Is your dog a good neighbour? Dog interviews for apartments in New York and Sydney

New Yorkers will tell you that passing a co-op board interview can be as tough as getting into Harvard. But it may be rougher still for Rover.

In addition to answering endless questions about your finances, what you do and who you may or may not know, many co-op boards now require dog interviews in hopes of avoiding distressing problems down the line. Those problems might include dogs that bark all day, frighten neighbours and other pets with aggressive behaviour, or even bite.

How should you prepare your dog for a co-op board interview? Some owners rely on simple approaches like making sure their pets are well fed or tired from a long walk. The process has led some to take more drastic measures, though, including DNA testing to prove a dog’s pedigree, Xanax or therapy to keep a dog calm, photo shoots, letters of recommendation and, increasingly, certificates of good behaviour.

The pet industry, naturally, has responded to the need with special boot camps and programs that will declare your dog a model citizen.

The American Kennel Club offers one such certificate for graduates of their Canine Good Citizen program. About 1,300 dogs across the country graduated from the program in 1989, when the kennel club began offering it, according to Dr. Mary Burch, the program director. Last year there were 65,000 graduates.

Certifying your dog’s good behavior isn’t just a New York experience, Burch said; “the legislatures of 42 states have passed resolutions endorsing the program.” More co-ops, condos and rentals across the country, she added, “like a vacation rental agency in North Carolina and a condo in Oregon, ask for this more frequently.”

New York City has 75 approved American Kennel Club instructors and evaluators who conduct approximately 2,500 tests a year, Burch said. Instinct Dog Behavior & Training, in East Harlem, is one, founded in 2009 by Brian Burton and his wife, Sarah Fraser, both certified dog behaviour consultants and professional dog trainers.

The couple have also been asked to write letters of recommendations for dogs they have trained. When Instinct opened, Burton said, he would see “a handful a year” of people getting their dogs ready for interviews. Those clients have since tripled.

• Related: One of Sydney’s biggest apartment buildings bans animals
• Related: Ten doggone reasons for stopping pets in apartments
• Related: Landlords should be saying ‘yes’ to pets

It’s not just New York, or even the United States, that is scrutinising dogs. Melissa Ayre and her husband, Eric Welles, encountered screening for their dachshund-hound mix, Mr. Milo, when they moved to Sydney  last year.

First there was a quarantine to deal with, then approval from “the strata,” the board of the rental building’s management company. “We worked with a relocation specialist who warned us that strata are notoriously unforgiving when it comes to renting with animals in an apartment,” Ayre said.

“The strata doesn’t meet with the animal personally; they look over the dog’s resume and letter of recommendation and approve or deny from there.”

Before moving, the couple enrolled Mr. Milo in classes at Instinct. “Sarah wrote a glowing letter of recommendation and luckily, Mr. Milo was approved almost immediately,” Ayre said. He now spends his days bounding along Bondi Beach.

This story was first published by the New York Times