Renting roulette: the great letting agents gamble

This article was going alright until the final paragraph. I would suggest that for “much more transparent” you should say “clearly visible”, for “headline price” you should say “statement of fees, charges and premium payable in advance of tenancy” and for “point of sale” you should say “prior to acceptance of tenancy”.

Otherwise, this is all very good and I think Which? should – in the likely event that nobody else will do anything about it and legislation is pure fantasy at present – produce a letting agents charter with a checklist for prospective tenants and landlords to follow when using an agent. And Which should waive its copyright so that it can be reproduced freely in the property pages of newspapers and magazines [similar to the guidance published in connexion with buying used cars].

Landlords have a free choice of letting agent and presumably go with the one that promises them the most. Tenants on the other hand have to deal with the agent selected by the landlord if they happen to manage the property they wish to rent. I would argue, therefore, that tenants need better protection than landlords do. The burden on tenants from quitting and removing greatly exceeds the upset caused to the landlord if a tenant gives due notice and leaves [despite their constant moaning about it].

I have been renting with Now! lettings who have decided to sneak in a hidden charge when moving our of my property of £65 for a check out fee. This was not explained to me at all until I requested my deposit back and the letting agent are now trying to take this out of my security/damage deposit. Is this legal? I have written a letter to the agency and advised I will be discussing with the Deposit Protection Service but now the agency have gone quiet and not refunded the uncontested part of the deposit.

Charges like this should be included in the fees at the start of the tenancy. I was also charged £30 in admin fees to protect my deposit in the DPS – which is a free service for landlords and tenants alike.

It might be worth noting examples of good practice in Scotland, like the government’s private landlord registration scheme, recently extended to include letting agents; and the rules about repairing standards here; and some recent campaigns about illegal viewing charges etc.

However, I still get an impression there are too many over-optimistic and inefficient people working in letting agencies, and that membership of a professional association, which should be a given, doesn’t ensure satisfactory performance.

There may also be loopholes in immigration controls, and other anti-social behaviour issues, around student letting, despite the UK Border Agency’s latest iterations around rules for colleges and student visas. As a landlord presented with foreign students making apparently well-founded requests for tenancies, and not wanting to discriminate unfairly against them, I think it would be better if the letting agents could be compelled to do more follow-up on student tenants, beyond looking at their passports and any previous tenancy records; any extra costs for these checks could be fairly placed on the foreign students rather than on the landlords. Similar checks are more likely to be standard practice in other European countries, if only because those countries have identity cards for their own citizens.

A letting agent is the agent of the landlord, not the tenant. Any work done is therefore done for the landlord. It follows that the duty of care is owed to the landlord, not the tenant. If the letting agent charges the tenant a fee, it follows that the agent is working for the tenant. The agent therefore owes the tenant a duty of care. However, to owe both parties a duty of care must surely indicate a clear conflict of interest, notwithstanding Lord Atkin’s comments in 1934.

Second, if the agent IS acting for the tenant, where is the contract to govern that relationship?

Third, the sorts of costs that are passed on to tenants (inventory, checking in, checking out, and drafting tenancy) are normal legitimate business expenses for a landlord. The landlord can therefore set off the entire cost against tax. The tenant cannot, of course.

Finally, these fees are, in my experience, excessive. £150 plus, a year for a word processed tenancy agreement is simply not acceptable.

Westminster must follow Holyrood’s lead and ban these charges. If a landlord wishes to recover these costs from the tenant, that is his prerogative. The landlord’s choice (whether or not to reflect these costs in the rent) is part of the market mechanism of the rental sector. A landlord who doesn’t reflect these charges will be cheaper and find it easier to get tenants thus giving him more choice but will have to absorb the cost.

These fees are also a disincentive to the agents to optimise their performance. They should be competing on price, efficiency and service. That all agents levy these fees (ie nobody breaks ranks) implies collusion and market abuse or at least market failure.

It remains though that these fees cannot be justified. Which, Shelter and others should be campaigning to have them outlawed.

From a landlord’s perspective: Letting agents in London demand ongoing tenant find fees on a declining basis – e.g. fist year 10%, next year 8%, year after 6% and so on. Outside of London the tenant find fee is a one off fee. There is some sort of cartel in London demanding totally unfair tenant find fees.

