It helps an awful lot if you've claimed the winnings and filed taxes on it I think. My friend Charles and I both simply put "self-employed" and wrote how much we made. The real estate agent asked what we did, we told him, and we got the apartment a few days later. The real estate agent happend to be a bit of a poker junkie which may or may not have helped . He was like "do you guys play on pokerstars?!" "What's your name's on pokerstars!?"


Do your parents know that you make decent money paying? If so they may not have a problem co-signing so you can actually get a place, but you actually paying since you're doing well in poker.

I have 3 places that I rent out. Here is what I look at when I get a prospective tennant, pretty much in this order...

Credit history. This supersedes all. If you've paid your bills in the past, I have no reason to expect that you wouldn't pay them in the future. If you've got a 720 or above credit rating, I will stop checking everything else.

Have you rented before. If you don't have the credit history, I'm gonna want to talk to someone who has rented to you before.

Can you pay the damage deposit.

These are the big 3. If this checks out, I'll pretty much work with you on anything else.

If you are young and don't have a credit history and have never rented before, but can pay me the damage deposit (which I am going to make higher if you've got no rent history), then we're going to have to work stuff out. And really it's going to depend on the market, because if I can find someone to rent to that has a history, I'm renting to them, not you. If the market is thin, it's going to come down to my "read" on you. If you are a young guy, let me give you some advice...putting on a shirt with a collar, looking the guy in the eye, and being very respectful will go a long way. If I think you are a good kid, I'll probably give you a chance. If I think there's a 50-50 chance that you are going to trash my place, I'll keep looking.

Just a couple of cents from a guy who's been on the other side.