Another Use For Psychics

In New York: Landlords Rely on Psychic to Vet Tenants.

Baruch Herzfeld, a landlord in Brooklyn, sometimes finds himself unsure about a potential tenant. Because his buildings are in neighborhoods like Bushwick and Bedford-Stuyvesant, which are frequented by artistic and creative workers, a number of his applicants have questionable credit or spotty incomes.
But rather than reject them out of hand, Mr. Herzfeld sometimes refers them to Joan Baker, a freelance property manager and superintendent who conducts as part of her services what she calls “psychic credit checks” — interviews in which she tries to intuit whether a tenant will be reliable.

Does it work?

“I’ve never had a problem with anyone she’s checked into,” Mr. Herzfeld said. “I don’t know what part is psychic, what part is luck and what part is interpersonal skill. But I know she’s effective.”

A tenant, Bob Hain, cites even more evidence:

“She’s always predicting when things go wrong in our apartment.” For example? “Well, last year, when our sink busted, we didn’t tell anybody — but within a week she’d installed a brand-new sink,” he said. “It was weird.”

Joan Baker is shown here with one of her biggest fans.