Applying for an apt....how much info do i give to verify income?

[balkii]

I am attempting to get an apartment....I told the person showing it to me (apparently not the landlord, it seems to be a property management company) that I played poker but that I could verify my income. I plan on giving them a copy of my 2004 federal tax record but am wonder how much else I should give.

-2005 bank statements with online cashouts highlighted?
-just an ING statement (where all my savings are)

or what?

Thanks

[gunt]

what city are you moving to?.... your tax returns should suffice...as long as you show that you have legitimate monthly income you should be all set.
P.S. if your poker earnings are not >$28,000 a year i would be surprised if they give you the apt, which is ironic because if you show tax returns and you make $9.00 an hour you can get an apt.

[gunt]

BTW, if you do play poker professionally, you can deduct your laptop and any cable/broadband connections/cell phones... trips to vegas as business expenses... if you apply to a job in any city you visit you can claim the whole trip as a business trip as long as you apply to a job in that city. FYO.

[RacersEdge]

I can't believe poker is going to do it for you. I've always have to give employee info or show my job offer letter. I think the risk rahter than the level is more important.

[bholdr]

I am a property manager and a leasing agent, and lemme tell you, if i had some young person tell me that they played poker for a living here's what I'd want (and keep in mind that i understand the poker thing, others may want even more)

-First and last, for sure
-a bank statement showing at least three months rent in it
-maybe a copy of a neteller statement probving consistant positive cashflow- the bank statements should be good enough.
-and maybe a co-signer, gambling gets areally bad rap, but for good reason, most of the time.

you can avoid ALL of this with almost any managment company by paying three or four months rent in advance, they will take this as a sign that you have a lot of cash on hand.

but, they should take what i listed above, as long as you've paid last month's rent, that gives them enough time to evict your degenerate ass if you go broke. remember that good refrences are important, but will not really help you very much.

[bholdr]

Also, if you show them any king of bank statement with 20k or more in it, they'll likely accept you regardless of what you earn now, but expect first/last/big deposit

[BusterStacks]

you douchebag, what happened to the house? put some effort into life pls kthx

[Alobar]

stop telling people in this situation what you do for a living. It will only lead to trouble for you. Just make some [censored] up like "I am a statistical analyst". You are independantly contracted and work over the internet, yadda yadda yadda. Then just give them a copy of your bankstatement (which can photoshop if you feel like it). It sucks to have to lie about what you do, but who cares, these types of situations are just a game anyway, play the game to win.

[bholdr]

[ QUOTE ]
stop telling people in this situation what you do for a living. It will only lead to trouble for you. Just make some [censored] up like "I am a statistical analyst". You are independantly contracted and work over the internet, yadda yadda yadda. Then just give them a copy of your bankstatement (which can photoshop if you feel like it). It sucks to have to lie about what you do, but who cares, these types of situations are just a game anyway, play the game to win.

[/ QUOTE ]

lying on an application voids the future lease that was signed with the understanding that the information provided was accurate- they could find out, throw his ass out, keep the deposit and the last months rent, and he would have no recourse. finding a landlord that's willing to accept a poker player is worth it, unless you don't care baout losing @$1500. they WILL screw you if you give them a big fat window like that.

Lie to women, your parents, whatever, just don't lie to your landlord about your job or income, they have you by the balls and they know it.

also, falsifying a bank statement so you can get an apartment (you are singing a document with a line in it that says 'to the best of my knowlage, all of the above information is true") is fraud, a felony. photoshopping a bank statement is HORRIBLE advice.

[LethalRose]

ask them what they want and give it to them.

why are you all secretive about it

[BusterStacks]

saying you are an investor or analyst is not lying. His bank statements will not need to be photoshopped to get the place.

[bholdr]

[ QUOTE ]
saying you are an investor or analyst is not lying. His bank statements will not need to be photoshopped to get the place.

[/ QUOTE ]

sure. that's fine- maybe he's a 'short term risk managment analyist' I kinda got the impression that alobar was reccomending that the OP lie, suggesting that they may want to photoshop bank statements. Still, 'Don't lie on contracts' (leases) is generally good advice.

