A tenancy advisor says more training should be provided to "ill-equipped" landlords on how to properly vet prospective tenants, to avoid their rental properties being infilitrated by organised crime groups.
Earlier this week police seized 1532 cannabis plants from 17 suburban rental homes across west Auckland, being operated as grow houses.
Several similar operations linked to Vietnamese organised criminals have increasingly caught the attention of law enforcement in recent years, and police specifically urged landlords and property managers to be more vigilant about checking their rental properties.
Tenancy Advisory director Sarina Gibbon told 1News she had noted an increase in the number of requests from property owners inquiring about issues involving possible illegal drug activity at their rental properties.
Landlords have an obligation to carry out due diligence on prospective tenants, and risked being financially liable in the event of a fire or significant damage due to a tenant turning their house into a growing operation.
"Organised criminal activity and rental property is nothing new, that's always been the case. I think in general self-managing landlords tend to be, for the most part, ill-equipped at dealing with these issues."
She said without thorough tenant vetting processes and regular property checks, many 'mum-and-dad' landlords were making decisions "when the training wheels are still on", and could easily find themselves in an unsafe position.
"To me the answer is in very vigilant vetting, because by the time you put somebody who belongs to organised crime in your property, your biggest problem isn't even termination, or the RTA (Residential Tenancies Act). Your biggest problem is personal safety."
"It needs to be taken a step further, right? Because what does being more vigilant mean when you have an industry that's traditionally being handed a script? I've seen those scripts. I think it's seven questions long, and it's a five minute phone call with a referee who is, for the most part, a complete stranger.
"I just think there needs to be more training in this space around how to support property managers and landlords to pick up some red flags and cues that they should be unpacking."
What are the 'red flags' landlords should be looking for?
Verification
Gibbon said alarm bells should ring if landlords or property managers put an ID — such as a driver's licence — through verification software and the results are not able to be verified.
She said sometimes this can be down to "genuine human error" on either side, but could also be a sign of something more sinister when combined with other red flags.
Unsure referees
Gibbon said a referee's inability to answer "very simple, basic questions about the tenant" pointed to a lack of knowledge that should raise a red flag for any landlord or property manager.
"I've had clients who rang the referee and had the referee go, 'who is this about?' and really take a long pause, and not be able to readily answer questions about the tenant's identity," she said.
She said a lack of knowledge did not necessarily equate to criminal intent, but advised that any information provided should be double-checked against another source.
"You'd be surprised how often I hear of property managers saying that once they do that double check, the information doesn't line up," she said.
Same references used
Gibbon said she's experienced multiple Vietnamese tenancy applicants all listing the same referee across their various applications, yet each time the property manager calls this 'person' they get a different voice.
"So sometimes it's a male voice, sometimes it's a female voice."
She added that even within the same property agency, if a reference name came up multiple times it would be best to check with the property manager to ensure the referee was who they said they were.
If your landlord is checking up frequently — is that a bad thing?
Gibbon said it wasn't necessarily a bad thing if your landlord or property manager conducted more-than-the-average number of check-ins per year, and tenants should not be alarmed if landlords were checking in with your neighbours, too.
"We have a very poor inspection culture, where a lot of the times it's literally going through the motion to maintain insurance cover," she said. "I think that needs to change."
"People need to keep their eyes peeled. You're not going to have visibility over electricity bills, because that goes directly to the tenant and the tenant has to pay for it, but how often are you inspecting your property in the first place?
"Do you have a system in place where if there are some red flags identified in that tenancy, are you ready to ramp up the frequency of inspection, or are you simply inspecting once every quarter because that's what your insurer wants you to do?"
She advised landlords to check all aspects of the property including sheds, "poking your head through the roof", doing a walk around the entire property and talking to neighbours.
"I'm constantly surprised at how few landlords have the direct contact details of neighbours. Neighbours, especially home-owning neighbours who want the community to be safe, they're your best eyes and ears on the ground," she said.
"If you're a present property manager, and when you're on site you're actually looking, you've actually got your eyes open, you're paying attention, you're asking the tenant questions, you have a good relationship with the neighbourhood, and you understand, then you have a good 360 degree picture of what is going on."
Additional scrutiny
Gibbon said it was a good thing that these crime syndicates were being caught — and made public — through the media, but was also "grappling" with the potential for additional scrutiny imposed on prospective Vietnamese tenants.
"We don't want to get the industry, and the sector, to a point where anytime anybody sees a Vietnamese name, it's straight away a no," she explained.
"Just because the trend right now seems to be that Vietnamese crime rings are more visible — it doesn't mean anyone from the same country, or same ethnicity, should be discounted or not have a fair chance of securing a tenancy."
In a statement to 1News, Race Relations Commissioner Dr Melissa Derby said the Human Rights Act protects renters, tenants and homebuyers from discrimination.
"This means landlords or their agents cannot refuse to rent a person a flat, treat them unfairly during their tenancy, or end a tenancy because of a person’s race, ethnic or national origins (which includes nationality or citizenship), gender, sexual orientation, disability, family status, or any other protected ground in the Human Rights Act," she said.
"If anyone feels they have experienced discrimination, they can contact Te Kāhui Tika Tangata Human Rights Commission to make a complaint or seek information and support."
Complaints could be filed through email, online website or by calling 0800 496 877.
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