Suggesting a co signed for the lease agreement

[Matthew Otero]

So we take an application fee and use a company to screen all our potential tenants. Recently we’ve run into a situation where the screening grade came back as acceptable, not good or great, which left us a little worrisome based on discoveries in the report. My question is if there a way to request the tenant have a co-signer even though it wasn’t a condition recommended by the report?

[Nathan Gesner]

Originally posted by @Matthew Otero:

So we take an application fee and use a company to screen all our potential tenants. Recently we’ve run into a situation where the screening grade came back as acceptable, not good or great, which left us a little worrisome based on discoveries in the report. My question is if there a way to request the tenant have a co-signer even though it wasn’t a condition recommended by the report?

Just because the screening algorithm tells you they are approved, you should be reviewing the credit/criminal screening yourself to catch anything they miss.

Personally, I only allow cosigners on apartments with college students. No houses, no grown-a$$ adults that should be adulting. If you are an adult and can't stand on your own, I don't want you renting from me.

The problem with cosigners is that they don't actually accept responsibility when the time comes. Tenant gets behind on rent, I notify the cosigner, and the cosigner starts complaining that it's not their problem. Or I send them to collections after move-out and they complain they're not responsible because they didn't live there. I have never, ever had a cosigner accept responsibility and pay the bill except when it was mom/dad paying for a kid to go to college. For that reason, I stopped allowing them.

You will also get cosigners that feel they have the right to call and complain about a dripping faucet or some other issue even though they don't occupy the property. When I do allow a cosigner, they sign a separate cosigner agreement that clearly states they are only financially responsible and that they do have have rights to the property or the ability to communicate with me about anything other than the financial side of things.