Paying Your First Month’s Rent

Welcome to Lobos Management! If you’re paying your first month’s rent, that’s exciting! We welcome you as our resident and look forward to a long time together. As you might have heard, you need to pay your first month’s rent with “certified funds.” We refer to these funds as “certified” because they are backed by a bank or other financial institution (such as a credit card company). Essentially, the bank or credit card company certifies that your payment is guaranteed.

What Do Certified Funds Include?

These funds include:

• Credit Card – Use this card to pay your rent online. Note: you will likely incur a processing fee of around 2.99%; we do not collect this fee. This fee is charged by the payment processor, not Lobos Management. Believe it or not, when you pay through the Resident Portal via a credit card, the processor charges 6%; we pay half of that, and you pay the other half. We accept all major credit cards except for American Express.
• Cashier’s Check – You are able to pay with a cashier’s check. This check is secure and drawn on the bank’s or institution’s funds rather than your own (i.e., as opposed to a personal check).
• Money Order – This secure, prepaid document is used as an alternative to personal or cashier’s checks. You can obtain these from credit unions, some banks, and institutions such as grocery stores or USPS. Note that you will need to have the equivalent amount of cash in hand to obtain your money order, and you may need to obtain more than one, as these orders tend to be limited to $500 to $1,000 apiece.

Why Do We Require This?

We are often asked why we require certified funds for the first month’s rent, while the rest of your residency allows for more varied payment methods. The answer is that we want to ensure that, before you move in, everything is squared away financially and no balance is owed. Requiring certified, secure funds is the best way for us to do that. Though this process may seem inconvenient, it actually benefits residents too.