Re: When can I destroy rental applications? - Landlord Forum thread 354465

Re: When can I destroy rental applications? by Gernot on September 30, 2017 @16:59

The IRS can go back and audit up to six years. The statue of limitation for Fair Housing Complaints is generally two years, but may be tolled during that time, if HUD is investigating the complaint.

A safe time limit may be at least six and a half years. But most important is proper disposal by the landlord by following the "The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act (FACTA)" which applies to all landlords. The Act states how to properly dispose of tenant applications and credit files.

As was stated, saving your files digitally and with back up is the most expedient way to handle the information. Every landlord should have a plan and written procedures for document safekeeping and disposal.

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Re: When can I destroy rental applications? by Garry (Iowa) on September 30, 2017 @18:15	[ Reply ]

It turns out that we are both right about the audits. I Googled the IRS audits, and found out the statue of limitations for an audit is 3 years. So I was correct. However, it did say that if a person omits more than 25% of their income in any of one of those 3 years, the IRS can go back up to 6 years to do additional audits. So you were correct on that count. So, to all of us landlords out there-----don't be claiming extra vacancies when they actually have renters in them, or claiming less monthly income than you are actually taking in.