I have been trying to find a property to rent in Southampton and am being quoted between £250 and a whopping £400 in fees alone!!! I have always rented as cannot afford to buy and the maximum I have ever had to pay is £100 and that was only 1.5 yrs ago. I do not understand why tenants have to pay such seemingly random amounts.
Surely it is part of their job and they are, as pointed out in a previous comment, already being paid to do their job by the landlord. It is those who cannot afford to buy that are being penalized and ripped off.
As for trying to get a reduction (as mentioned in another response) HA! too many people now having to rent and competing for property that I would suggest (with experience) that this is not an option.
Something needs to be done ASAP

I am unfortunately going through the process of renting a property from an estate agent in Dorset by the name of Goadsby. I have a list of the charges now I have decided to take the flat:
Deposit £900.00
rent in advance £600.00
TDS Admin Fee ? What is this £ 30.00
Preparation of requisite legal documentation and inventory charges (inclusive of VAT £148.00
Holding deposit I am now told is none refundable already paid. ” ” £118.00
I thought this deposit should be repaid as I am taking the flat…

I was informed it would be a month in advance and 11/2 x rent deposit, nothing else: I paid for my own bank reference, I took it in to the office, I delivered 2 references myself to the office. A further 2 they collected. All locally available. I would say this is money for nothing it is taking a lot of restraint by me and have politely discussed this amount but we have not got any legal standing. This practice surely needs looking into.. I have asked to meet my landlord but it has been bypassed.. I am a middle aged person, and feel very ripped off by this system… My other biggest gripe is they get £900.00 deposit and the interest… and if I stay in the flat for a long period will wear and tear be an excuse not to give my deposit back if I leave… We need some legislation to cover the unregistered charges these agents are demanding.. Why did I pay because I have to leave my current abode as it is up for sale I needed a home.

We’ve just received a letter from our letting agents – Dunhill Property Management – with an invoice for a ‘standard check out fee’ of £100 + VAT.
I’ve never had this before and have checked back through the contract and there’s no mention of it.

Surely if this isn’t agreed upon, they can’t legally charge us this, can they?

On top of this, they want us to have the place professionally cleaned. So what is this check out fee for?
When we moved in, the place was dirty and full of cobwebs. The landlords asked that we hold off moving in sooner because they wanted to clean the place, but it was filthy. Maybe I should’ve charged them a £100+VAT time-wasters fee.

My daughter was charged £200 by Sterling Estate Agents for a credit check even though she was paying the whole 12 months rent in advance.

This was not a residential let,it was a tenancy agreement for renting an acre of land and two stables.

This is ludicrous,letting agents are taking advantage of the lax laws governing their charges.

When questioned about the fee their attitude was “no credit check,no rental agreement“

They are ripping off tenants and landlords.

SHUTTLEWORTHS estates of Bexhil-on-Sea are a prime example. They have admitted to me that all of their local properties are uninhabitable due to a mould problem in the area which they have no intention of doing anything about. They readily employ underhand tactics to disable communications between landlords and agents and place barriers in the way of tenants making reasonable complaints. They do a good job of presenting a profesional facade but are extemely dismissive and rude once they have your business. Left me with no choice but to take legal action over what should have been a fairly straightfoward issue. Absolute cowboys.

When is a deposit not a deposit?

When the landlord wants (3K) for a new fitted kitchen ….so I am taking the wrap for something that was wrong with the propert prior to my tenancy….(no I dont have photographic evidence to prove it) and the waste of space letting agent is siding with the landlord…is this common?

As a landlord I would never employ an agent. The tenant and the landlord need to know exactly who they are dealing with at all times. We did employ an agent once and the outcome was dire, never again.
All our tenants have our addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses and they contact us direct about problems from blocked drains to problems paying the rent and we deal with these problems. Why would I pay 20% to some business who’s performance I couldn’t monitor and who could block communication between me and the tenant. If I had 10 plus properties I might consider employing somebody to help me look after the tenants and the properties but they would be my employee and responsible directly to me.

My wife and I are new to renting a home and were staggered by our first experience of applying for a let.
The estate agent in Halifax, who acted as agent for the landlord, asked us for an £85.00 “Application Fee” for the property. I asked why this was needed if they were looking for tenants and their response was that it is to cover credit searches etc. I asked if we would have to pay the same amount if we were unsuccessful on this occasion and the response was “Yes, for each and every property you apply for”, even though one credit check etc should be enough, surely. I then asked how soon we would get to know if we were successful and was amazed by the agent’s response.
He told me that, as it was a popular property, there were still a dozen or so viewings to take place over the next two weeks and that they would then decide who should be offered the rental. I asked how many applications had been put in besides ours. The agent replied that there were already more than 30.
I couldn’t believe it! I asked if the unsuccessful applicants would get any kind of refund and the agent said “No!”
I said, “So you have collected more than £2650 in application fees when you know there can only be ONE successful applicant. Not only that, you are purposefully recruiting the maximum number of applicants instead of processing them in turn as the applications are made. Following a successful application there would be no need for further applications!”
That agent stated that it was “common practice” in order to give all applicants an equal chance of securing the let!
I see this as a blatant fraud and a money making scam but it seems that it is all perfectly legal.
I do hope that Which? will take up a campaign to stop this criminal like practice as soon as possible!