If my relative had checked her renter’s social media ahead of time, she would have seen that he was an unemployed self-styled “dj” with lots of warning flags for behavioral issues. It took many months to evict him (nonpayment, property destruction), what with pandemic restrictions.
In my city, there are restrictions on landlords discriminating based on criminal history.
There are plenty of online services that allow you to do a credit check on potential applicants, at a reasonable fee. I STRONGLY suggest you avail yourself of these services. They’re a great judge of who the tenant will be.
Even if you don’t do a credit check, just SAYING you’ll be doing a credit and background check, and asking if there’s anything they’d like to disclose before you run it, is a GREAT way to find out things. “Well, when you do it, you’ll see I have four evictions, a bankruptcy, and I’m three years behind on child support, but I PROMISE I’ll be a great tenant and never late on the rent!”.
This is not a made-up example.
You’re going to meet every prospective tenant when they look at the property, right? All else being equal, I think it’s perfectly fair to just go with your gut. You might wind up being wrong, but you can spare yourself the regret of “I always had a bad feeling about them…”
(FWIW I’ve been a renter since 1994.)
Go with the first who arrives on the day, if they’re all genuinely equal. Most renters know that’s how it works.
Don’t go with them if your gut says no and you can honestly say it’s not due to race, etc.
Or picture your perfect tenant, see who’s closest to that, and ask them to come and view first.
You also might get an absolutely amazing tenant if you allow cats with a reasonable pet deposit because you could get really reliable (and honest) people who’ve been turned down by other landlords, but it’s probably too late for that now.
Oh, absolutely a credit and eviction check. It’s only $20, and could save so much. I always tell prospective tenants it’s to make sure they’re not lying on the application. “I have no reason to think you’re lying, this just makes sure.” My thinking is if they can’t be bothered to pay Citibank, why do I think they’ll pay me?
I frequently do a quick search on the person’s name. Sometimes it’s too common to amount to much, but usually it will turn up something that can verify a story. Look, here’s this person who says she’s an engineer on an old web page at her university from four years ago saying she was selected for an internship at some engineering firm.
Some of them are relocating, and not physically here. I don’t have a problem renting to somebody far away, assuming the credit check and such looks fine, and they can get me the deposit and first month’s rent at lease signing without a problem. Lots of ways to instantly move money in today’s world.
Oh yeah, the person who shows up at the last minute of the tour window does not make a good impression. The person who texts 10 minutes before the tour is supposed to start to say they’re stuck in traffic and will be a few minutes late or something, almost gains points. They’re showing themselves to be considerate enough to at least let me know they’re going to be late.
Really what I want is maturity, which is very different from age. Somebody who knows when the garbage disposal is leaking to call me right away, but also knows not to try and “fix” things themselves. Sure, change light bulbs; you don’t need my help with that, but don’t go digging into the bathroom fan because it’s noisy. An entire replacement motor is $25 and takes 10 minutes to install. Also, I’m not your dad.
Agree check their social media profiles.
As a landlord and living in Iowa I can check “Iowa Courts Online “ and look up potential tenants if they have lived in the state for sometime. Middle initial and birthdate required on my applications. Any bill recovery or collection judgments they move to the bottom of the list depending on how many and how long ago. A page full of traffic violations doesn’t help either.
Maybe filter for longevity of previous tenancy, then, if you can.
It’s a lot harder if you’re not actually meeting your tenants - for all you know, they could be passing as someone else.
Ex-landlord here. I check the court system and if they didn’t have a LOCAL landlord reference, it wasn’t happening. Too easy to fake. And if they did have a local landlord reference, I always met with them in person. There are restrictions as to what a former landlord may tell you or write on the reference checking form, but in person? Do it right and that rental agent or landlord will tell you stuff you’ll need to know, off the record, y’know? Saved my making horrible decisions a few times.
You’d let a tenant replace the bathroom fan? Am I reading that right??
Speaking as a landlord (I own two small apartment buildings, 2 units each), allowing cats is an excellent way to guarantee that you will need to replace carpet and wood trim once the tenant moves out. FWIW I do allow pets in my units, but I factor the added repair costs into the rent.
