Can a landlord ask if you are employed?

The chance that someone who needs to provide fake references will actually pay are probably quite low.

Well whether you find it hard to believe or not, I just did it a little over a week ago.

phoned up, gave them the name and address I had for a supposed landlord.

And they were able to tell me not only did they not have the name I gave them but they also had no tenancy registered at that address.

From that I deduced either the reference was a total fabrication.

or the prospective tenant was renting from an illegal landlord.

Either way their reference couldn’t be verified so I moved on.

It's public information on the rtb website.

What is? Do you mean faking references or a landlord asking about employment?

Yup. And it's not even reliably accurate. My (owner occupied) house still appears on it but hasn't been rented since maybe 2019. My last rented place isn't on it now although I know it was registered and I know it is currently occupied by a new tenant and there's a very above board letting agent involved.

Again, I am saying that I phoned them up and I gave them the information written on the alleged landlord reference.

and they told me that they had no record of the name I gave them and they had no record of any tenancy registered at the address I gave them.

Where have I said they “gave me” any landlords name?

I didn’t!

For the third time.

I said I phoned them up I GAVE THEM the alleged landlords name.

I GAVE THEM the alleged tenancy address.

And they told me they had neither the name registered nor any tenancy registration from that address.

AT NO TIME did they GIVE ME anybody’s name or anybody’s address.

Yep, asking for info like payslips, bank statements etc, they may be leaving themselves open to a discrimination case.

From my limited experience ( only have one property I let) but with these ever changing laws, I have employed legal counsel to guide me through what is permissible to request.

I request three pieces of information.

1. How many people in occupation?
2. Previous landlord references / work references and / or character references. ( It’s up to the prospective tenant to decide which references they want to give and I do my utmost to verify whichever reference they decide to furnish me with)
3. Proof of ability to pay. This may be a rent book showing a history of payments to a previous landlord or some other means.

Some people have sent me payslips which at no time have I asked for.

Well in my experience, last week, they confirmed that they had no registration in that name nor from the address I GAVE TO THEM.

And yet again, I REPEAT, for the last time, they did NOT at any time, give me anyone’s private information.

With regard to the information being available on their website. Indeed, I had previously tried to search the address for a listing and couldn’t find one. Hence I picked up the phone and called them.

As for being a “randomer”. I quoted my own RTB landlord registration, along with the address of my rental property to the person I was speaking to. They knew exactly who they were speaking to and had access to see the history of my own tenancy registrations.

Frankly, at this point, it’s of no concern to me what you believe.

I got the information that was important for me at the time to assess the reference I had received as unverifiable.

I subsequently went with a different tenant whose references I could verify.

And they are now living in my property and their tenancy has been registered with the RTB.

there Is nothing in it for the landlord to rent out their room/property to this someone they don’t trust. What I usually do is either try and get someone who is. Friend of a friend or ask them to tell me about themselves in which cases 90 percent of them tell me where they work up front.

I dont see a problem with your claim.

Boards is full of posts from people in the past who have been able to check with the RTB if a property is registered with them.

I would imagine all you do is ring up and pretend you live there and ask it it registered. easy peezy. Not going to try it myself, but im sure those who dont believe you could give it a go themselves and check.

Every potential tenats should be aware that they need to send as much info as possible to a landlord when trying to get a rental.

Of course you dont have to if you dont want to, but it goes something like the following.

Landlord advertises property with email for contact.

Applicant responds to email asking about property.

Landlord responds to applicant via email : Please send me some blurb about yourself together with any other information or references you think would help your application.

Potential tenants 1 - 10 : My name is xxxx. Is the property available. - Bin.

Potential tenants 11 - 20 : My name is xxxx. I work in x, here are my references from my job. Here are my references from my previous landlords. Here are my latest payslips.

Top of the pile to call back after checking refs.

Potential tenants 21 - 30 : My name is xxxx. I work in x, Im not giving you references til i get the property. - In the maybe pile if you run out of the other ones.

Landlord then checks the refs of the the top 3 or 4 and puts them in order of preference.

Landlord then phones his preferred tenant after checking refs and offers them the property. If he was too slow and tenant already has a place he moves on to the next.

Landlord never responds to anyone who they do not intend to intend to offer the property to.

This only works in a landlords market like these days. You would nearly have the opposite situation if it was like 10 years ago and it was a tenants market.

What a welcoming place this has become. Boom, first response to the OP is derision.

Sorry typo in my previous message. Was meant to read *prohibiting. Didn’t have my reading glasses on.