Agency or private landlord?

jenny_f

Myself and my boyfriend are about to start renting - we've only rented at uni a few years ago so not done it in the real world!

A friend has just said to stay clear of private landlords. I was avoiding agents to Private due to the agents fees.

She has said that we aren't covered with a private landlord if the house gets repossessed or anything.

However due to the tenancy deposit scheme I thought this was now all covered.

Anyone any advice?

s0127786

I think the rules are (largely) the same since renting through an agency (in my experience) is just renting through the landlord but having a company as the first point of contact. My current lease is through an agency but with a private landlord and I believe my lease is between me and my landlord, not the agency.

From personal experience, I've had much better service from private landlords than agencies but each to their own I guess.


Michael

new_home_owner_3

You are covered with a private landlord, just the same as a letting agent, as long as they have told their mortgage company and they have consent to let.

If they dont you can get kicked out by the mortgage company, just ask them for proof they are on a btl mortgage, or they have got a letter of consent from their mortage lender, then you should be okay.

sparkle83

toughie... we've always done private before. If you get LHA, or have pets, I think private tends to be more flexible. There seems to be less competition, they are (in my experience) cheaper.

however, very little of the work got done to anywhere that has been private, often not being able to get hold of the landlord for days or weeks. also, if you rent private and have a clash of personalities, it can be very awkward, whereas an agent has to be professional. Also with an agency, you'd be more sure of the renting being above board (eg with buy to let mortgage etc) and your deposit being protected.

We've just decided to go for agency for the first time, and move on weds.

chewmylegoff

if you go through a LA it is usually more expensive, because the LA is taking anywhere between 5-15% of the rent, so the LL will tend to want a higher rent for the property. on top of that you have to pay the LA's admin fees - i have paid as much as £150pp for credit/reference checking.

of course ruling out any house advertised through an LA does mean that you are limiting your choice of places to live.

one problem with properties advertised privately is that you need to be that little bit more cautious about whether the person you're dealing with genuinely has the right (and the intention) to rent the property to you- scams where people show you a house, then take a deposit and vanish are not that uncommon, so you need to make sure they show you some proper evidence that they own the house before handing over any cash.

ginvzt

We were renting previous place through agency, and there were nothing, but trouble. So, when we found this house and it was through the same agency, we were not very happy with the arrangement. But, as they were being 'difficult' in sorting out the contract, etc, landlord was happy to get rid of them and the agent was used only to sort out the inventory/contract/etc. If we have any problems, we just email or call landlord and all is sorted. We had previous few landlords, and the worst one was much better than the agency!!!!!

Gwhiz

You can get a crap or a good LL in either scenario and it often comes down to luck!

stationaryace

how knowledgable are you of the ins and outs of renting? I have had crap private landlord and crap letting agents (both reticent to do any of the necessary work- fixing the oven in one case and the windows in the other), the difference is now I know what questions to ask in order to weed out the rubbish ones. Personally I want my next place to be a private rental but it depends who has what available.

chucknorris

I'm a private landlord but when the market is slow I also sometimes use an agent in addition to marketing the property myself. However I usually add the agent's fee to the rent (all or part). So the tenant not only ends up paying the tenant's fees to the agent but also a substantial part (if not all) of the landlord's fee too.

Always ask a private landlord to proove that he owns the property, anyone honest will not mind you asking, if they do mind then at best it tells you that they are awkward and problematic to deal with and obviously the worst case scenario is that he/she is not the landlord and you are being scammed.