Common Practice - Bank Statements?

ec18

Hi,

Is it common practice for letting agents to ask for months of full bank statements? It seems a bit overkill for a lease?

snubbleste

No.

ec18

snubbleste wrote: »

No.

to which part?

MouseTail

ec18 wrote: »

to which part?

You only asked one question, is it common practice.

fartyarse

I never had to before but when I moved into my current apartment, four months ago, the letting agency insisted that I provide them.

It was either hand them over or pass up the opportunity to rent a lovely apartment in South County Dublin for a relatively reasonable price.

ec18

hmmmm....thanks....previously I've only had to provide salaried reference letters from work...

handlemaster

when a landlord gets stung by a tenant you can't blame him/her looking for extra confirmation that you can pay.

murphaph

In Germany a landlord doesn't need to see bank statements except in rare cases. This is because here they have a proper credit rating system that issues people with % scores. Landlords won't take anyone with a poor credit rating. In addition, it is generally requested to provide a statement from the previous landlord that no rent is outstanding (mietschuldenfreiheitsbescheinigung). Landlords won't issue them to tenants who owe them money obviously.

When such systems are absent, as in Ireland, landlords must protect themselves some other way. Bank statements are a really useful indicator of at least raw ability to pay. If, for example, the applicant had no salary on his bank statement, it would raise eyebrows.

john.han

In my opinion it's complete overkill, they could just ask to see a payslip but a work reference should be enough, complete invasion of privacy, not as if they're applying for a mortgage.

handlemaster

john.han wrote: »

In my opinion it's complete overkill, they could just ask to see a payslip but a work reference should be enough, complete invasion of privacy, not as if they're applying for a mortgage.

When you lease a property to a stranger you will change your opinion

usernamegoes

Has the data protection commissioner made any finding or given any advice on this I wonder.

I sounds like it could run afoul of principle 6 of the data protection laws i.e. ensure that it is adequate, relevant and not excessive. Usually this is interpreted conservatively.

Would be interested to have a ruling.

shruikan2553

In Dublin it is not unheard of. I find it to be over the top and would pass if I had another option but there aren't many options in Dublin

dudara

We've recently been in the rental market, but no one asked us to provide payslip/salary details. We did come with employers references and an excellent reference from our previous landlord.

I know it is a common practice, but I would have politely refused any such request. My salary is a private matter between my employer and I. There are landlords and agents out there who don't seek it and I would have been happy to wait to find one who didn't request it.

ec18

Yeah I'm not particularly comfortable with handing over two months of financial transactions for a lease. I understand for a mortgage where the bank is giving you a large sum of money and wants to be paid back but for a one year lease it's seems overkill

murphaph

ec18 wrote: »

Yeah I'm not particularly comfortable with handing over two months of financial transactions for a lease. I understand for a mortgage where the bank is giving you a large sum of money and wants to be paid back but for a one year lease it's seems overkill

It's not about the lease. It's about weeding out potentially disastrous tenants because the state is completely ineffective in dealing with delinquent ones. If there was some register of landlords and tenants with reviews like eBay then nobody would need bank statements.

usernamegoes

murphaph wrote: »

It's not about the lease. It's about weeding out potentially disastrous tenants because the state is completely ineffective in dealing with delinquent ones. If there was some register of landlords and tenants with reviews like eBay then nobody would need bank statements.

Could you give some examples about what you're looking for on a statement? Salary - of course, payments to previous landlord; what else? Assuming these are addressed in references.

Regular visits to a GP and hospital? Paddy Power? What kind of things?

handlemaster

Proof that rent has been paid at regular intervals. Also salary amount

usernamegoes

handlemaster wrote: »

Proof that rent has been paid at regular intervals. Also salary amount

That's fair enough, why can't that be addressed in a reference? If not can everything else on the statement be redacted?

murphaph

usernamegoes wrote: »

Could you give some examples about what you're looking for on a statement? Salary - of course, payments to previous landlord; what else? Assuming these are addressed in references.

Regular visits to a GP and hospital? Paddy Power? What kind of things?

Salary and rent paid. Rest can be blacked out.

shruikan2553

So a letter from an employer saying that they can afford the rent and a reference from a landlord do the same job.

dudara

In our reference, our current landlord stated that we had paid the rent on time, every month, for the duration of our tenancy. He provided his phone number for contact. My employer stated that I was paid every month by credit transfer into my account.

It up to my employer if they want to disclose my salary to a third party. My contract doesn't allow me to do so.

MouseTail

dudara wrote: »

It up to my employer if they want to disclose my salary to a third party. My contract doesn't allow me to do so.

Really? That's a bizarre clause, what if you want a loan or mortgage?

murphaph

shruikan2553 wrote: »

So a letter from an employer saying that they can afford the rent and a reference from a landlord do the same job.

"Can afford the rent"....the employer cannot and will not make that call. Anyway, the least a prospective tenant of an expensive asset such as a house can do is prove they actually have an income stream big enough to cover the rent. If they aren't prepared to do that in a convincing way, I'll look for someone else.

