I rented to 3 BK’s - Posted by Frank Chin
Posted by Frank Chin on August 12, 2003 at 08:07:32:
Hi Jorge:
So far, I rented to 3 tenants with BK on their records, in all my years landlording. All of the BK were more than 2 years old at time of rental.
Tenant 1 ran into trouble two years into his tenanacy, and his retired mom and dad paid the rent for a while. He was evicted owing over 6K. He filed bankruptcy again - BUT paid me two years later, over 5K of the 6K, when he cleaned up. He was on drugs at the time.
Tenant 2 was a police officer, and claimed the BK was due to his first wife whom he divorced. He paid the rent OK for almost two years till he decided to buy a house and skipped out on the last three months rent pointing out I already have one and a half month security. And the reason for not paying me “I was 3K short on my downpayment”.
Tenant 3 was an elderly grandpa, an easy going fella, and didn’t want to talk about his BK. I took a chance, and as it turned out, he filed because he guaranteed a loan for his son’s business that went bad. He was one of the best tenants I ever had, paid his rent on time for over five years he was there, and complimented me on how nice the apartment is on the few occasions that he had a complaint.
Conclusion. Paying bills, and trustworthiness, is a habit. Tenant 1 and 2 had bad habits that had nothing to do with being able to pay or not.
Tenant 1’s bad habit is drugs. Tenant 2 found out how easy it was to skip out on bills and tried again.
Tenant 3 had no choice, as he had no way to make up 100K in loans on a “Doorman’s” salary.
So this is my track record on BK’s, so you be the judge.
Frank Chin