Tenant background check in Texas

Disclaimer: This article is not legal advice. We encourage you to consult a local real estate attorney for guidance on this or any other legal topic.

You commit to a tenant for the length of a lease, so it helps to know who's signing it and who is going to be living in your property. A background check shows an applicant's credit history, criminal record, and eviction history so you can evaluate every application against the same criteria.

Texas gives you a wide view. The state sets no cap on application fees, adds no protected classes beyond federal law, and places no state-level restrictions on how you weigh a criminal record.

What Texas does regulate is the paperwork around your decision, and the first piece is due before an applicant fills anything out. Here's what a Texas background check covers, the rules at each stage, and how to evaluate the results.

What a Texas tenant background check includes

Tenant screening usually covers three reports: credit history, criminal history, and eviction history. You can also add income verification to confirm an applicant makes what they say they do.

Credit history

A credit report shows how an applicant has handled financial obligations over time, including open accounts, payment history, outstanding balances, and collections.

You'll also see a credit score. FICO scores were designed for lending. TransUnion's ResidentScore® was built for tenant screening and gives more weight to housing-related payment behavior. RentSpree includes ResidentScore® with every screening, so the number in front of you reflects how an applicant has already handled housing payments.

Texas adds no restrictions on the credit information you can consider, so the full report is yours to weigh.

Background check

A background check searches national records, including sex offender registries, Most Wanted lists, and the OFAC watchlist, along with local criminal court records in covered jurisdictions.

Texas doesn't limit how you weigh a record once it appears. It does something other large states don't: it limits your liability for renting to someone who has one.

Under Texas Property Code 92.025, nobody can sue you simply for renting to someone who was convicted of an offense, arrested for one, or placed on deferred adjudication.

Under Texas Property Code 92.025, nobody can sue you simply for renting to someone who was convicted of an offense, arrested for one, or placed on deferred adjudication. The protection applies when you approve an applicant with a record.

That protection has a limit. If you rent to someone you knew or should have known was convicted of one of a short list of serious offenses, including murder, aggravated kidnapping, sexual assault, and trafficking, or of an offense that requires sex offender registration, a person that tenant later harms, such as a neighbor or another resident, can still sue you for negligence.

That shapes how you read a report. Federal fair housing guidance asks you to weigh the nature, severity, and recency of a conviction rather than turning away anyone with a record. Since Texas law shields you from claims over renting to anyone outside that short list, you can weigh each record on its own terms.

Local court coverage varies by jurisdiction across every screening provider, so an applicant who lived somewhere without it can come back clean regardless of which company runs the search. A clean report reflects the jurisdictions that were searched, not every place the applicant has lived.

Eviction history

An eviction report shows court records from previous landlord-tenant cases, including filings, judgments, and outcomes.

In Texas, an eviction filing becomes a public court record the moment a landlord files in justice court. That happens whether the case ends in a judgment, a dismissal, a settlement, or a ruling for the tenant. Court records are presumed open to the public under Rule 76a of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, and there's no general way to seal or erase an eviction case. A filing on a report tells you a case existed, not how it resolved, so the outcome is what you should weigh against your criteria.

RentSpree's eviction reports are powered by TransUnion and pull from public court records, including Texas justice court filings.

Income verification

Income verification confirms whether an applicant's actual income matches what they reported on their application.

A common approach is to ask for pay stubs or bank statements, but those have become easy to fabricate. According to the National Multifamily Housing Council, more than 93% of rental housing providers report experiencing fraud, and 84% of those have seen falsified income documentation. In Texas, the Real Estate Commission has revoked licenses over schemes that placed unqualified applicants using falsified income, credit, and eviction records, concentrated around Houston.

Bank-verified income pulls deposit history directly from the applicant's financial institution through Finicity, a Mastercard company, so there's no document to forge. When you add RentSpree's income verification for $10, typically paid by the applicant, it shows you up to 18 months of deposit history, giving you a pattern over time that tells you more than a few pay stubs can.

How to run a compliant tenant background check in Texas

Federal fair housing and consumer reporting laws shape how you request and act on screening reports. Texas adds a short list of its own requirements, and they start before anyone applies.

Know the fair housing rules that apply

The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination based on:

• Race
• Color
• Religion
• Sex
• National origin
• Disability
• Familial status

The Texas Fair Housing Act covers the same seven classes and adds none at the state level. Some cities go further, and the classes differ by city:

• Austin adds creed, student status, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, and source of income.
• Dallas adds source of income, plus sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression.
• Fort Worth adds sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and transgender status.

In Austin and Dallas, you can't turn someone down because they pay rent with child support, spousal maintenance, or a non-federal subsidy. Check the ordinance where your rental is, since these are city lists, not a statewide one.

Source of income rules work differently in Texas than in many states. Under Local Government Code 250.007, cities and counties can't stop you from turning down an applicant because their income includes federal housing assistance, such as a Housing Choice Voucher. One exception: a city can protect military veterans who pay rent that way. Fort Worth adopted veteran protections in 2024, and San Antonio passed an ordinance in May 2026 covering housing providers with five or more units. If you rent in either city, check whether your properties fall inside it.

Give your tenant selection criteria before anyone applies

Decide how you'll evaluate applications before you start accepting them. Your tenant screening criteria might cover credit score, income-to-rent ratio, and rental history.

