What should I do if the tenant reports me to the authorities? It's not uncommon for tenants to attempt to blackmail property owners or property management companies to accept their applications or they will report you.
But these are empty threats. If the property owner or his property management company has done nothing wrong, then there is no one to to report this to.
Read full transcript here:
Today’s question is from Susan Goulding.
“Joe, this is our first applicant and he said he's going to report us as fraud to the authorities if he can't sign the lease and pay us in person. I don't know that I should be concerned. What are your thoughts?”
To be honest with you, people make threats all the time to get what they want. It’s not altogether uncommon for us to get threats. We’ve been threatened by senators, we've been threatened by attorneys—we've been threatened a lot! However, most people are not going to take the effort to follow through with these threats, in our experience. It actually takes effort to do more than just say you’re going to report someone!
With that being said, I would say this is not even a valid threat. What authorities is he going to report you to? How does this situation constitute fraud in any way? In the end, I would definitely just not take on this tenant and not lose sleep over anything that came out of his mouth. It’s a nonevent in my eyes; this being reportable or a case of fraud is just nonsense. It’s certainly nothing that’s going to go on your permanent record! Try not to worry about that, and good luck dealing with the applicant.
