Screening Tenants with MySpace

[9/11/09-Update-It appears the site is off-line] When I read Steve’s post at The Property Pundit, I couldn’t help but smile from ear to ear. When he takes applications for his apartments, he searches the Internet to see if the prospective tenant has an on-line identity. In one case he came across a prospect that was advertising her erotic services on Craig’s List! Oh boy!

Probably the most creative search is how he searches MySpace looking for (and reading) their profiles. Read the full article here.

4 comments

#1John GallDecember 2, 2007, 11:04 am

Good point, here’s another tip. Get your prospective tennant’s e-mail address. In Google put in the adderss in “email@email.com” so you have an exact search. If your tennant has used that address anywhere Google index’s it will turn up and you can learn abit about your tennant. I had one person e-mail me about renting and I ran the address. The address turned up on an escort review site. I could then from there get the web site address the tennant uses and determine that it would be highly likley my property might be used for a “home business”. All this information without asking one question of the tennant.

#2Scott FicekDecember 2, 2007, 8:29 pm

Nice. Great idea! I have 2 applications here for an apartment in Minneapolis of mine. I tried it and came up with nothing. I also Googled their cell phone numbers looking for anything. Just an an example that if you do mine (612-281-5419), I have 239 entries because of my postings around the net!!

#3Low Interest Rates in MinnesotaSeptember 9, 2009, 8:08 pm

Hi Scott, the link for the story takes me to a domain hosting page. Is this site no longer up?

#4Scott FicekSeptember 11, 2009, 11:54 am

He must have taken the site down. I may rewrite this post.

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