Tool to detect fake paystubs?

Question

New landlord here.

Got served an ad for this tool that detects if paystubs are edited / fake. Says it’s free but not sure what the catch is?

Has anyone tried this?

Mo Green · Answer

Update: I decided to give Celeri a try on a new applicant’s pay stubs.

First impression, it’s pretty simple and results were spit out in ~15 seconds. One of the paystubs actually failed the check, so I’m going to reach back out to the applicant to get their story.  Definitely wouldn’t have detected any of these flags with the naked eye.

All in all, feels like it’s worth spending a minute checking the docs with this tool before spending hours trying to chasing down employers.

Chris Davidson · Answer

Like @James Are said find the employers number from a 3rd party not the tenant and verify. It doesn't take long. I'd be more worried about getting the applicant to sign disclosures that you are running their info through a screening service. What if that service is selling info pulled from pay stubs...

Sometimes fewer tools make for a better job.

Mo Green · Answer

Thanks for the insight. I went down a rabbit hole on instagram/twitter and found these accounts that sell fake documents also offer to be your reference. It’s pretty wild out there.

James Are · Answer

Fortunately this kinda of fraud isn’t to hard to combat. I don’t call the number provided by the applicant, I Google the company and call the listed number to verify employment. I’ll ask to speak to someone who can verify employment. Next I ask for the person listed as the employment reference (often it’s the same person). I’d think that this would be sufficient to prevent employment fraud.

Adam Bartling · Answer

@Mo Green You need to call the company asking if they are employed.  Our underwriters do it

Melanie Thomas · Answer

Check out Findigs! Great service that can help with this and make application processing tons faster with less effort! Good luck and happy investing!

Cliff H. · Answer

Any long-term landlords will tell you to never call the current landlord, far better to call the one just before the current one who has no vested interest in handing off a bad tenant. Additionally, employment checks should follow a standard processes  Many larger fortune 500 companies have very specific employment disclosure processes that must be followed meaning you increasingly cannot simply call someone to confirm whether someone works there or not, but rather work through an intermediary or specific request form.

James Are · Answer

I also call the employer and ask if the applicant is currently employed in a stable position and let the employer provide as much or as little information as they wish. The call to former landlords is generally more informative but both calls are definitely worth the time. I only make calls for the candidate(s) I plan to move in.

Chris Seveney · Answer

@Mo Green

Call the employer. That’s what we do

Thai Chau · Answer

I’m going to follow this just because it’s a new topic I never considered. I’m sure there are reasons someone may want to forge paystubs but I can’t think of any, especially for real estate/rental applications.

Because you can literally print paychecks and pay stubs on any printer at home, it’ll be hard to tell unless someone is altering an existing one. But only sure way is to cross reference with bank statement & deposits.

Best of luck here. Happy investing!

Tool to detect fake paystubs?

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