AAOA Blog

Seven Vital Tips to Help You Collect Your Tenant Debt– Part Two of our Seven Part Series

Last week, Tenant Debt Collection guru Bill Gray shared his insights on debt collection, and taught us that debt collection begins when your prospect walks through the door.

Now for TIP TWO in our series:

TIP TWO

A verified Social Security Number, previous address verification and three personal references are a must!

• The previous address and Social Security Number will help identify a debtor when he or she skips and is living elsewhere. 

• The three personal references could be instrumental in helping your collection agency find them and collect any money owed.

SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER SCAM ALERT!  

• Social Security Fraud is epidemic! 

• Scam artists are creating numbers, using other people’s numbers, and even using their children’s numbers to lease apartments! 

It is absolutely crucial that you ensure the social security number you are given belongs to the person presenting it.  If you are not verifying the social security number on all prospects today, start doing it immediately!

Here’s a little story to show just how easy it is to scam a landlord:

Let’s say our villain, John D., has bad credit.  What does he do? John simply applies for credit with a fake number.  The first time a credit report is requested, it’ll come back ’no file found’ because that number was not listed with the credit bureau.  But that very act caused a new file to be created - a new file for John D. with that number!!!! 

The next time a report is requested for Mr. D., using that number, the report will now show ’no credit’.  All our illustrious villain has to do now is be persistent in building credit under that fake number.  

• Remember, there’s a huge difference between ‘no file found’ and ‘no credit’.  BE SUSPICIOUS, VERY SUSPICIOUS, OF ANYONE WITH ‘NO CREDIT’ ON THEIR REPORT.  It is a rare occurrence in this day and age. 

Scroll down for last week’s installment, Seven Vital Tips to Help You Collect Your Tenant Debt, if you missed TIP NUMBER ONE!

Subscribe to our free newsletter and receive the Bill Gray’s next five tips, and lots more helpful information for apartment managers.   

In need of debt collection services?  Call 303-938-8280 for more info, or email collection@joinaaoa.org.  Be sure to add “COLLECTION” to your subject line.

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Share your insights on social security fraud.  Post comments below.

Tags: collect+tenant+debt, bad+debt+collection, tips+for+debt+collection

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