The Power of a Judgement Search

[Sherilynn]

One of my standard tenant screening tools is a judgement search. It is a $10 expense that can save me thousands.



Civil judgements are public record, hence a landlord can visit the provincial courthouse and request a "Judgement Search" on a potential tenant. This search reveals any civil judgement, including: small claims court, civil suits related to criminal acts, and Residential Tenancy Tribunals (RTDRS, in Alberta).



A prime example of the power of 'Judgement'...



On Saturday, my property manager showed a suite to a nice young couple. The application looked good. The references checked out. (I'm sure their credit would have been fine too, but we do credit checks after judgement searches, so we didn't get that far.)



Then we did the judgement search and discovered that they had a previous landlord that they neglected to mention, and this landlord had to take them to the RTDRS twice for rental arrears and eviction. It's easy for the tenants to exclude such a landlord when all one normally requires are their current and previous landlords.



It is important to remember that credit checks will only show Residential Tenancy judgements (and other civil judgements) if those judgements get sent to a collection agency. Otherwise, the credit report could look clean.



And 'professional tenants' RELY on this fact. A professional tenant can disappear without a trace. He will leave no (accurate) forwarding address; his bank account may be closed; he may have already changed jobs; he won't have any assets to seize; and his emergency contact won't reveal how to find him. This leaves the landlord with nothing for a collection agency to work with, hence nothing will appear on a credit report.



However, many tenants don't realize that a judgement search will reveal Tenancy Tribunal decisions, regardless of whether there is enough information for collection.



When I called my prospective tenant this morning and gave her the bad news, she spouted all sorts of lies regarding the judgement (specifically that she had never been to court in her life). She later tried telling the the property manager the 'truth' in a vain attempt to play on his sympathies. Obviously, we had caught her off-guard by discovering the Tenancy Tribunal judgements.



So please, add judgement searches to your arsenal of tenant screening. And consider taking bad tenants to court even if you know that you will not collect. (You would likely need to file suit before they move so that you can serve documents before they potentially disappear.)



The judgement on file could prevent another landlord from suffering the same fate.

 

[kir]

I do those searches too. Once , the legal secretary at the court of Queens Bench was so surprise that a landlord was doing this, she waived my fee.



The problem is these past convictions are on the record for a long time (possibly forever), so the question is when do you overlook the past convictions? If the conviction was 8 years ago, do we forgive them? 5 years? Definitively not one year ago.



The nice thing is there is an amount dollar on the judgment, but I'm not too entirely sure what amount should be irrevelant or significant. For example, if 200 dollars was on the judgement, I would tend to be a little bit more lenient compared to a 2000 judgement. But not sure on yet on how to process the details. I guess it all about getting the best tenant, but it seems everybody has something.



I agree...if you file for Notice of Hearing...follow it through completely and file it at the Court of Queens bench. The dollar judgment and details are , I think, more useful then the credit search.



Kir.

 

[Mellon17]

Hi Sherilynn,



Do you just go down to your local court house to purchase a judgement search?



Thanks,

 

[Sherilynn]

[quote user=Mellon17]Hi Sherilynn,

Do you just go down to your local court house to purchase a judgement search?

Thanks,




Yes. Some smaller court houses won't know what you are talking about, so you may need to ask for a supervisor.

 

[reinvestors88]

A very informative post. Thanks for sharing.

 

[RedlineBrett]

Would love for this to be available online, like a title search.

 

[David90]

Does a Judgement Search only cover the particular province being searched, or are they Canada wide?



Thanks for sharing this very valuable tip.



David

 

[Sherilynn]

They are provincial searches. If the tenant was from another province, you could potentially order one from that province, but I have never done one so I'm unsure of how you could do it. Some provinces may offer online searches.

 

[smmcguire]

I'm not sure about Ont. as the tenant is protected by several agencies/commissions/acts. Perhaps someone from Ontario can shed light on this.



Steve

 

[derekchien]

It would be interesting to know if this can be done in Ontario. Is it possible to request such records directly from tenant and landlord board?

 

[Sherilynn]

Civil judgements should be public record. Why not visit a court house in Ontario and ask?

 

[invst4profit]

The courts in Ontario have no records of Landlord Tenant Board rulings.

The Ontario government does not allow any rulings of the LTB to be made public with tenants names attached.

As the majority of rulings appear to be against tenants of low income and those on government assistance the

government does not want negative rulings to prevent individuals from obtaining housing.

Our government believes wealth landlords can shoulder the financial burden of risk associated with housing the undesirables

in our society.



In a nanny state like Ontario the guilty are protected.

 

[KCLC]

[quote user=invst4profit]

In a nanny state like Ontario the guilty are protected.



This means you should be happy considering your criminal record.

 

[derekchien]

There are a few things that I just found out. Under the freedom of information act. We can pay $5 to landlord and tenant board and have access to any names that we give them. However, they have 30 days to respond. This is no good when we are selecting tenants and need to make decisions in a reasonable time frame.



I also just had a chance to meet with VP from rent check few days ago. She told me they are working on this new services to all their members. Hopefully they will have it by May this year. They are cooperating with a paralegal firm to have all the tenant names who were brought to tribunal in the past available to memebers.

 

[KCLC]

Rentcheck is brutal and experienced landlords avoid them like the plague because they keep trying to trick new landlords. They always waive some imaginary carrot in front of new landlords to catch $$$

 

[derekchien]

I see. I sort of sense that as well when I was talking to them. It seems a bit over promising. However, any valid methods you recommend in terms of better screening tenants.

 

[KCLC]

Rentcheck is lying!



Avoid them!

 

[KCLC]

It's not your fault at all.

 

[derekchien]

Great Info, and small World. Say hi to me if I see you there again.

 

[housingrental]

I'm curious why do you write this

It seems like they provide a market cost credit check and supplemental information

Few small landlords go direct to credit bureau or want unfiltered information

Please elaborate on why to avoid them?



[quote user=KCLC]Rentcheck is brutal and experienced landlords avoid them like the plague because they keep trying to trick new landlords. They always waive some imaginary carrot in front of new landlords to catch $$$