Mark and Mat as they discuss tips and strategies on finding the right tenant for your rental properties and also drafting the most effective lease agreement. The will also be joined with special guests Steve White and Eric Worral from www.RentPrep.com.  Steve and Eric have screened thousands of tenants for property owners over the past 10+ years.  You will be amazed at the insightful tips that will help you maximize your profits with your rentals.  For more information and to sign up for Mark and Mat's weekly E-Newsletter visit www.refreshyourwealth.com.

Join Mark and Mat as they discuss tips and strategies on finding the right tenant for your rental properties and also drafting the most effective lease agreement. The will also be joined with special guests Steve White and Eric Worral from www.RentPrep.com.  Steve and Eric have screened thousands of tenants for property owners over the past 10+ years.  You will be amazed at the insightful tips that will help you maximize your profits with your rentals.  For more information and to sign up for Mark and Mat's weekly E-Newsletter visit www.refreshyourwealth.com.

This is a timely but unfortunate topic to discuss as hurricanes have ripped through Texas and Florida. In this rebroadcast of episode 59 Steve and Jeff will discuss what landlords... The post #172 Natural Disasters and Landlords (rebroadcast) appeared first on RentPrep.

I was on a landlord thread recently where a property manager explained how he ended up with his former tenant’s ashes. His story was the reason we decided to rebroadcast... The post #171 Abandoned Ashes!?!? appeared first on RentPrep.

Emotional Support Animals are all the rage these days for landlord or perhaps we should say that they enrage landlords. It’s a tough subject and we’ve found a great ally... The post #170 ESA Troubles? Meet Jaime Michelle Cain appeared first on RentPrep.

Stephanie DeLeo is an active landlord in our Facebook group and she asked plenty of great questions. We reached out to her and asked if she would be willing to... The post #169 Community Member Shares Her Landlord Journey appeared first on RentPrep.

  Bill Manassero of Old Dawg’s REI podcast is our guest this week. He shares with us his experience of picking up real estate later in life and everything he’s learned... The post #168 Old Dawg’s REI Podcast Interview appeared first on RentPrep.

We’re continuing to read through a post from our Facebook Group where 30+ landlords chimed in to give us their best landlord advice. This is part two of a two... The post #167 Best Landlord Advice Part 2 appeared first on RentPrep.

  Recently a landlord asked our Facebook group for their best landlord advice. The 59 comments that rolled in are priceless in our opinion. This week’s episode is part one of... The post #166 Best Landlord Advice Part 1 appeared first on RentPrep.

Our guest Al Williamson is a former engineer and now full-time landlord who likes to experiment with his rentals. He works on ways to increase the revenue of his rentals and... The post #165 Short-Term Rentals With Al Williamson appeared first on RentPrep.

It happens… sometimes you have that great tenant lined up to move into the rental and the lease is signed… and they call and want to break it. What do... The post #164 Tenant Wants To Break Lease Before Moving In appeared first on RentPrep.

In this casual episode Steve and Eric rift on landlord stress and ways to manage it. Intro – Impressions 1:00 – B- Morgan Freeman 3:10 – Dealing with stress 4:20 – Rocking... The post #163 Dealing With Stress appeared first on RentPrep.

Philip Bottfeld is a landlord down in Miami, Florida that purchases condos in 55 and over communities. In this podcast he shares what he has learned about managing rentals in... The post #162 Managing 55+ Rentals With Philip Bottfeld appeared first on RentPrep.

Andrew Schultz is a property manager in Buffalo, NY and he shares a document with every potential client that covers the 10 questions you should ask a property manager before hiring... The post #161 10 Questions To Ask A Property Manager appeared first on RentPrep.

Joan Mershon teaches classes for renters at RentWell.org She has an interesting perspective in that she helps to educate renters on how to get a rental and knowing their rights.... The post #160 Flipping Perspectives With Joan Mershon of Rent Well appeared first on RentPrep.

Lee manages over 250 rental properties and shares his tips on using Google Voice and how he handles the rental application process. Learn how he was able to defend a... The post #159 Mastering The Rental Application Process With Lee McEachern appeared first on RentPrep.

In this week’s episode we’re talking about how to collect on tenant debts. This is a tough task and Steve shares years of experience working in the debt collection industry. Discussions in... The post #158 Service Animals and Landlords appeared first on RentPrep.

In this week’s episode we’re talking about how to collect on tenant debts. This is a tough task and Steve shares years of experience working in the debt collection industry. Discussions in... The post #157 Collecting On Tenant Debts appeared first on RentPrep.

  In this week’s episode we’re talking about security deposit funds and what to do with the funds. A good resource is to check your state laws with our state... The post #156 Security Deposit Funds appeared first on RentPrep.

  We’re continuing from last week’s episode on Landlord Vernacular. Steve and Eric discuss 5 more landlord terms you should be aware of with your rental properties. Discussions in this... The post #155: Landlord Vernacular Part 2 appeared first on RentPrep.

  There are terms that your average joe won’t know but an experienced landlord will. In this episode Steve and Eric discuss some terms you may or may not know... The post #154: Landlord Vernacular Part 1 appeared first on RentPrep.

  Dan Lane has interviewed over 100 landlords on his podcast called the Rental Income Podcast. He agreed to join us for an episode on our podcast and share his... The post #153: Dan Lane Shares His Experience From The Rental Income Podcast appeared first on RentPrep.

For over 10 years we’ve hand-compiled each and every background check for our clients and have included a pass/fail credit check as an available add-on. Now we’re pleased to announce... The post #152 – SmartMove Background Checks For Landlords appeared first on RentPrep.

Stephen R. Covey wrote the book called “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” where he discusses the circle of influence. Here’s a video showing how to use this technique... The post #151 – Seven Habits of Highly Effective Landlords appeared first on RentPrep.

This is the 5th round of Landlord Balderdash where Steve has to guess which landlord story is real and which one is balderdash. We’ve decided there should be a punishment... The post #150 Final Round of Landlord Balderdash appeared first on RentPrep.