Bank Status Enquiry when renting a house

Firsttimebuyer_4

Hi,

We're about to put down a deposit on rental and asked to fill in a form for a consent to provide "Bank Status Enquiry".

This will supposedly show the estate agent if we are ok to rent to. How do these work? I've read about the on the internet and know that the answers will be pretty vague.

What does it take for the bank to give a negative reference. I know they can't say its negative but they may reply "We cannot comment on the commitment".

Both me and my other half have regular income, but also regular outgoings which sometimes mean we go into our overdrafts for a week or so until we get paid again.

What factors are the banks taking into consideration when doing these status references?

Hopefully someone from a bank can answer these questions?

Many thanks.

chickmug

Differing banks express the reply to reference requests in differings way. All keep very brief usually one sentence and typically: -

"This customer is considered fit for your enquiry"
"We wouldn't expect this customer to take on a commitment they could not afford"

However on the other hand it could be: -
"This customer has gone over without authorisation twice in the last six months "
"The amount is more than this customer normally takes on"

The bottom line is that the bank will make comment based on their experience with you and your responsibilty in handling your financial affairs with them. What LL's LA's look for is also the responsibilty to how you conduct your affairs. So no problem with your having gone over if you sought your banks permission first. However if you didn't get permission first you will get a duff reference.

clutton_2

i have seen about 3 different banks "references" for prospective tenants and not one has been specific about their bank behaviour. the only way i could tell if it was a good/bad reference was to ask, for example, the halifax, to let me have a look at their 5 different reference responses - its only when you read them all, that you realise that the one which sounds halfway decent, is their "last" resort type reference - and is a coded message to say "dont - whatever you do offer this person a tenancy - they are rubbish with money "