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That's a distinction without a difference. Whether the renter or the landlord buy the credit report, the renter will pay for it anyway.

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Well, no. If the applicant is denied they pay nothing.

In NYC we have application fees that are non refundable to cover background checks. It’s turned into its own scam where people show rooms to rent, collect deposits, and never run the checks and keep the deposits.

The applicant keeps applying until they are approved, so everyone ends up paying. Being perpetually denied would mean being homeless. Not much of a silver lining.

No, a business (or landlord) is free to spend their own dime on a report and is not entitled to get data about others for free.

In the case of landlords it is possible that they ask the potential tenant to hand in a report as a precondition to even make a contract offer. In that case the potential tenant would have to pay for their own data if it weren't for GDPR. The Schufa uses dark patterns to trick people into buying data they legally are entitled to get for free. If you get around their confusing UI (we recently did...) they send you that infamous 30 Euro report for free without much more ado.

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