How to find a former tenant for collections using the internet

Make it easy from the start

People are optimistic and generally enter into a business relationship thinking everything is going to work out fine. Landlords and tenants are the same way as they rarely take the steps necessary to protect themselves at the start of a rental relationship. Landlords should collect as much information as they can about a prospective renter from the start so that collection proceedings can be much smoother if they are necessary.

In our sample rental application, we ask for the following background information on a tenant: tenant's current address; home, work and cell phone numbers; date of birth; social security number; e-mail address; driver's license number; vehicle license number; previous two addresses; former landlord information; employer information; bank account information; references; and emergency contact person. The idea being that if the tenant owes money and unexpectedly vacates the unit, the landlord has plenty of information to begin to locate the tenant and potentially collect what he or she is owed.

If you did not collect such details about the tenant, one place to attempt to dig up information on the tenant is the internet. A starting point for such searches is anywho.com. Generally anywho.com will not have information on individuals who have just moved but if it has been a while since your tenant has left, he or she may be in anywho's database. Anywho's suggestion that you just use the last four letters of the last name and the first letter of the first name is very helpful. You may even find relatives of your tenant that you could contact. If your tenant kept the same phone number, you can do a reverse lookup by using the phone number to find the current address associated with the phone number.

Another starting point would be to perform a google search on a person by putting their name in quotations. For example, one could search for "Molly Ramsey" - by putting the name in quotations, Google only searches for the exact phrase. If that brings up too many results, you could narrow the search by adding more terms, for example "Molly Ramsey" Ohio. By adding "Ohio" to the search phrase, you would be looking for the terms "Molly Ramsey" and "Ohio" at the same time. If you believe the tenant is still in Ohio then such a search may turn up all the Molly Ramsey's in Ohio. If you believe the tenant was still in Columbus, Ohio then you could add Columbus to the search and so on. If the tenant had a particular hobby or interest such as studying French, making a Torch or writing letters to the editor about sophomore who may not have seemed to return her favor, you could add that to the search phrase to further narrow the results.

Another search could be done using your local court's web site, if the court maintains public records on line. Since almost everyone receives a speeding ticket from time to time, chances are your tenant may be on record. Franklin County's Municipal Court maintains such a web site and you can look up individuals through their public access records search. Or you can use a commercial service to search court records in many different courts.

Many county auditors have websites and if your tenant purchased a home, you may be able to find his or her current address. Another good resource is classmates.com, if you know where the tenant attended high school then you can obtain some contact information through that website.

Another good resource is by performing and instant background check. I've found this to be a great resource in not only getting background information but finding where people currently are located.