If you’re a landlord, then you have most likely heard of the FCRA, Fair Credit Reporting Act. They are a federal agency who holds landlords accountable to promote fair practices, regulation, and privacy for consumer reporting agencies. Landlords, it doesn’t matter if you own one property or 100 properties, you have no choice but to comply with rules and regulations or be penalized.
The FCRA regulates who can access information on people, it’s that simple. They also regulate whose denied employment and housing. Therefore, you should have a legitimate business and be doing business with a reputable employment screening or tenant screening company. Did you know that having public information about someone cannot be used when considering them for a housing lease? For example, you cannot deny someone housing because you spoke with the applicant’s neighbor and they made negative comments about the person or because of a person’s social media presence out on the Internet. None of this public information can be used for tenant screening in a negative way.
Many landlords today use consumer reports to help them evaluate rental applications, which include reports from tenant-screening companies who provide information such as an applicant’s rental history based on reports from prior landlords or a credit report from the credit bureau. Although, these consumer reports are full of information about the potential tenant, landlords must be careful when it comes to following the FCRA guidelines when verifying this information. The FCRA only covers those landlords who work with agencies initially hired by the landlord themselves.
So what happens when the information that you have from the consumer report assists you in denying someone housing? This is called an adverse action, also known as rejecting the applicant. Again, the FCRA plays a major role in the rejection of all applicants. As you may know, this is part of the tenant screening process and could cause many problems for the landlord if not handled with finesse.
The FCRA states that if applicants are rejected then they have a right to the following:
•They must be told if the information in their file has been used against them.
•The must be provided with the name, address and phone number of the
agency that provided the information.
•They have the right to ask for a credit score.
•They have the right to dispute incomplete or inaccurate information.
Landlords, please make sure you are taking the FCRA compliance requirements very seriously when it comes to Tenant Screening. Point2 Property Manager would like to help you make this process as seamless as possible that is why we partnered up with ScreeningWorks. Comprehensive tenant screening services are a necessity, but access to these services can be difficult to secure for many property management companies who do not meet rigorous FCRA compliance standards.
Point2 Property Manager has partnered with ScreeningWorks, an industry leader in resident screening to allow you instant access to important information about your applicant’s credit and background history. Point2 Property Manager has made it easy for you to sign up with no waiting for approval. It’s also directly integrated into the Point2 Property Manager Online Software Solution!
Tags: fcra requirements, online property management software, rental property, tenant screening
Many property management companies are releasing their new mobile service, which gives you the ability to do everything you’ve always done on your computer on your mobile device! I know many are thinking why would I want to use my mobile device to manage my properties? Actually, there are numerous reasons why you should consider going mobile with your property management business.
Here are a few reasons why using mobile service may be a good idea for you:
• Service Requests – Maintenance workers can enter requests directly into the system while out in the field. A mobile device will allow them to access all service request information while in the field; perhaps they forgot to print one out before leaving the office or a new request came in while they were out of the office. Mobile access will save trips back to the office and will allow the maintenance worker to stay in the field and increase productivity.
• Resident Information – Mobile access will allow you to quickly view current and previous resident information on the go, including lease, rent and contact information without having to go back to the office.
• Unit Status – If you are traveling and receive a phone call about a property and cannot get to a computer right away, mobile access will allow you to quickly pull up property information to check things such as, is the unit ready, when will it be ready or which units are available.
• Applicants – Perhaps a landlord is out to dinner and receives a phone call inquiring about a property, the landlord could add their basic contact information on the fly, and when they return back to the office they would be able to finish the application they started on the mobile device.
So you see, mobile access is not just a “fancy” term to use, but it can definitely provide many benefits to your property management business. Let me give you another reason how mobile access can add to your bottom line business numbers. Say for instance a service request comes in through the resident portal of your Point2 Property Manager Software or you get a service call and the maintenance worker is out in the field at another unit. The service request can either be received or seen by the head of maintenance and then delegated, or maybe it’s just you, so you can see the request and call to schedule a time or go there, depending on your operations.
When the service worker is in the field, they will have the ability to grab tools to go to the site where they can then take pictures and send them back to the main office. Although pictures cannot automatically be attached, they can be attached if using an email client (such as Outlook Express, Gmail, Yahoo, etc.). Here, we see the beauty of the cloud when it comes to information sharing. You no longer have to go to the office to get a sheet of paper that would indicate the issue of a request. Everything can be done in the cloud or on the go because now all the information needed is all located in the mobile device.
I hope you now see the power of saving time when it comes to managing your property using Point2 Property Manager’s mobile service. Perhaps you can relate to a few reasons why you should take your business through the clouds or customize some of these ideas you read here within your own software or operations.
Point2 Property Manager’s mobile service is available for all of our clients. We support iPad/iPhone Safari, Windows Phone IE9Mobile, and Android Chrome/Firefox browsers. Please note that clients using Firefox on Droid based tablets will be provided with an option to alternate between the full version and the mobile version via a link on the login screen.
So what are you waiting for? Log in to your Point2 Property Manager account just as you normally would with your same username and password. Try it now, get your mobile device, open your browser window and type www.diyres.com.
Tags: cloud software, mobile device, mobile software, online property management software, property-management