I was actually joking about that, I know the OP has to think about things besides his personal opinions. However, when we were renting our cats were NOT allowed to tear up our security deposit and I knew how to use a carpet cleaner. We got our full deposit back both times. I suppose our landlords got lucky, but we kinda like our deposit money more than we like living in a trashed apartment.
That’s why my next suggestion was that if all of the applicants were equal to just pull a number out a hat.
There was no “let” about it. More a matter of going over for some random reason and asking why the cover is off the fan in the ceiling. Like I said, the maturity to know that just because you’re an EE and pretty good at fixing things, it’s a problem to contact the landlord about, not tackle on your own.
The ones who called about the leaking garbage disposal were great. They said they noticed it was leaking, so the put a bucket under it and called me. I was there the next morning, and swapped it for a new one.
The life of the disposal might have been reduced by the previous tenants. They called to say the disposal stunk, and was making a horrible noise. Upon investigation I discovered it was full of rotting onion peals stuck to the sides, and had a plastic Jesus statue in it. It was fine after I cleaned it out. That was the same couple who generated nastygrams from the HOA for putting trash in the compost bin.
I actually did let one tenant paint the inside. I knew it needed new paint, and she said she’d pay for the paint if I let her do it. I warned her that if she did a bad job then getting it repainted when she left would be on her, and no painting over outlets or anything. She did a great job. It wasn’t the colors I would have picked, but new interior paint for free is hard to turn down.
It needs painting again, so maybe I should pick the prospect that is an artist, and see if I get lucky again.
I’ve been warned that before, but have never had a problem. It is a laminate floor, so cleans easily. As long as they don’t just leave messes. I’m sure it only takes one intact male cat to be real sorry.
Disposals, ugh. I pulled every one of them out of my units. Or I would be looking for a plumber the day after any holiday because some numbnuts put a turkey carcass (or in one case, a whole fish that had gone bad) in the damn disposal. And about cats, tenants with pets do tend to stay longer. Fewer options available to them.
My garbage disposal leaked in November, but it was because I’d shoved a bunch of nachos down it.* So I called Roto-Rooter and had the unit replaced myself. I sent my landlord a note along the lines of “FYI, the house has a new garbage disposal now.” I also got some waterproof shelf lining for the sink cabinet, just in case: the cabinet floor didn’t warp, but one more minute under water and it would have.
*In 26 years of renting places with garbage disposals, I’d never broken one before! 
I have to admit I had to google the term “garbage disposal” as although I have heard the term before, I had no idea what that is. I’m 68 years old and here I’ve learned it’s what we call a “garburator”.
Maybe that’s a “Canadian” thing?
A few people have mentioned fairness to the selection process.
As long the new tenant isn’t picked for a reason that would violate the Fair Housing Act, why does it need to be fair?
Blindly picking at random sounds like a good way to chance ending up with the worst of the bunch.
People selling homes are allowed to choose buyers that strike them as the most likable in sappy letters, and they don’t even have to deal with them after signing at closing. Presumably the OP will speak to the prospective tenants - choose the one you gut has the best feeling about.
Yeah, it’s a Canadian thing. I have Canadian relatives and that’s what they call it. The first time I heard the term I was like “the what?” I don’t think I have ever heard it referred to as a garburator in the U.S.
I’m assuming that you did not rent to #2?
I’m sure that when I move out of here, they will replace all the carpet, tile, etc. but that’s because I’ve been here since 2012, not because I have (a) cat(s).
My garbage disposal doesn’t work, and the troubleshooting they suggested didn’t work either. I rarely use it, and when I DID need it, that’s how I found out it didn’t work. They do send out messages regularly with updates, and they almost always mention that you should not put potato peels or nonfood items in them. (If you don’t know, whipping or grinding potatoes for too long basically turns them into wallpaper paste.)
It’s really an issue of deciding between several equivalent applications. If I have four people who are all currently employed with adequate income, and good rental histories, which do I pick? If one of them seemed difficult to work with, or was in some other way unpleasant, they’d be out of the running.
While showing the place and the conversations with them find out why they are looking to move from their current place. Place was sold, having another kid, job location, etc … acceptable reasons. Landlord was an ass, problems with neighbors, etc… maybe they were the problem?