I honestly think that his best option, if he could afford it, would be to go in there and plunk down six month's rent and say, I have lots of money, give me the place. No landlord in their right mind turns down six months in advance. but, like i said earlier, having 20k in the bank is just as good as having a high paying job, when it comes to renting an apartment.

[balkii]

meh

my friend got an apartment with no tax record just a few bank statements (place wasnt a complete shithole either)...i'd much rather tell the truth and not worry about it

[jaxUp]

a tax return and a printout of your PT stats

[SuitedSixes]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
saying you are an investor or analyst is not lying. His bank statements will not need to be photoshopped to get the place.

[/ QUOTE ]

sure. that's fine- maybe he's a 'short term risk managment analyist' I kinda got the impression that alobar was reccomending that the OP lie, suggesting that they may want to photoshop bank statements. Still, 'Don't lie on contracts' (leases) is generally good advice.

I honestly think that his best option, if he could afford it, would be to go in there and plunk down six month's rent and say, I have lots of money, give me the place. No landlord in their right mind turns down six months in advance. but, like i said earlier, having 20k in the bank is just as good as having a high paying job, when it comes to renting an apartment.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am about to be in a similar situation in regards to renting a house. On top of the fact that poker is my prime source of income, my credit sucks. Is 4 months rent in advance going to be the magic number to bypass all that and get me into a house?

[BusterStacks]

I recommend telling them you're an INTERNET GAMBLER. Be sure to stress how lucky you've been so far.

[youtalkfunny]

Funny, I'm in the same boat. I'm hoping to move next month, before school starts. I've only been playing full-time since March. The BR is growing, but U-Haul and Texaco are going to get a big chunk on the ride up. That's a month or two that I can't give the landlord.

And my Neteller withdrawals don't go through my bank, but through my Neteller debit card.

Am I screwed?

I don't want to lie, either. Especially since it's tough to come up with a believable cover story when your "employers" pay you via Neteller.

(I posted the same question on a landlords' message board. I got 7 replies, which agreed unanimously that they wouldn't consider renting to a poker pro. One property owner said he might think about it with four months up front--but even then, he'd probably pass.)

[JAA]

Tell the agent you swear that you're really good at poker, and if they don't believe you prove it to him/her by playing a heads up freezeout for 6 months rent.

All kidding aside, I just got a pretty nice new apartment and showing them my bank and neteller statements with ~30k was enough to qualify. (I told them I was self-employed but didn't get specific) All they made me do was pay first and last month. FWIW my place is also run by a management company, and they seemed to have had a set formula for qualifying.

- Jags

[JAA]

FWIW, the experience I've had is that if you can find a property that is run by a management company (preferably a lagre one) you will have better luck qualifying through them then you will from a ma and pa landlord. If you can show them some solid savings or are willing to put a few months down, that will do the trick for many of them.

- Jags

[goofball]

i recently got an apt. in vegas with no job. I showed them my ameritrade accoutn balance and bank account balancs, combined to be around 40k. The guy made it clear that that was more than fine.

[Emoney]

so to sum it all up....have a fat wad of cash and you're fine.

[Malachii]

[ QUOTE ]
you can avoid ALL of this with almost any managment company by paying three or four months rent in advance, they will take this as a sign that you have a lot of cash on hand.

[/ QUOTE ] Would you still need a cosigner if you haven't built up much credit?

[Alobar]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
stop telling people in this situation what you do for a living. It will only lead to trouble for you. Just make some [censored] up like "I am a statistical analyst". You are independantly contracted and work over the internet, yadda yadda yadda. Then just give them a copy of your bankstatement (which can photoshop if you feel like it). It sucks to have to lie about what you do, but who cares, these types of situations are just a game anyway, play the game to win.

