How much Info is too much info?

[Robert C.]

Hi,

I'm a first time landlord, long story short I had a potential tenant very interested in the property that cleared all the checks.

The tenants were having a baby soon, and the wife was making the larger income of the two. Knowing this, I asked when the baby was due, how long is she planning to take maternity leave and is the leave paid for, if the leave is not paid for I asked for a copy of their bank statement to verify the cushion.

The tenants were immediately offended that I was asking for way too much personal information, and declined on wanting to rent the property. Was this asking for too much? I thought it was a valid justification.

[Pam Storm]

Hi @Robert C.   The right process is to have acceptance criteria and ask questions about items that impact the acceptance criteria.  These are generally around credit, criminal, and evictions but could expand for instance to your pet policy and or smoking etc..  To be compliant, generally speaking 1. you shouldn't ask anything of one applicant that you don't intend to ask of others  and 2.  there are Fair Housing categories/protected classes you need to steer clear of, such as familial status, disability, race, religion etc.  Probably handle that a bit differently next time.  Good of you to ask and get on track!