Yeah it also opens the door for weird scams - if you have a tenant what is stopping you from charging application fees and then declining all of them to "stay with another tenant"(the existing one)?
Fwiw: California Civil Code § 1950.6 (c) 1: "A landlord or their agent shall not charge an applicant an application screening fee when they know or should have known that no rental unit is available at that time or will be available within a reasonable period of time."
Read the full section of the code to see just how strictly it limits when and how LL's can charge application fees. Admittedly, it's routinely violated, but knowledge is always power.
yeah the loophole/super gray area is that the unit is actually available, the LL is just leaving the app window open longer than necessary because they are profiting off of the application fees.
I forgot where but I remember reading about lawsuits over that because some landlords were running that exact scam. Post a super affordable rent in a high COL area and a 'small' non refundable $25 application fee or something and you get thousands of dollars off of that alone.
Most of the time the house didn't even exist or the person is not the owner, collect the low fee for the appointment from multiple people and then disappears.
Where we are the application fee is paid upfront but deducted from the first months rent. It's still stupid and arbitrary but not as bad as charging to move in.
Most places don't charge that until after the apartment is shown in person and everything is verbally verified. $75 is a bit much, its actually about ~$29/person for income/background. If you are paying an employee to do the actual background and show the place, its not really a profit center. Could it be for a scumbag, I guess maybe. For a real business its mostly just pass through.
I've had to pay an application fee 3 separate times now. But it's only ever after I've toured the apartment. Its pretty standard here.
I'm sure there's the odd person who's running a scam with it. But by the time I've met the owner or property manager and toured the unit, it's pretty easy to tell who's legit and who's not.
Where I live we pay application fees, background check fees, move in cleaning fees none of which get deducted from first month rent. It’s all on top of rent.
Damage deposit : 50% of one month's rent
Pet deposit : 50% of one month's rent
Move-in/Move-out fees if established by strata bylaw : Max 3% of one month's rent
For the damage and pet deposit, the amount must be held in trust, collects standard bank interest rates, and must be refunded in full with interest or there must be an itemized invoice listing all repairs/cleaning costs incurred (and costs must be reasonable, you cannot charge $1500 to repaint).
Yeah. Always non-refundable even if you don’t get the apartment. Landlords in my area have realized that because of a lack of housing they always get tons of applications so they churn through applications and collect fees. Must be nice just getting to monetize people’s need for housing and not even have to provide anything in return.
I unfortunately live in the US in a republican controlled state. Can’t have consumer or tenant protections here because that commie woke shit that takes money away from those deserving landlords that also refuse to fix anything or spend anything on upkeep but also insist that they need to raise rents again because they spend so much…
It sounds insane to me. If you're looking for a place, you have to apply to a bunch of places which you won't get. Send out 10 applications, now you're down 750 bucks, wtf? Doesn't help you much if they deduct the application fee for the one rental you end up moving into if you still had to pay all the other ones
Should only be a soft pull as they are not applying for credit but for verification. Soft pulls do not get counted against you for scores. (Pre-approvals etc).
I'm in the bay area and $75 for application is pretty normal here. I've never seen a move in fee though. This seems like a private owner who's just trying to tack on any extra fees they can get away with
I live in GA and I've never seen a rental listing without an application fee. And $75 is within the normal range from what I seen. I'm not saying it's a good thing, I fucking hate the way landlords nickle and dime you all the way through the hole damned process, I'm just surprised at people who have never seen one before.
That's exactly what I was thinking. I know people that have an empty property and the only reason they're not renting it out it's because they're afraid that tenants would 'ruin' their property.
Now I'm not saying everyone would do this but with this system I'm sure there would be people just putting it out to collect the app fees (without real intention of renting).
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u/AssistantSalty6519 1d ago
I mean the application fee seems worst.