Graduate looking to rent home, any scope for negotiation?

becky_rtw

barnaby-bear wrote: »

The old bit is ok but it's a bit isolated and not much going on - wouldn't recommend it for a female to get back to easily at night with the river crossing... is the OP a girl...

I walked back there from Town on Saturday! :rotfl:

becky_rtw

barnaby-bear wrote: »

Those back onto the railway (ok for a train spotter) and it's a noisy road and cut through with lots of street-scum at night... and it's a nightmare driving from there to science park (30-40 min) in rush hour....

I lived there for 2 years on 2 seperate occasions - B-B where abouts are you?

It can be noisy, but is exciting, strangely enough you get used to the train! Plus its great when you get back late form London and every other fool is pilling into a taxi! Tee Hee.

barnaby-bear

becky_rtw wrote: »

I lived there for 2 years on 2 seperate occasions - B-B where abouts are you?

It can be noisy, but is exciting, strangely enough you get used to the train! Plus its great when you get back late form London and every other fool is pilling into a taxi! Tee Hee.

Used to live Tenison Rd area then Romsey... via East Chesterton and a dozen other places...

Nenen

I work in Cambridge and live in a nearby village myself. It's a great place to live and work! The biggest problem we have is the incredible traffic snarling! It can take more than half an hour to travel a mile by car at peak times. Many people prefer to cycle (nice and flat) or take a bus. Bus services are good in many areas but not all. You'd need to know which routes your workplace is served by to make a good choice of area to live if you are going to travel by bus.

Fulbourn is nice as are most parts of Cherry Hinton. However, buses from Fulbourn are not as frequent as from Cherry Hinton and go all round the houses taking a considerable time to get to the centre of town. Whereabouts are you going to be working?

My son and his girlfriend are both recent Nottingham graduates now working in different parts of Cambridge (gf from Wakefield originally) so I'm sure they'd offer advice from a peer pov if you want.

If I can be of any help please don't hesitate to ask.

fiish

There's a studio out quite near my workplace advertised for £485pcm, which I viewed yesterday and am considering doing that for 6 months and then finding a better place.

It's not a bad flat, although the windows require repair (LA says repairs have been arranged), and the hotplates and some bathroom fittings are a little rusty.

http://tgresidential.com/Rent/Details.aspx?id=L0849

Shuttling up and down from London is getting tiring, though with my railcard it's still cheaper than staying nights

Nenen wrote: »

Fulbourn is nice as are most parts of Cherry Hinton. However, buses from Fulbourn are not as frequent as from Cherry Hinton and go all round the houses taking a considerable time to get to the centre of town. Whereabouts are you going to be working?

My son and his girlfriend are both recent Nottingham graduates now working in different parts of Cambridge (gf from Wakefield originally) so I'm sure they'd offer advice from a peer pov if you want.

If I can be of any help please don't hesitate to ask.

Going to be working round Fulbourn Road. Have found the bus services to Cherry Hinton quite good. No real experience of bus to/from workplace, though - caught the bus from High St (near Robin Hood pub) when I had the interview.

barnaby-bear

fiish wrote: »

There's a studio out quite near my workplace advertised for £485pcm, which I viewed yesterday and am considering doing that for 6 months and then finding a better place.

It's not a bad flat, although the windows require repair (LA says repairs have been arranged), and the hotplates and some bathroom fittings are a little rusty.

http://tgresidential.com/Rent/Details.aspx?id=L0849

Shuttling up and down from London is getting tiring, though with my railcard it's still cheaper than staying nights



Going to be working round Fulbourn Road. Have found the bus services to Cherry Hinton quite good. No real experience of bus to/from workplace, though - caught the bus from High St (near Robin Hood pub) when I had the interview.

ARM?
That new science park in the grounds of the asylum?

fiish

Thanks all!

Could you share any experiences you might have had with the local LAs? Would like to know which ones I should be more wary of (e.g. refuse to fix problems, OTT charges or hidden fees, service, provision of information etc.). So far I've viewed with Bush, TG, Russell, CB Properties and Vernon. haart have never answered my phone calls so I probably won't want to deal with them :-/

Nenen

fiish wrote: »

There's a studio out quite near my workplace advertised for £485pcm, which I viewed yesterday and am considering doing that for 6 months and then finding a better place.

It's not a bad flat, although the windows require repair (LA says repairs have been arranged), and the hotplates and some bathroom fittings are a little rusty.

http://tgresidential.com/Rent/Details.aspx?id=L0849

Going to be working round Fulbourn Road. Have found the bus services to Cherry Hinton quite good. No real experience of bus to/from workplace, though - caught the bus from High St (near Robin Hood pub) when I had the interview.

That flat is in a really nice part of Cherry Hinton on an excellent bus route into the city too. There is a lovely park just up the road and you could easily cycle to work from there. It seems a lot of money for such a small place but that is typical in Cambridge city centre (hence we live in an outlying village)! I think TG are OK as letting agents, I haven't heard anything horrendous about them and, when we were looking, they seemed very organised! Mind you, I'm always skeptical of any agent or LL that says repairs are 'going to be' done!

Nenen

If you want to try to find a private landlord (saves agency fees) then you could try looking here:
http://cambridge.gumtree.com

I did a search using 'cherry' as keyword and it came up with three different flats for rent in the area.

barnaby-bear

fiish wrote: »

Thanks all!

Could you share any experiences you might have had with the local LAs? Would like to know which ones I should be more wary of (e.g. refuse to fix problems, OTT charges or hidden fees, service, provision of information etc.). So far I've viewed with Bush, TG, Russell, CB Properties and Vernon. haart have never answered my phone calls so I probably won't want to deal with them :-/

These lot are notorious for their high fees: http://www.ambassador-properties.co.uk/tenant_fees.html
note that's 25 pounds per room when you leave to check the inventory....
(Ex-colleague had many problems including failing to do gas safety cert. with them)

St. Andrews are notoriously rubbish at managing / repairs and keep deposits...

Had good experience with RAH - very professional and good on maintenance

Russell seem very keep on witholding 150 from everyone's deposit I've ever met whose used them...

Haart apparently quite good I'm told...