Your name is your most valuable trademark.

We come across plenty of young people who rent properties. They have no idea of the repercussions of not paying your rent, damaging the property or just not notifying the landlord about critical maintenance issues.

If they have to go to the Tenancy Tribunal this will be on their record – with all other potential Landlords being able to see the outcome of the hearing. This could make it difficult to rent in the future. It may not worry a 20 something who jumps from flat to flat, but I am sure a 30 something with young children and a desperate need to find a decent home may regret having a record.

If they owe money after the Tribunal hearing then this may also affect their credit rating. Which in turn could affect their ability to do a who number of things such as gaining credit, buying a house or even limit your job prospects.

One young “ex” tenant that have been dealing with told me it didn’t worry him if I got debt collectors to collect the amount he owed in rent arrears. After all he owned nothing and had nothing for them to take, he was bullet proof and invincible. I sent him a little email, outlining the impact that decision will have on his future. He is due to make his first payment tomorrow towards paying back his debt.

So for all tenants who are new to the renting scene. Don’t take your decisions lightly. Take care in who you choose for flatmates. Always pay your rent and look after the place. Your name is your most important trademark and don’t ever tarnish it.

The first rule to avoid "bad tenants" - you can never do too many checks.

Further to Jackie's last blog, I came across another situation recently where the property investor could have been saved time and expense if their Property Manager had spent a few minutes checking the prospective tenants thoroughly. While doing a routine check for a prospective tenant on the Tenancy Tribunal site I noticed an individual had a history of seven Tenancy Tribunal applications made against them over a period of 3 years with total costs awarded being over $7000.00 plus other costs that were not pursued at Tribunal. All the applications were made by Real Estate companies and each of the offences were similar to the last.

You can forgive the first applicant and maybe the second as the first case might not have been published at the time of checking the tenants background, but there is really no excuse for the real estate companies who filed the last few applications. One of which required a bulldozer to remove the rubbish on the property, it was that bad (one wonders why a property inspection didn't pick this up sooner). Amazingly enough a few of the real estate agents were also chasing their letting fees. I would have thought the tenant would have been required to pay this before moving in. Yet another alarm bell ringing that was ignored.

If they had taken the time to do the checks and looked at warning signs they would have realised that this is a tenant nobody should ever rent to. They would have saved the property investor and themselves undue stress and cost.

Check your prospective tenants Tribunal history here

Check your Tenants Carefully

This week we have had two incidences that show how important it is to check tenants backgrounds before you sign on the dotted line.

The first was a tenant we currently have gave notice to vacate (following an 'ugly rent rise'). 'Hooray!' we said at the office, glad to be rid of a grotty tenant who came with the property when we took over management. That's one property we'll be glad to get cleaned up and rented out to a suitable tenant at a much increased weekly rental. However, we had not heard a peep from any prospective landlords asking about their suitability as tenants. Not one. Well, good luck to whoever takes them on, they are about to have their property declared a health hazard.

The second was a prospective tenant who applied to rent a property. They produced a glowing written reference from their landlord who was 'not contactable' having sold the property and moved overseas (yeah right). A little digging by us revealed they had forged the written reference, and had not one, but two, Tenancy Tribunal awards against them for breaching the conditions of tenancy. In my experience landlords rarely take poor performing tenants to Tribunal, so for them to have gone twice in recent history tells me they performed very poorly indeed - how many more times had they caused problems and not been taken to Tribunal? I shudder to think. If they are lying right at the start, you don't want them. If only their past landlords performed background checks. I have no doubt they will find someone silly enough to sign them up to a tenancy based on a bogus written reference.

So, if you don't know how to check a tenants background effectively to save yourself heartbreak and a great deal of work sorting out problems, or you just can't be bothered, call us to do it for you. The money and time we will save you will more than likely pay for the property management fees. And best of all, we guarantee our tenant selection, making your investment property lower risk.