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Old 03-13-2021, 09:50 AM   #93
garysanfran
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For many years I owned a credit reporting agency that tracked the performance of residential and commercial renters. My screening process was beyond what most landlords could do on their own... Way beyond a credit report and a few reference checks.

One important item that does not show on a credit report, is a prior eviction, or more important...An eviction in process. This action, in New Hampshire, is called a "Landlord-Tenant Writ".

Unless there is a money judgement. Evictions aren't on your Experian, Equifax or Transunion credit reports.

Evictions are an issue of possession of property, not money. Even if it's money owed. So, because credit reports deal with monetary issues, a possession of property won't show.

After the writ-of-possession, the landlord can get a money judgement and if successful, that will show on a credit report a few months after the fact...But not as an eviction. You may not know what this public record is for.

So what we did...

The filing of an eviction complaint, is a public record. We hired a network of data-gatherers that went into every court house throughout California (and other states) from every day, to once every two weeks to gather Unlawful Detainer (eviction) complaints at the point of filing. So, we knew of an eviction "in process" before the tenant started looking for another apartment, while using his Uncle Freddy as a phony landlord reference.

Plus, the same laws that allowed banks to report your handling of debt to credit reporting agencies, our clients could report objective rental issues into our database...Good and bad....Bounced checks, property damage...Great tenant, had unauthorized pets, etc.

In San Francisco, for instance, there are approx. 12,000 Unlawful Detainer complaints filed every year. While these people are being evicted, they're looking for new places to live using fake landlord references... and we knew!

The courts had to provide us access to their files and a place to work.

A local newspaper ran a business article on us. A local TV station then ran a news story that was seen by the director of one of the local public housing authorities who then hired us to exchange data between housing agencies...So we became the screening agency for HUD, privately owned public housing (Sec. 8), and publicly owned public housing...San Francisco, Oakland, Contra Costa, Los Angeles Housing Authorities as well as thousands of conventional landlords and large property management companies.

So, there isn't a scam I have not seen or heard of. I could write a book.

I sold my company in 1998. Similar companies are still out there, including mine with an office in Tewksbury, MA.

The problem today, is that almost all of these companies purchase stale eviction data. It was expensive to gather "live" evictions. So today they purchase packaged "eviction data". However, it's packaged after judgement, so an eviction-in-process is more difficult to uncover.

I also used questions to uncover fraud during reference checking...For example...

The applicant says he's paying $1,200/month rent. I call his landlord "reference" and ask if the landlord can verify that the applicant was paying $1,000/month rent and paid on time? If the answer is yes?

"Oh...I'm so sorry. I made a mistake. The applicant says $1,200/month. Why did you confirm $1,000?" Listen to them squirm!

And if the applicant is using a phony Social Security number? Most people don't know they're geographically coded. If you come from a New England state, it begins with a 0...New Hampshire, Maine a double 00. Chicago a 3. California mostly a 5. And if you're from NY, 050-134.

So your applicant says he just arrived from Korea and gives you a SS# beginning with 580, you ask him when he was in Puerto Rico?

It was fun...
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