Save social media for marketing

Businesses of all kinds are using social media, mostly as a marketing and public relations tool. Facebook pages, Twitter feeds, LinkedIn profiles and Pinterest accounts are quickly becoming must-haves in many industries. Interacting with consumers, gaining followers, promoting products and services … it all can be done online for free through social media sites.

But some businesses are finding another use for social media: Background checks. It’s a tempting practice, the ease with which you can look up a potential employee or tenant on Facebook to see what kind of person you’re about to hire – or accept as a tenant. But is it a good idea?

We think it’s a risky endeavor for a few reasons. First of all, there are privacy concerns associated with using people’s personal information and photos to make a judgment about their potential as a tenant. In fact, Fair Housing laws are in place to keep such discrimination at bay.

Second, it’s too easy to make a mistake. There are tons of folks out there with the same name, and you can’t be absolutely sure you’ve got the right Jane Doe’s Facebook page or Twitter feed. And even if you’re sure it’s the right person, the inferences you make about what you see could very well be false. For instance, just because Jane has a lot of photos of herself with two big dogs doesn’t mean they’re her dogs and will potentially be moving into your rental property with her.

It’s best to stick to the tried and true tenant screening methods of having the tenant applicant undergo a credit check, background check and employment verification. Leave the social media to your marketing plan

Visit ATS Inc's homepage for more information about our Tenant Screening Services 

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Delegate smaller landlord duties so you can focus your priority on profits

Many landlords, particularly accidental landlords, think they should do everything about the business themselves. They think that because they are capable of doing it, they should be the ones to market the property, interview applicants, perform tenant screening, get the lease signed, and take care of any maintenance issues or problems that arise with tenants and/or the property. That’s a long list of chores for someone who might have another job (plus a family, private life and home of their own!).

It’s understandable that you want to save as much money as you can by not hiring someone else to do what you can do yourself. After all, you’re in this business to make money, so you want to position your business endeavor to be as profitable as possible, and that means saving money, not spending it.

But keep in mind that your time is valuable too, and when your schedule becomes jammed with an endless “to do” list, you become your business’s own bottleneck, impeding the flow of work — and, therefore, also the flow of money — simply because there’s too much to do and only one person to do it.

As the head of your business, your most important job is to delegate. You should spend your time doing only what will increase profits. That includes shaping the business’s future and bringing in more money. If you’re spending valuable time fixing leaky faucets and making photocopies of signed leases, then you’re not spending all your time increasing profits. Don’t short-change yourself:  Hire qualified people who can help you with maintenance and repair issues, keep track of paperwork, and conduct background checks and credit checks on tenant applicants. Your ‘to do’ list will thank you!

http://www.alwaysscreen.com/

ATS has solid experience, longevity in a crowded field of start-ups

With the upswing in demand for background checks and the increasing need for criminal records checks and credit reports during the tenant application process, a whole new crop of tenant screening service companies has popped up in recent years. Their websites are filled with tempting promises of cheap reports in record time. But do you know anything about them? How much experience do they have? Which databases are they checking? How thorough, and really how cheap, is the service?

American Tenant Screen has been around since 1988. Long before many of today’s landlords were in the real estate business, ATS was establishing a reputation based on sound guiding principles and exceptional customer service. We pride ourselves on the thoroughness of our background checks: We pursue verifications to completion or until you tell us to stop...whichever comes first.

There are no hidden charges associated with our services; our clients always know the fees up front. And our customer service continues to be second to none. Our guarantee is that a phone will be answered by a live expert within 1 minute of your call during business hours. And we never charge for customer support.

Tenant screening may seem like a necessary formality to some, but it is a serious business. It’s your property, your reputation, and your money on the line if you select an unqualified tenant. Only trust the most experienced professionals to screen your tenants and give you the peace of mind you deserve. 

http://www.alwaysscreen.com/

Tenant screening service should help you interpret the results, not just spit out a report

Most property owners understand the importance of tenant screening, but many are still a bit lost about how best to use all the information gleaned from background checks and credit reports. The best way to make the tenant screening process as simple and clear as possible is to hire a tenant screening service that not only provides accurate reports but also qualifies the information. This rare extra step allows the landlord to make an informed, quantifiable decision about who should become their next tenant.

At ATS, the landlord sets the criteria for the hiring decision. In other words, you pick what is most important to you in regards to the background check, and ATS returns an approval, conditional approval or denial based on what was found regarding the criteria you set. This system not only simplifies the screening process, it also creates a uniform decision that negates any question of bias and helps eliminate any subconscious discrimination against an applicant.

For even greater efficiency, ATS offers its clients pre-filled denial notice and Fair Credit Reporting Act compliance letters, to help landlords deal with the legalities involved with making the best decision for their property while maintaining a balance of fairness and objectivity.

http://www.alwaysscreen.com/

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Make sure that rental application is legible

Many tenant applications are filled out hastily, as applicants want to get their paperwork back to you before anyone else scoops up the place their interested in renting. The first mistake a landlord can make when reviewing an application is to assume something — anything — when trying to decipher someone’s handwriting. If you’re unclear whether that digit in someone’s social security number is a 6 or a 0, don’t guess! Likewise, don’t guess about the spelling of a person’s name. When it comes to background checks, you’ll need the following information to be rock solid:

1. You’ll need the person’s social security number in order to do a credit check. Thousands of people have common names and birthdays, and if you guess on even one of the person’s social security numbers, you might end up pulling the wrong person’s credit.
2. You’ll need a correct spelling of the full legal name and date of birth for any criminal background check or previous eviction check. Most public records databases have removed SSNs from their files. So screening providers use the name and DOB identifiers to narrow down their search. So a criminal record for “Thomas McMurray, born 6/2/1987” may not come up if the landlord inputs “Tom McMurry, born 6/7/1987.”
3. You’ll also need the proper spelling of the applicant’s name to do a state or national search in sex offender registries.

If something is unclear, call the applicant and double-check. Also let them know that if you have to re-run a background check because the information wasn’t clear and correct, they’ll have to foot the bill.

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