Tenant Screening Done Right: Our 3-Tier Method
Vacancy is expensive. But the wrong tenant is far more expensive. The single biggest driver of rental ROI isn't the house, the neighborhood, or the rent — it's who you put in the property.
The real cost of a bad placement
Add up a missed month of rent, an eviction filing, legal fees, turnover repairs, and the weeks of vacancy that follow, and a single bad placement can wipe out more than a year of profit on a typical Memphis rental. That's why we treat screening as the most important thing we do — more important than marketing, more important than pricing.
Our 3-tier method
Every adult over 18 who will live in the home completes an application, and every application goes through a TransUnion background check paid for by the applicant's fee — never by the owner. The three tiers:
- Credit history. We're not looking for a perfect score — we're looking for a pattern. Does this applicant pay the bills that matter, on time, at a level consistent with the rent?
- Eviction history. Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior. Prior evictions or landlord judgments are the strongest red flag in the file.
- Criminal history. Reviewed carefully and lawfully, with fair-housing compliance front and center, to protect the property, the neighbors, and the community.
"The goal of screening isn't to reject people. It's to find the applicant who will treat your property like their home — because it is."
What great screening looks like from the owner's side
Boring. That's the point. Rent arrives on time through the portal, maintenance requests are reasonable, renewals happen without drama, and your monthly statement is the only time you think about the property. Owners who self-manage often skip verification steps when a friendly applicant is standing in front of them — a professional process removes that pressure entirely.
And if the worst happens anyway? We handle the eviction process end to end, and under our lease, tenants are responsible for any legal fees arising from a breach.
Want your next placement to be the boring, profitable kind? Let's talk.