Your Roommate Referral Needs To Be Good
Posted on 26. Aug, 2009 by Stuart in Real Estate
In college, in a city, or even in a small town where a home is too big for one person; inevitably, roommates are needed for all of these situations. Sometimes the rent or the mortgage is just too much for a single tenant, in these cases, roommates can be a valuable asset. However, it is also important to know that having or taking on a roommate might also be the ultimate downfall of your home. To avoid getting a serial murderer as a roommate, it is always important to require good referrals from any prospective roommate candidate or even potential prospects. Understanding this makes it clear that if you are looking to live in a home as someone’s roommate, your referrals must be good. For the sake of clarity, let’s break these two situations up into groups.
When Taking A Roommate Referral:
If you own a home or rent an apartment or home but are looking for a roommate, the number one thing to require for any and all candidates is a letter of reference from several people. The people writing the letter of reference should be a reputable member of the community and not family members. This letter could come from a local member of government, a member of the clergy, doctors, teachers, and so on. It is best if the letter comes from one of these types of people rather than a mechanic or a tailor.
When the referral has been taken, the next thing to do is make sure that they are viable. On letters of reference, it is required to leave some contact information so that the owner of the home may contact the issuer of the letter to make sure it is not forged and that it is legitimate.
Contact the issuers of the letters of reference to just conduct a short little five minute interview with them about the potential tenant. Ask questions about their character, their living habits, their diet, their friends; that kind of thing. Any type of question that will give you a more intuitive grasp of who they are and how they live is important.
In some larger areas, there are so many people applying for the room that there might not be enough time to contact all of the reference writers. If this is the case, pick a top 2-4 candidates that you are impressed the most by. Once you have established these top contenders, and then contact the reference issuers for final verification. Then, make your final decision based on those contact’s verbal references.
When Compiling Your Roommate Referral:
What is just as important is making sure that, when applying for a roommate position that your referrals are good. When deciding who to ask to write your references, the first thing to do is make sure they will be viewed as reputable in the eyes of the owner or principal renter. Some good people to consider are friends that know you well and will be able to tell of your best character easily. Picking someone of a reputable profession is also a good idea. If you are applying for a roommate position in a college setting, try and stay away from other college students. Principal renters or owners prefer to have references of people in authority that can speak more truly about your character, as college students are more inclined to lie about character.
Perhaps picking an old family doctor, a former pastor or a favorite teacher would be some of the better decisions. Never ask a parent or close family member to write a letter as they will not be taken seriously. However, if it is a more distant family member or a family member by marriage, those will usually be more acceptable.
As long as these general ideals of a roommate referral are followed, it should be no problem picking the best roommate or finding a nice, clean place to live.
Photo source: Aaron M
