Pros and Cons of Online Tenant Screening Services
When renting out your property, it is highly recommended that you screen potential tenants beforehand. Tenant screening services help you with the processes that need to be completed before an applicant is selected to be the right tenant for your property. However, like any other service, tenant screening has its pros and cons.
PROS:
Simplicity - Screening tenants on your own can be a hassle-filled and time-consuming process. You need to get in touch with the tenant's previous landlords, do an exhaustive search of public records, and do a thorough credit check to make sure that the applicant's past indicates that they pose no problems in the future. With online tenant screening services at your disposal, all that you as the landlord have to do is just fill in the applicant's details into the tenant screening service's Website and let them do the heavy lifting for you, right from background checks to previous references.
Quicker Response - If you do the tenant screening process on your own, it is going to take more time than an organisation that does the same professionally. Tenant screening services have the infrastructure and know-how to get the job done quickly and efficiently, thereby ensuring that your property is rented or leased quicker and starts being profitable to you a lot earlier than if you had screened the applicants by yourself. This also ensures that you don't lose a perfect tenant to someone else just because you were late to respond.
Attention to Detail - It is not about doubting your meticulousness, but when it comes to finer details of a field as tricky as tenant screening, even the most thorough nonprofessional is bound to make some errors in judgement when compared to a professional. Also, since tenant screening services use state-of-the-art software to compile tenant screening reports, so the margin of error is minimal to nil.
CONS:
Cost - Due to the workforce and infrastructure needed to accomplish the tenant screening process without any lapses, tenant screening services might be costly, especially if you have a number of applicants to be verified. Most services offer two options; the landlord can pay a fee to check for each client or pay a monthly fee for a contract with the company. This would cost the owner initially, but as the saying goes, "Better to be safe than sorry." It is worth shelling out a few bucks to ensure your peace of mind.
Impersonal Decisions - There is no metric to gauge the 'niceness' of people effectively, and when it comes to tenant screening reports, they are mostly just facts about the applicants. Due to the impersonal tone of the report, it is possible that the landlord might reject some good prospective tenants. So, although the report is exhaustive when it comes to facts, there are subtleties that may get lost when it comes down to numbers.