What questions do I ask a potential house tenant's personal reference?

[Poetry in Motion]

The couple I'm thinking of renting to listed 2 friends as character references? What questions should I ask them to get a better idea of who this couple is & how they would be as tenants?
This is in addition to calling their employment & past LL. And yes, I have paystubs. So what should I ask their friends? Obviously, the questions will be different then ones I ask employees or past LLs.

[Lynn]

you shouldn't ask questions to their friends , you should call their previous land lord and their bosses
you need to know how long they have been at their current jobs and you need to know did they pay their rent on time , and if they ever broke a lease. i don't think 'character reference is a good idea. you should definitely ask to see a pay stub.

[A Hunch]

Nothing = what good is a personal reference?
If you are landlord you need to join your local apartment association, they will do the background checks for you and provide you tools to help determine a good tenant from a bad tenant.

[Landlord]

Don't waste your time. Friends and relatives will all tell you whatever they think they are supposed to say. If you want to know what kind of person they are check their credit report, that is a very good way to detemine their ethics.

You might try Facebook too, you can sometimes get a very good idea of them from there.

[Frankie]

Character references are a waste of time. Get a credit reference and landlord history instead along with a criminal and credit report. That will give a more realistic idea what they are like. All a friend will say is they are great people. You can't get friends to say bad things, that's why they are friends.