One resource that everyone covets regardless of financial situation is time.

We all want more of it but there are only 24 hours in a day.

If you're a landlord or property manager it might feel like there is even less time in the day because a leaky pipe, late rent, or eviction suddenly taxes your time.

One area where landlords spend too much of their time is on the tenant screening process. 

The pre-screening phase.

There is an old saying that goes a little something like this, "Sometimes you have to go where you don't want to go... to get where you're going."

A great example of this is working out. If you're feeling out of shape you're going to feel worse when you start working out but if you stick with it you'll get to where you want to be.

With tenant screening this axiom is true as well. A lot of landlords skip steps because they fell like they are a waste of time.

Let's illuminate this by looking at two hypothetical landlords.

The first landlord list his rental and then shows it to each interested applicant.

The second landlord list her rental and then speaks with every person on the phone after administering an automated survey (more on this later).

The second landlord is adding steps (going where they don't want to go) in order to weed out the applicants that are a bad fit before showing the rental.

What typically happens is the first landlord is in a hurry and ends up showing the rental to unqualified applicants. Simple pre-screening questions about their income, smoking, pets, etc would have weeded these applicants out.

The second landlord is only showing the rental to qualified applicants and will spend far less time traveling to the rental to do showings.

Earlier we mentioned an automated survey.

We suggest creating a custom gmail account for your rental business purely used for pre-screening applicants.

This email will help add a layer of privacy for you and also give you the option to create an autoresponder that include a link to a survey.

You can create free surveys using Google Forms or Survey Monkey.

The trick is to create the survey using a feature known as "logic" which is a "if this than that" feature.

You'll have two final pages to the survey. One will say they do not meet your minimum criteria and the other will say they're approved to move to the next step and to enter their contact details below.

When you ask qualifying questions in the survey such as "Do you smoke?" you can send them either to the denial page (if they say yes) or to the next question if they say no. This will depend on your screening criteria.

It takes a little bit to set up these surveys and it adds an additional step in your screening process. However, you'll automatically remove applicants that are a bad fit for the property.

Institute an automated pre-screening survey asking questions about income standards, pets, smoking, and if they're willing to submit to a background check and you'll save time as a landlord.