Letting agent charging for new agreement - some advice

tigtig

Hi

Our letting agent is charging us for a renewal of our tenancy agreement, i know some letting agents do this. Less than 12 months ago they charged us £40, now its £88! :eek:

I have a really good relationship with the lady who owns the house and asked her if she thought this was right. To mine and her surprise she has been charge £88 as well to sign a new agreement with the letting agent. So between us we are paying £176 for a bog standard photocopied agreement.

I said to my landlady perhaps she should just rent the house direct to me, which she is happy to do but she thinks she is now tied in with the letting agent.

What does everyone think, do you think this is outrages or is this just normal practise. Is there anything we can do about this?

Sammy85_2

It is a normal fee im afraid.

We have one property left with a LA purely because to take the current tenant on privately we have to pay the LA a finders fee equal to 3 months rent.

The tenant has been with us over 2 years now, she is on a rolling tenancy now as neither of us wanted to pay the renewal fees. That is always an option open to you if your LL is happy not to sign you up for another fixed term.

tigtig

Wow i might set myself up as a letting agent sounds like easy money. Photocopy some standard paperwork and charge 176 quid for it. Right off to companies house to register my limited company moneyforoldropelettingagent ltd

But in all seriousness i think the rolling tenancy might work well for both us and the landlady..

P.S I’m really seriously thinking about setting up a letting agency that does not rip people off

clutton_2

""finders fee equal to 3 months rent. ""

you've been conned.... i have never paid more than one months rent and am currently paying 2/3rds of a months rent for a tenant find.....

dump these shysters as soon as you can

Fire_Fox

tigtig wrote: »

Hi

Our letting agent is charging us for a renewal of our tenancy agreement, i know some letting agents do this. Less than 12 months ago they charged us £40, now its £88! :eek:

I have a really good relationship with the lady who owns the house and asked her if she thought this was right. To mine and her surprise she has been charge £88 as well to sign a new agreement with the letting agent. So between us we are paying £176 for a bog standard photocopied agreement.

I said to my landlady perhaps she should just rent the house direct to me, which she is happy to do but she thinks she is now tied in with the letting agent.

What does everyone think, do you think this is outrages or is this just normal practise. Is there anything we can do about this?

Are you saying you both want a new fixed term contract? If so organise it between yourselves, the AST is between the two of you anyway. You can cut out the middle-man on the preparation of the contract only, the letting agents cannot charge an admin fee if they didn't actually do any admin. Whether your landlord then cuts the letting agent out of the equation for the other aspects of your tenancy such as collecting rent depends on the nature of the contract she has with them.

GEEGEE8

Myself and my landlady just decided on a rent amount and carried on ourselves without a letting agent. Seems to work out just fine and she reduced my rent by £25 as this was half of the amount she would save each month.. woop

boliston

tigtig wrote: »

Hi

Our letting agent is charging us for a renewal of our tenancy agreement, i know some letting agents do this. Less than 12 months ago they charged us £40, now its £88! :eek:

I have a really good relationship with the lady who owns the house and asked her if she thought this was right. To mine and her surprise she has been charge £88 as well to sign a new agreement with the letting agent. So between us we are paying £176 for a bog standard photocopied agreement.

I said to my landlady perhaps she should just rent the house direct to me, which she is happy to do but she thinks she is now tied in with the letting agent.

What does everyone think, do you think this is outrages or is this just normal practise. Is there anything we can do about this?

It seems strange to charge to tenant if it's just a renewal by endorsement (ie simply continuing on same terms). If the tenant wants different terms then it would seem reasonable for redrafting.

I would have thought the landlord would get charged an annual fee based on % of rent rather than a specific fee for the document.

Ditch_Crawler

tigtig wrote: »

I said to my landlady perhaps she should just rent the house direct to me, which she is happy to do but she thinks she is now tied in with the letting agent

If she only thinks she is tied in with the letting agent, then the two of you are being insufficiently proactive!

If your contract is due for renewal, then say that you do not wish to renew. Unless she has some totally unreasonable contract with them, your landlady can then ask the agency not to relet the property because she has decided to 'go private'. If the two of you get on really well, you might even get your deposit back, because the agency will have to repay it (if the landlady is happy with the condition of the place) and hopefully she would not ask you to pay it again.

Even if she has to pay some kind of 3 month penalty for withdrawing from the agency, she will soon recoup it, if you stay in the property for a significant period of time, because she will have saved her agency charges.

Ditch

poppysarah

No it's not a normal fee at all.
It's a cheeky cheeky bad monkey fee from companies whose business model needs to make abusive charges on tenants.

Refuse to pay.

It does surprise me that Martin himself doesn't take up this very unfair charge as a cause.

boliston

Ditch_Crawler wrote: »

.... If the two of you get on really well, you might even get your deposit back.....

It is however possible for landlord and tenant to get on "too well" and for the landlord to feel guilt when the annual rent review time comes around.

Ditch_Crawler

boliston wrote: »

It is however possible for landlord and tenant to get on "too well" and for the landlord to feel guilt when the annual rent review time comes around.

Do I hear a voice of experience?