The current landlord's reference is unfortunately worthless in Ireland. People will (albeit understandably) say mass to get rid of a delinquent tenant. References from previous landlords carry more weight, but are not current. A statement shows a regular rent level payment being made, which helps convince that the applicant is serious.

It's all academic anyway...if you don't want to provide statements to a landlord who asks for them then don't. Bring your business elsewhere.

murphaph

MouseTail wrote: »

Really? That's a bizarre clause, what if you want a loan or mortgage?

Indeed, that clause could cause no end of grief when seeking finance. I wouldn't agree to it in any contract I signed.

shruikan2553

murphaph wrote: »

"Can afford the rent"....the employer cannot and will not make that call. Anyway, the least a prospective tenant of an expensive asset such as a house can do is prove they actually have an income stream big enough to cover the rent. If they aren't prepared to do that in a convincing way, I'll look for someone else.

The current landlord's reference is unfortunately worthless in Ireland. People will (albeit understandably) say mass to get rid of a delinquent tenant. References from previous landlords carry more weight, but are not current. A statement shows a regular rent level payment being made, which helps convince that the applicant is serious.

It's all academic anyway...if you don't want to provide statements to a landlord who asks for them then don't. Bring your business elsewhere.

Fair enough, still seems pointless to me. A bank statement would be ridiculously easy to fake anyway.

murphaph

shruikan2553 wrote: »

Fair enough, still seems pointless to me. A bank statement would be ridiculously easy to fake anyway.

Don't agree that a bank statement is as easy to forge as an employer reference, especially if the employer is claimed to be a small operator who doesn't even have headed paper. A bank statement is printed on headed paper...unless the forger has access to some fairly high quality printer, it will not be that easy to reproduce the headed paper feel. A BoI statement has a tractor feed mark on its left edge (or something like that) and the entire reverse is printed with no margin with terms & conditions or whatnot. It would actually take some skill to forge such a statement and to make it look like it didn't come off your printer at home. I believe some banks even have a watermark in their statements...forging that will be practically impossible.

Would you be fooled by a forgery likely to be available to the average Joe? Remember master forgers have better things to do with their skills than fake bank statements for landlords

shruikan2553

murphaph wrote: »

Don't agree that a bank statement is as easy to forge as an employer reference, especially if the employer is claimed to be a small operator who doesn't even have headed paper. A bank statement is printed on headed paper...unless the forger has access to some fairly high quality printer, it will not be that easy to reproduce the headed paper feel. A BoI statement has a tractor feed mark on its left edge (or something like that) and the entire reverse is printed with no margin with terms & conditions or whatnot. It would actually take some skill to forge such a statement and to make it look like it didn't come off your printer at home. I believe some banks even have a watermark in their statements...forging that will be practically impossible.

Would you be fooled by a forgery likely to be available to the average Joe? Remember master forgers have better things to do with their skills than fake bank statements for landlords

I have needed bank statements for things but landlords want an original copy on header paper from the bank? You might as well keep their passport until the lease is up. Cant remember the last time I got a statement in the post but it was quite plain paper.

The_Morrigan

murphaph wrote: »

Don't agree that a bank statement is as easy to forge as an employer reference, especially if the employer is claimed to be a small operator who doesn't even have headed paper. A bank statement is printed on headed paper...unless the forger has access to some fairly high quality printer, it will not be that easy to reproduce the headed paper feel. A BoI statement has a tractor feed mark on its left edge (or something like that) and the entire reverse is printed with no margin with terms & conditions or whatnot. It would actually take some skill to forge such a statement and to make it look like it didn't come off your printer at home. I believe some banks even have a watermark in their statements...forging that will be practically impossible.

Would you be fooled by a forgery likely to be available to the average Joe? Remember master forgers have better things to do with their skills than fake bank statements for landlords

I haven't had an original bank statement in years...online banking means most statements are electronic these days and therefore easy to forge if they are to be printed on a standard printer at home.

murphaph

Fact is, banks themselves will often refuse such printouts when used as part of a mortgage application, for example. They will request originals from the bank. Tip: If you think you may need bank statements like this then cancel your e-Statements and let them send you real ones because requesting copy statements is ridiculously expensive.

The_Morrigan

murphaph wrote: »

Fact is, banks themselves will often refuse such printouts when used as part of a mortgage application, for example. They will request originals from the bank. Tip: If you think you may need bank statements like this then cancel your e-Statements and let them send you real ones because requesting copy statements is ridiculously expensive.

No they won't; I've had credit cards, overdrafts, personal loans & a mortgage approved on foot of electronic statements and e-bills. Electronic statements are accepted by the banks as it's their own service that they are pushing on their customers to cut admin costs off the bottom line. Even the revenue have electronic correspondence.
They are also even accepted by the likes of the social welfare, so if landlords are going to refuse them we've a problem on our hands.

murphaph

A quick check reveals that AIB will require at least one original statement in the 6 months statements when applying for a mortgage. I don't make the rules! I did say "often" and not "always". Perhaps you got lucky with the bank you applied to for your mortgage. I have read this several times on forums that folks have been requested to produce original statements.

Link to pdf

KBC the same:
Link