Tenant Screening in Texas: What's Legal to Use and How to Actually Do It

Screening a tenant in Texas is a legal act, not a gut call. You are pulling a federally regulated consumer report, applying criteria that federal fair housing law constrains, and — under Texas Property Code § 92.3515 — you are required to hand the applicant your written selection criteria and get their signed acknowledgment before you take their application fee. Do that wrong and you either refund the fee or, worse, invite a discrimination complaint.

Here is how to run it correctly on a Bexar County rental, what each report actually tells you, and where landlords keep tripping.

Write your tenant selection criteria first

Texas Property Code § 92.3515 requires a landlord to give each applicant, in writing, the criteria used to accept or reject them, and to obtain the applicant's signed acknowledgment. If you don't, you must return the application fee. The criteria should be specific enough that the same applicant would get the same answer from any staff member.

A defensible written criteria sheet covers:

• Income: gross monthly income at least 3x the rent (common, but pick a number and stick to it)
• Credit: minimum score or, better, specific disqualifiers (open bankruptcy, unpaid judgments over $X, utility collections from CPS Energy or SAWS)
• Rental history: no filed evictions in the last X years, no balance owed to a prior landlord
• Criminal history: individualized assessment, with the nature, severity, and recency of the offense considered (see below — do not write "no felonies ever")
• Occupancy: two per bedroom plus one, consistent with HUD's Keating memo
• Pets, smoking, vehicles: whatever your policy is

Give this sheet to every applicant. Same document, every time.

Federal fair housing is the hard floor

The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex (including sexual orientation and gender identity under HUD's 2021 directive), familial status, and disability. Texas does not add protected classes at the state level. San Antonio's non-discrimination ordinance (Chapter 2, Article X of the City Code) extends protection to sexual orientation, gender identity, and veteran status for housing inside city limits.

Source-of-income protection — meaning you cannot refuse a Housing Choice Voucher (Section 8) applicant solely because they use a voucher — is not Texas state law. San Antonio has debated it; confirm current status with the San Antonio Housing Trust or your attorney before you write "no vouchers" into a listing. Refusing a voucher on pretextual grounds while accepting similar non-voucher applicants can still produce a disparate-impact claim.

Credit reports and the FCRA

Pulling a credit report makes you a "user of consumer reports" under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act. You need:

• A permissible purpose (tenant screening qualifies)
• The applicant's written authorization
• A vendor that has certified your rental property (TransUnion SmartMove, RentPrep, FindigsPro, or the tenant-screening arm of Experian)

Skip the "just email me your credit karma screenshot" approach. It's not a real report, it's trivially forged, and it doesn't create the paper trail you need for an adverse-action letter.

What to actually read in the report:

• Trade lines: chronic 30/60/90-day delinquencies matter more than the score
• Collections: utility collections from CPS Energy, SAWS, or a prior apartment complex are the strongest predictor of whether you'll get paid
• Public records: civil judgments, especially from prior landlords
• Address history: does it match what they wrote on the application

Criminal background — the 2016 HUD guidance trap

This is where landlords get sued. HUD's April 2016 guidance says a blanket ban on applicants with any criminal record has a disparate impact on protected classes and violates the Fair Housing Act unless the policy is necessary and narrowly tailored. "No felonies" as a bright-line rule is the textbook wrong answer.

The compliant approach is individualized assessment:

• Consider nature and severity of the offense (violent vs. non-violent, person vs. property)
• Consider recency — a 12-year-old drug conviction is not a current risk signal
• Consider evidence of rehabilitation — employment, housing history since
• Never consider arrests that did not result in a conviction

Write your policy in those terms. "Convictions for violent felonies within the last 7 years may be grounds for denial, subject to individualized review" is defensible. "No felons" is not.

Eviction history — pull the Bexar County JP records yourself

Evictions in Bexar County are filed in one of four Justice of the Peace precincts depending on the property's location. Records are public and accessible via Bexar County's online JP Case Search and the statewide Odyssey portal (re:SearchTX). Commercial screening vendors pull from these but miss filings that are very recent or that were filed in surrounding counties (Comal, Guadalupe, Kendall) — relevant for anyone who just moved in from Schertz, Cibolo, or Boerne.

What matters in an eviction record:

• A filed petition is not the same as a judgment. Cases get dismissed, settled, or decided for the tenant.
• Judgment for plaintiff (landlord) with a money award is the real red flag.
• Writ of possession executed means the constable physically removed them. That's the strongest signal.

A single dismissed filing from 2019 is not a disqualifier by itself. A judgment plus writ from eight months ago is.

Income, employment, and the 3x rule

Most San Antonio landlords require gross monthly income of at least 3x the rent. On a $1,800 rental in Converse or Live Oak, that's $5,400/month gross, roughly $65,000/year. Verify with:

• Two most recent pay stubs (or LES for military applicants from JBSA-Lackland, Randolph, or Fort Sam Houston)
• Employer verification — call the published main number, not the cell the applicant gives you
• For self-employed: two years of tax returns or 1099s, plus three months of bank statements

For military applicants, the LES tells you base pay, BAH (which varies by rank, dependents, and ZIP — check the DoD BAH calculator for the current year), and any flagged deductions. BAH counts as income for the 3x calculation.

Application fees, holding deposits, and adverse action

Charge a reasonable application fee that reflects your actual screening cost (commonly $40–$75 per adult). If you collect a holding deposit to take the unit off market, put the terms in writing: how long you'll hold, what happens if they back out, what happens if you reject them.

If you deny based on a consumer report, the FCRA requires an adverse action notice that tells the applicant:

• The name, address, and phone of the screening company
• That the screening company didn't make the decision — you did
• Their right to a free copy of the report within 60 days
• Their right to dispute inaccuracies

The screening vendors generate this letter for you. Use it every time you deny.

What most people get wrong

• Skipping the § 92.3515 written criteria. If it's not on paper and signed, a rejected applicant who files a fair housing complaint has a much easier story to tell. Fix: one-page criteria sheet handed to every applicant.
• Using a blanket "no felonies" rule. Directly contrary to 2016 HUD guidance. Fix: individualized assessment with nature/severity/recency written into your policy.
• Counting eviction filings as evictions. A dismissed case means the landlord couldn't prove it or the parties settled. Fix: read the disposition, not just the filing.
• Charging non-refundable fees without a signed acknowledgment. Under § 92.3515 you owe a refund if you didn't provide the criteria. Fix: signature line on the criteria sheet.
• Verifying employment by calling the number the applicant wrote down. That number is sometimes the applicant's friend. Fix: Google the employer, call the main line, ask for HR or the manager.
• Accepting a screenshot in place of a real credit report. No FCRA trail, no adverse-action mechanism, easy to fake. Fix: use a certified tenant-screening vendor.
• Treating the Section 8 question casually. San Antonio's housing ordinance and HUD disparate-impact theory both matter. Fix: apply the same income, credit, and rental-history standards to every applicant regardless of payment source; get the voucher amount counted as income.

Screening is where a landlord's first year gets made or broken. When you're ready to list, you can post a rental free at RentInSA's /list-your-home, browse comparable active listings at /rentals to pressure-test your rent and criteria, or find a property manager or leasing agent at /agents if you'd rather hand the intake to someone who runs this playbook every week. More landlord guides live at /resources.