Why Tenant Vetting Still Wastes Time
Despite all the digital tools available today, tenant vetting still wastes time for property managers, landlords, and rental agents across South Africa. From missing documents and manual checks to disorganised systems and slow responses, the process can take days, sometimes even weeks, delaying lease signings and impacting revenue.
Let’s take a closer look at the key reasons why tenant vetting is still such a time drain and how automating these steps can dramatically improve efficiency without compromising due diligence.
1. Manual Document Collection Is Clunky
It starts with the basics. Many agencies still request prospective tenants to email their documents or submit them in person. This often leads to missing payslips, incomplete ID copies, or blurry photos of bank statements. The rental agent is then stuck following up via email or phone, multiple times, just to get the right paperwork.
Even when documents do come through, they need to be manually renamed, stored in the correct folders, and matched to the tenant’s profile. None of this is value-adding work – but it’s unavoidable when you’re stuck in a manual system. It’s a major reason why tenant vetting still wastes time in even the most well-run offices.
2. Verification Processes Are Still Mostly Manual
Once the paperwork is in, the real admin begins. Verifying employment, checking income, and confirming references all take time. Many property managers still email employers or call HR departments directly, hoping for a quick response. Unfortunately, delays are common.
Bank statements also require careful manual review, especially if income is irregular or comes from multiple sources. Verifying tenant identity can take even longer when cross-referencing ID documents against other information. With no automation in place, agents spend hours reviewing details that could be flagged or processed automatically.
3. Credit Checks Are Not Streamlined
While many rental businesses use credit bureaus like TPN or Experian, few have these checks fully integrated into their workflow. Instead of being triggered automatically during the application process, credit checks are often submitted separately, with results downloaded manually. Agents then have to interpret reports, extract key data, and feed that into another system – all of which eats up time and introduces room for error.
4. No Integration Between Platforms
One of the biggest time-wasters is poor integration. Applications might come in through one platform, documents via email, credit scores from a bureau, and signed leases in another system altogether. Agents spend half their day switching tabs, copying data between spreadsheets, and trying to keep track of which tenant is at which stage.
Without a central dashboard or automated alerts, it’s easy for steps to be missed or delayed, and easy for tenants to lose interest if they haven’t heard back in a few days.
5. Missed Automation Opportunities
The tools to fix this exist, yet many agencies are hesitant to adopt them. This is one of the core reasons why tenant vetting still wastes time, because much of it could already be automated. Application forms can be digital, documents can be auto-sorted and verified, credit checks can be instant, and lease agreements can be generated and signed with the click of a button.
Automation doesn’t remove human judgement; it simply removes all the repetitive, manual tasks that clog up the process and distract from the real work – choosing the right tenant.