Vincent Wong : Be Careful Who You Rent to

 Actually, he says, be careful about breaking your own rules. In this case, he waived the reference check because he could empathize with the Chinese couple who were making a new life in the UK. And?

I knew Chinese people who had moved over to the UK and had struggled to get their lives going because they didn’t have bank accounts or references. But most of the Chinese people I knew in this position had money, and the guy said he would have no problem paying me cash up front for six months‘ worth of rent, so I had no reason to believe anything was untoward. The guy drove a BMW, and he and his girlfriend were very well dressed and presentable; there were no obvious red flags.

So I took the money and gave the couple the keys to the house. Three months later, I tried to contact the couple to make a house check. I tried calling the house and their mobile phones, but there was no answer and they never returned my calls. I went around to the house and put a letter through the door, asking them to contact me to arrange a time for an inspection. No response. Of course, legally I have to get the owner’s permission before entering the property, but I was getting seriously worried. I drove over to the property and knocked on the door. There was no reply. All the curtains were closed, and what really worried me was that there was a broken window. It was just a small hole but I couldn't think why they wouldn't have contacted me to get it fixed. Finally I decided that because I'd tried to enter the property by going about it the right way but had absolutely no response from them, I was within my rights to let myself in. I tried my key in the door but it didn‘t work. They had changed the locks! Now I was growing extremely concerned.

I left the property and the next day, while I was in another location on business, I called a local builder who often worked for me and asked him to go round to the house with a locksmith and my to get. in and take a look around. I’ll never forget the moment I got his call later that afternoon. I asked him if they‘d managed to get in to the house and if everything was okay. He said it definitely wasn’t okay, but he wouldn’t tell me why over the phone; he just told me to get round there immediately.

I jumped in my car and drove straight round to the property, my heart thumping in my throat. When I got there and joined my builder inside, I couldn’t believe my eyes. The front room was like a jungle. It was completely filled with green leafy plants. There was an elaborate sprinkler system affixed to the ceiling. There were large ventilation ducts running throughout the house and huge holes had been knocked through the walls and ceilings to accommodate them. The entire house had been torn up to create a huge cannabis factory.

---- Ok, let's dissect all of that -- Yes, hindsight is xy and all of that is true.. --

I've lived with a man who made his living off property rentals (and SS too) and here's a tip. In a situation like this that fails your gut-check (ok, maybe Vince's gut didn't act up this time - that's why you fill out a checklist and tell your secretary to look it over - or do a design review :) - what you should do is,

1) call the folks after a couple of days just to check that everything is ok

2) A month later, tell them you need to swap out the batteries in one of the smoke detectors even though it has a few more months of life left. If they volunteer to do it themselves, that's a red flag. What more do you want.

Just thinking out loud :)