proving "income" for rent?

[retire-early]

The apartment rental office wants proof of income for 3x the monthly rent.
This is a 55+ apartment community.

Pension + Social Security covers about 2x.
The rest would come from RMD.

How do you prove the RMD without divulging too much?
In other words, you want to be approved but you don't want them to know that you have $X in assets.

.

 

[braumeister]

Maybe you could offer to give them three months rent as a security deposit? They could hold that for a year until you have proven your reliability as a tenant.
I have a friend who did that, but it may have been a unique situation.

 

[Llep]

This may not help you for now but might in the future. I’m a renter and have had a few apartments in the last few years that wanted the 3 times rent “income”. I don’t have pension or social security all of my expenses are paid from investment assets. Monthly I have an amount sent from my brokerage account to my checking account. If I suspect I will need to qualify for a lease (like moving when a lease expires) I will make sure the amount is at least three times my expected rent. The place I am at now wanted to see that amount for three months in a row so I upped my monthly draw three months before I knew I would apply. All I had to give them was three months of my checking account statements and they were happy with that. I told them I was retired and they didn’t inquire as to the source of my funds.

One other time, before I started doing what I described above, I transferred approximately a years worth of living expenses into my checking account and showed that to the apartment people and they were happy with that.

 

[Alan]

We have been in a similar situation twice since retiring, trying to get a lease on a rental house in England, and paying 3 months in advance worked each time. We had the additional challenge of having no credit history.

 

[retire-early]

Thank you.

I will inquire about 3 months of advance payment in addition to the submission about the Social Security and the pension.

 

[Franklin]

The apartment rental office wants proof of income for 3x the monthly rent.
This is a 55+ apartment community.

Pension + Social Security covers about 2x.
The rest would come from RMD.

How do you prove the RMD without divulging too much?
In other words, you want to be approved but you don't want them to know that you have $X in assets.

.

I rented a place for my SIL. Just show them the RMD deposits and SS deposits. I have deferred comp and had to show 3 months of deposits. I'd think a 55plus community understands RMD's.

 

[Winemaker]

I ask for bank statements if you receive irregular payments or unverified income. Once I had a stripper apply for an apartment and she showed her weekly cash deposits from tips and whatever. She had the income, but only 2 months of statements instead of 3, as she was a new employee. But I turned her down because she was evicted from public housing, and lied about it on her application. You gotta be a real dud if you are evicted from public housing.

 

[Joylush]

I’m a landlord. You can show tax returns. Not sure why you don’t want to show strong assets. Then again many landlords want an income source that can be garnished and yours doesn’t qualify. A very strong credit score should help them overlook that.

 

[Major Tom]

You can show tax returns.

This is what I was going to say. A tax return will show your income, without revealing your assets. You can back it up with the last 2 or 3 months of bank statements, showing regular income into your checking account. I don't know how you do it, but I transfer money from my savings into my checking on a monthly basis. That way, my checking account statement shows a regular income being deposited into it every month.

Before submitting the documents, I would ask to see if what I was giving them would be considered sufficient.

 

[Mr. Tightwad]

I ask for bank statements if you receive irregular payments or unverified income. Once I had a stripper apply for an apartment and she showed her weekly cash deposits from tips and whatever. She had the income, but only 2 months of statements instead of 3, as she was a new employee. But I turned her down because she was evicted from public housing, and lied about it on her application. You gotta be a real dud if you are evicted from public housing.

A stripper lying about something?

So difficult to believe this happened.

 

[Winemaker]

A stripper lying about something?

So difficult to believe this happened.

Why? As a landlord having more than 3 units, you are subject to federal and state laws, and you must have an acceptance policy and rules, so you do not discriminate. Occupation is not a protected class. Age, see, marital status, and familiar status are BIG no not.

I need proof of required income, a clean vehicle that you own show up on time, a co signer if you have a short employment history,or income that is under my threshold. You must have references, and they can't be relatives. And above all, you can't screw a fellow landlord.

 

[armor99]

The apartment rental office wants proof of income for 3x the monthly rent.

This is a 55+ apartment community.



Pension + Social Security covers about 2x.

The rest would come from RMD.



How do you prove the RMD without divulging too much?

In other words, you want to be approved but you don't want them to know that you have $X in assets.



.

Apologies this might not be relevant, but I would advise not to become a long term renter. In my option, when you do that you are giving way too much control of your life over to someone else.
In the next decade you could easily get priced out of where you have decided to live. What if the landlord is slow to fix things that need to be? When you are a long term renter, you now have a perverse incentive for your neighborhood to never get any nicer than it currently is. Renters hate gentrification, home owners welcome it…