In Texas this is a legal requirement. Under Property Code 92.3515, when you give someone a rental application you have to make your criteria available in writing, along with the reasons an application can be turned down, including:

• Criminal history
• Previous rental history
• Current income
• Credit history
• Failure to provide accurate or complete information on the application

The applicant then signs to confirm they had the chance to read it. Without that signature, the law assumes you never provided it. The acknowledgment can sit inside the rental application itself, as long as the notice is bold or underlined.

Skipping this step costs you twice. If you reject the applicant, the application fee and any application deposit go back. You also lose the record showing a denial rested on criteria that you set in advance and applied to everyone.

With RentSpree, you can share your screening criteria alongside your listing details, so applicants see the requirements before they apply.

Set your application fee

Texas sets no cap on rental application fees. The fee you set should still reflect what screening an applicant costs you, and applicants comparing listings will notice if yours runs high.

Texas distinguishes between two payments:

• An application fee is nonrefundable and offsets the cost of screening.
• An application deposit is refundable when you reject the applicant.

Calling something a fee doesn't make it one, and if you turn an applicant down without making your criteria available, you need to return both. Under Property Code 92.354, keeping either one in bad faith costs you $100, plus three times what you kept, plus the applicant's attorney's fees.

Screening through RentSpree costs $39.99 per applicant for credit, background, and eviction reports, or $49.99 with bank-verified income verification. Applicants typically pay, but you can choose to cover it yourself instead. Some jurisdictions limit or prohibit passing screening costs to applicants, so check your local rules.

Get written consent before screening

You need an applicant's permission before ordering their screening reports. The federal Fair Credit Reporting Act requires written authorization and a clear disclosure that you'll use a consumer report in your rental decision. RentSpree captures it as part of the online application, before any reports are generated.

Answer within seven days

Texas puts a time limit on your decision. Under Property Code 92.352, an applicant counts as rejected if you don't tell them they're approved within seven days of the day they turn in a completed application on your form. If you didn't give them a form, the seven days start the day you accept an application deposit. Rejecting one co-applicant rejects all of them.

The clock starts when the application arrives, not when the reports come back, so a slow local court record can run out the week without you noticing.

Notice counts if you call the applicant, a co-applicant, or someone living with them by the deadline, or mail it postmarked by then. If the deadline lands on a weekend or a state or federal holiday, it moves to the end of the next day. Deciding from your RentSpree dashboard as soon as reports arrive keeps you inside the window.

Review all reports together

Federal fair housing guidance asks you to consider each applicant individually, and apply the same criteria to everyone instead of letting one number decide. Use a tenant screening checklist to keep the process consistent from one application to the next.

Send the required denial notice

If a screening report leads you to deny an application, or to offer less favorable terms such as a higher deposit or a co-signer requirement, federal law requires a written notice. It must:

• Name the screening company that provided the report
• Say that the company didn't make the decision
• Explain the applicant's right to a free copy of the report and to dispute anything inaccurate
• If a credit score played a part, include the score, where it came from, the scoring range, and the main factors behind it

With RentSpree, you can accept, conditionally accept, or deny an applicant right from your dashboard. When you deny an applicant, RentSpree generates the required denial notice automatically, so it goes out without adding a step to your to-do list. A notice that always goes out is also one you can't be penalized for missing.

How to evaluate your Texas tenant background check results

Once the reports come back, measure what you see against the criteria you set before you listed.

What to look for in the credit report

The score is a starting point. Consider payment history, outstanding balances, collections, and whether any problems are recent or well in the past.

What to look for in criminal and eviction records

How a case ended matters more than the filing itself. A charge means a case was filed, a conviction means a finding of guilt, and a dismissed case is neither. The same holds for an eviction filing, which in Texas becomes a permanent public record whether or not a judgment was ever entered.

For convictions, HUD guidance asks you to weigh nature, severity, and recency, and to consider what a record says about this tenancy. Blanket exclusions based on any record don't meet that standard.

What to look for in income verification

Review the size and consistency of deposits against the income criteria you gave applicants up front. Consistency matters as much as the total; a steady pattern across 18 months tells you something a single month can't.

If you're reviewing uploaded documents instead, compare figures across pay stubs and bank statements and look for details that don't line up. A well-made fake pay stub can pass that check, since generators now produce correct math and realistic withholdings. With bank-verified income through RentSpree, you don’t need to determine if any documentation is fake, since deposit history arrives straight from the applicant's bank.

Screen Texas tenants from application to decision

Texas gives you room to set your own standards and charge what screening costs you. In exchange, it expects those standards in writing before an applicant applies, an answer within seven days, and a refund if you skip the first part.

RentSpree handles those steps in one place. Share your criteria alongside your listing, then collect applications and screening consent. When an application arrives, pull TransUnion credit, background, and eviction reports, and add bank-verified income verification so income isn't the one thing you're taking on trust. Make the call from your dashboard, and the denial notice goes out for you.

RentSpree is free for landlords and agents. Screening costs $39.99 per applicant, or $49.99 with bank-verified income added, and is typically paid by the applicant. Some jurisdictions limit or prohibit passing the fee along, so check your local rules.

Frequently asked questions