[/ QUOTE ]

lying on an application voids the future lease that was signed with the understanding that the information provided was accurate- they could find out, throw his ass out, keep the deposit and the last months rent, and he would have no recourse. finding a landlord that's willing to accept a poker player is worth it, unless you don't care baout losing @$1500. they WILL screw you if you give them a big fat window like that.

Lie to women, your parents, whatever, just don't lie to your landlord about your job or income, they have you by the balls and they know it.

also, falsifying a bank statement so you can get an apartment (you are singing a document with a line in it that says 'to the best of my knowlage, all of the above information is true") is fraud, a felony. photoshopping a bank statement is HORRIBLE advice.

[/ QUOTE ]

I dont have much experience with real apartment complexes that use property managers and such, but I'd prolly still lie to them as well (altho, if you wanna get picky, there are plenty of ways to say "proffesional poker player" with out using the words "poker" and make it sound like a "legit job).

Im renting a house in pretty nice area of town, the first 3 houses I went and looked at, the door pretty much got slammed in my face when the found out what I did for a living, so the place im at now, I told the guy the whole analyst story from my other post. Im glad I did, cuz I like living here.

I bought a new vehicle at the start of the year, I put $20K down on it. Youd think that would keep me from any hassles right? The car sales man when we were filling out the various papers, pretty much all but told me I wasnt going to be able to finance even $5 unless I could come up with real job. He was really cool, and we worked out a "lie" to tell the finance people together. (I was a numbers distrabution specialist). When the finance people asked me to explain what that was, I just threw out a bunch of big words until their eyes glazed over.

So like I said, its not always best to tell the "Truth", and its a just a game anyway, so play it to win.

As for the photoshop thing, yeah, I wouldnt do it if I could get by without doing it. But I'm pretty sure theres no way for most places to find out (especially if its just some normal shmo like my landlord), so if you dont have any other option, and know youll get shutout for being a gambler, then Id still go for it.

[bholdr]

Well... I wouldn't tell them exactly what you do for a living- show them that you have a lot of scratch in the bank and say something like, "I don't have a job- Don't need one, I've GOT money, if you need me to, i can pay a few months up in advance."

that SHOULD do the trick, I'd be suprised if a managment company saw a 20k+bank statement and asked for anything beyond first/last/security- but then again, i deal in apartments and don't really have experience with houses.

[bholdr]

your credit score goes a long way in determining how easily you can rent- We've had some applicants with PERFECT credit, just not a lot of it, that we stil asked for first/last/security, and others with just pretty good credit, but a TON of it, that we let in the building with just their first month's rent and a $400 deposit. it's tricky, but the MORE credit you have, the better, and the quality of your credit is a close second in terms of importance.

There's nohing wrong with having a cosigner, as long as it's someone you trust- parents, usually, occasionally a signifigant other or VERY good freind (though i'd reccomend against the latter two, but not for financial reasons).

Don't forget that good refrences go a long way. If you've never paid rent late or had a problem with your previous/current landlord, try writing a letter of reccomendation for yourself and get the manager to sign it.

[liquidboss]

FWIW I jsut got a new apartment in downtown Seattle through a national company (Equity I believe) and there really wasn't too much trouble. They just have a formula that requires you to have 2.5x the rent in verified income. Of course, I didn't have this (verifiable) so I had a family member co-sign. They had no problems with me being a professional gambler. I came right out and said, "I play poker professionally and I don't have tax records to prove my income." My only options were co-signer or half the lease up front.

Going with a big rental company like this is the way to go, they are used to having to evict people and have procedures for it so they aren't that worried, or at least more likely to take the risk. Also, the person making the decision is not the owner of the property. They get paid to get people in the apartment and they don't really care what happens after that. If you are evicted they don't have to take you to court, some lawyer for the company does. Mom and pop landlord don't want to have to worry about it on their only piece of property so they are a little more careful.

[youtalkfunny]

[ QUOTE ]
...remember that good refrences are important, but will not really help you very much.
(later post)
Don't forget that good refrences go a long way.

[/ QUOTE ]

So which one is it? /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Thanks for your help in this thread, we appreciate it.