Be prepared for viewings
Making a good first impression for your prospective tenants is important
You only get one chance to make a first impression so, once you’ve secured a viewing it’s important to make sure you’re available at a time to suit your prospective tenant.
This may well be during an evening or a weekend. It goes without saying that you need to keep the property clean and aired, especially if it’s been unoccupied.
Make sure you can answer questions about topics that tenants are likely to be interested in, such as where the nearest amenities are. You may find it helpful to create a checklist, looking at your rental property from the viewer’s perspective with fresh eyes - if a room is dark, leave a light on, if it’s noisy with the window open, close the window.
Aim to provide prospective tenants with a blank canvas by removing your everyday personal effects.
While it’s important that you and your property make a good impression on a prospective tenant, the viewing is also an opportunity for you to assess whether they are suitable.
Criminals and serial fraudsters will go to great lengths to portray themselves as the ideal tenant. Some red flags to look out for which you might spot during a viewing include offers to pay several months’ rent in advance and putting you under pressure, wanting to move in straight away, which can be a sign that they are attempting to circumvent the referencing process.
It’s important to be mindful that if a prospective tenant is showing any of these red flags, you should listen to your gut instinct and, if in any doubt, don’t go ahead with the tenancy.
Due to the current rental stock shortage there are in most areas more people looking for properties to rent than there are properties on the market, so the chances are you will have other tenants interested in your property.
A robust referencing process will actually reassure an honest tenant that they are dealing with a professional landlord so don’t be tempted to cut corners when it comes to vetting a prospective tenant.
If a bad tenant causes malicious damage to your rental property, you’ll need to provide evidence that you carried out a robust referencing process.
Our Premier policy offers protection against malicious damage by tenants and their guests, as well as loss of rent resulting from the need to carry out repairs. But for a claim to be successful, you’ll need to provide evidence that you did all you could to prevent the damage from happening in the first place.
You can find out all you need to know about referencing in The ultimate guide to tenant referencing.
