What to Look for When Touring a Rental (Before You Sign)

A rental tour usually lasts about fifteen minutes. The lease you sign afterward lasts a year. In a tight market it's tempting to walk through, like the light in the living room, and put down a deposit before someone else does — but fifteen minutes is enough to find most of the problems that make a place miserable to live in, if you know where to look. Here's a practical checklist for the tour, the questions to ask, and the signs that mean you should keep looking.

Before you go

Two things to do from your couch that save you a wasted trip:

• Search the address. Look at the street view, check the walk to wherever you'll be going most, and search the address plus words like "flood" or "complaints." In Louisiana, a quick look at the FEMA flood map for the address tells you whether the ground floor has a history worth asking about.
• Confirm the numbers. Rent, deposit, application fee, and what utilities are included. If the listing doesn't say, ask before you tour, because a $1,200 unit where you pay water, trash, and a $50 amenity fee is not a $1,200 unit.

Bring your phone with a full battery — you're going to use the camera and flashlight — and a small phone charger to test outlets.

Inside the unit: test, don't just look

Landlords show clean units in good light. Your job is to check the things a clean-up doesn't fix.

Water and plumbing

• Run every faucet, hot and cold. How long does hot water take? Does the pressure drop when two things run at once?
• Flush every toilet. Listen for running after the tank refills.
• Look under sinks for water stains, warped cabinet floors, or a musty smell.
• Check the ceiling in every room, especially bathrooms and under an upstairs unit, for stains or fresh patches of paint that don't match.

Electrical

• Plug your charger into a few outlets in each room. Dead outlets are common and annoying.
• Flip every light switch. Note any that do nothing.
• Find the breaker panel and check that it's labeled and accessible.

Heating and cooling

• Turn the AC on and stand under a vent. In Louisiana, a weak AC in September is a $300 electric bill in July.
• Ask the age of the unit and when the filter was last changed. Look at the filter if you can — a black one tells you about the maintenance culture.
• Check for window units and whether they're included.

Doors, windows, and locks

• Open and close every window. Do they lock? Are there screens?
• Do exterior doors have deadbolts? Ask whether the locks were changed after the last tenant.
• Check for daylight around door frames — that's air conditioning leaking out.

Signs of pests and moisture

• Open kitchen cabinets and look in the corners and along the back edge for droppings or dead roaches.
• Sniff. Mildew, mold, or heavy air freshener are all worth asking about.
• Look at the baseboards and window sills for soft spots or bubbling paint.

Storage and layout

• Open every closet. Measure the bedroom if you have a bed frame you're bringing.
• Where does the washer and dryer go, and are the hookups there? Is there a dryer vent?
• Where would you park, and where do guests park?

Cell signal and noise

• Check your phone's signal in the bedroom and the living room.
• Stand quietly for thirty seconds. Traffic, a neighbor's TV, a train, an AC compressor outside the bedroom window — you'll be hearing it every night.

Outside the unit

• The building and grounds. Peeling paint, broken fixtures, overflowing dumpsters, and dead landscaping are all telling you how quickly your maintenance requests will get handled.
• The neighbors. If you can, come back at a different time — a quiet Tuesday morning and a Friday night are different places.
• Lighting and safety. Walk from the parking spot to the door and imagine it at 10 p.m.
• Mail, packages, and trash. Where do deliveries go? How often is trash collected, and is there a fee?
• Drainage. In a lot of Louisiana neighborhoods, the question isn't whether it rains hard but where the water goes. Look for water lines on exterior walls, standing water in the parking area, and ground-floor units that sit low.

Questions to ask the landlord or property manager

Ask these directly, and note the answers. A good landlord has ready answers; a bad one gets vague.

1. What's included in the rent — water, sewer, trash, gas, internet, pest control, lawn care?
2. What's the security deposit, and is any of it non-refundable? Louisiana doesn't cap deposits, but the landlord does have to return it or itemize deductions within one month of move-out. Our guide to Louisiana security deposit law explains what they can and can't keep.
3. What's the application fee and what does it cover? The landlord should be able to tell you what they screen for — income, credit, background, prior landlords — and apply the same standards to everyone.
4. How do I submit a maintenance request, and how fast are emergencies handled? Ask for a specific answer: a portal, a phone number, a person.
5. What's the pet policy — deposit, fee, monthly rent, breed or weight limits?
6. What's the lease term, and what happens at the end? Does it go month-to-month, auto-renew, or require notice? How much notice do you have to give to move out?
7. Can I paint, hang shelves, install a video doorbell?
8. Has this unit ever flooded or had roof damage? Watch the answer as much as the words.
9. Why did the last tenant leave?
10. When is it available, and what's the move-in cost in total — first month, deposit, fees, anything prorated?

If the person showing you the unit isn't the decision-maker, ask who is and how you'll be contacting them for the next year.

Red flags

Some things aren't dealbreakers; some are. Keep looking if you see:

• Pressure to pay a deposit on the spot or "hold" the unit with cash before you've seen a lease.
• Refusal to let you see the actual unit — only a model, or "one just like it."
• A landlord who won't put anything in writing, or asks you to sign a lease with blanks in it.
• A lease clause that says the deposit is non-refundable no matter what. In Louisiana, that isn't enforceable, and a landlord who puts it in a lease is telling you how they plan to handle move-out.
• Fresh paint over one specific patch of ceiling and no explanation.
• Wire transfer, gift card, or cash-app-only payment, especially from someone you've never met in person. That's a scam, not a rental.
• A rent that's dramatically below everything else in the neighborhood. Sometimes that's a motivated landlord; usually it's a reason.

If you want it: what to do before you sign

• Read the whole lease, not the summary. Look for the notice period, the late fee, the renewal terms, who handles which repairs, and any fees not mentioned on the tour.
• Get every promise in writing. "We'll replace the carpet before you move in" belongs in the lease or a signed addendum, not a text.
• Do a documented move-in inspection. On day one, before you unpack, photograph every room, every wall, every appliance, the inside of cabinets, the floors — and send the photos to yourself and the landlord so they're time-stamped. Ask for a move-in checklist and make sure both of you sign it. This is the single most important thing you can do to get your deposit back a year from now.
• Confirm the total move-in amount in writing and pay by a method that leaves a record.

The bottom line

Fifteen minutes is enough if you use it: run the water, test the outlets, turn on the AC, open the cabinets, listen, and ask ten direct questions. Look at the grounds as closely as the unit, because they tell you how the place is managed. Trust a landlord who answers plainly and puts things in writing, and walk away from one who wants money before you've seen a lease. Then, on move-in day, photograph everything — it's how the deposit comes back.