An Irvine Homes reader wrote in last week, soliciting advice on how to score a sweet rental deal. Our readers came through with some great tips.

Reader Talyssa writes:

One thing I highly recommend is that you go around 8-9pm on a weekday and drive around the properties you are interested in. You can instantly see what the population density is like (if every spare inch is covered in cars you know they are packing way more people into the area than it was ever designed for) and how courteous people are in terms of the mess they leave around at night (trash left outside the bins, cars parked crooked or taking up multiple spaces, etc).

The best luck we have had for both of our last two places was just walking in to a bunch of leasing offices and asking what they had to offer for me to sign that day. Usually you can put down a small deposit that is fully refundable within 1-2 days to hold the apartment for that time…

The thing with calling a leasing office is that they kinda don’t care about making the sale, the agent on the phone has no guarantee that you will come in and sign with him/her so they won’t really go out of their way to lure you in. If you walk in the person helping you is MUCH more motivated to close the deal — the way most leasing offices work is each agent gets some kind of credit (bonus, something) for each new renter that they sign… They will do their best to get you to do that including offering you as many enticements as possible.

Also don’t be afraid to say “I dont’ want to pay xx, I’m looking to pay yy” — they don’t always have a TON of a flexibility on price but they will often direct you to another complex that they think might.

Reader Big Cat chimes in, letting us know that Talyssa has the right idea:

I worked as a District Manager for a Property Management company for several years. The agents in the office do get bonus money for getting “X” amount of people to lease.

There is also a minimum that a unit can rent for on a specific day. Fair housing states you must give that price to anyone, but it does not have to be the first offer. Usually the agent starts at retail and works back from there.

Ask if they have any specials first. Then ask what price you will get by reserving today. Try to talk with the manager about the apartment, they usually get bigger bonus checks if they fill their units, so they are more aggressive in making deals. Most managers work on the weekdays.

If you can sneak a peak on their desk, they usually have a list of the apartments available, if there are a lot on the list, they will make better deals.

Also, going the last week of the month when the properties are trying to get on target for month end is a good way to get the best deal.

Finally, check out the reviews if you are looking at a complex. Most of them will be bad, but you can see what recurring problems are at each property.

There you have it…readers helping readers. Any additional tips to share?  Please add them in the comments!

And if you’d like to solicit advice in a future Ask the Readers! column, email your query to echavez@ocregister.com.

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