Frequently asked questions

Yes. Building and sharing your verified renter profile is free, and it is always free for landlords to view a profile you share. We will add optional paid features later (like reporting your rent to the credit bureaus), but your core profile stays free.

Yes. You connect through Plaid, the same secure service used by major banking and finance apps. The connection is read-only — we can confirm your rent payments and income, but we can't move money. CertRent never sees or stores your banking username or password; you enter those directly with Plaid.

CertRent gives a landlord bank-verified facts — confirmed on-time rent, verified income, verified ID, and references from people we've checked really own the building. That's stronger than the screenshots and pay stubs most applicants hand over. We can't force any landlord to accept it, but it's designed to make saying "yes" easy — and under New York law, bringing your own recent verification can even get your application fee waived.

We'll always be honest about this: rent reporting mainly helps by making you visible to the credit system. On-time rent can help newer scoring models (like VantageScore and FICO 9), but it does not change the older FICO 8 score many mortgage lenders still use. If you have little or no credit history, becoming "scoreable" is the real win — not a guaranteed jump in points. Anyone promising a specific score increase isn't being straight with you.

No. CertRent is a tool you control to prove you're a reliable renter. You choose what to verify and which landlords ever see it. We don't run criminal or eviction-court checks, and we don't make rental decisions for landlords.

In most cases, yes. Identity verification works from a government ID, and your rent and income are confirmed straight from your bank — so newcomers, students, and people building credit for the first time can still create a strong, verified profile.

They see your verified results — for example, "rent history confirmed," "income verified," "identity verified" — not your raw bank transactions or your ID images. You decide who gets a link, and you can turn any link off at any time.

Most people finish the core verifications in minutes. Identity and bank verification are near-instant; references depend on how quickly your past landlord responds.

Yes, anytime. You can remove individual verifications or delete your whole profile from your settings, or email us at info@certrent.com. See our Privacy Policy for details.

We're starting in New York City, where the renting rules make a verified, portable profile especially valuable. More cities are coming.