anyone dealt with Martin & co estate agents?

shellyshoe

Hi everyone, i am currently looking at property to rent and have saw an ideal house being let by Martin & Co east belfast, went to view it and they seemed genuinely nice. I had a few issues with things in the house and they said they would check with the landlord to see if they could be rectified - true to their word the guy did ring me back and said it was fine, the landlord agreed and these could be written into lease agreement.

My question is has anyone else any experience with renting with this company? My reason for this question is i did a search online and saw some very bad reviews but all of them for offices in England, none for here, i have been very lucky in the past and only ever rented privately and had great landlords so i'm a bit worried about renting through a letting agency.

many thanks

Shelly

thetope

I can only speak from the other side of the fence, but i have nothing but praise for them. I moved in with my fiance in 2008 have let my house out through Martin & Co since then. Regarding bad reviews in England, the company is essentially a franchise, i think and the belfast operation is run privately by an agent named Gordon Campbell.

For me, Martin & Co have been exceptionally efficient, friendly and professional throughout and have made it completely hassle free to be a landlord. I was very new to the "landlord" game and they were very good about advising me on certification for gas and electrical appliances. They also made sure I had the place certified by the council as well and checked I had the right number of fire alarms etc. Basically everything a good letting agency SHOULD do, however I "interviewed" a few agents before choosing them and none of them were as thorough. From a landlord's perspective it's nice to know the property's in safe hands and my payment seems to always come in bang on time as they insist on setting up standing orders from tenants. They also do inspections every 4 months so beware if that sort of thing would annoy you as a tenant (i think it's basically to check that you're not damaging/turning the house into a tip - there's no real hoking and poking round the house or anything, or running of a white glove along the windowsills!)

oops i've gone on a bit. but basically - yes, you can rest assured that they aren't cowboys and they will look out for your best interests

maggie5

i rented through them and have to say they were fantatstic. on the day i moved in there was something wrong with my heating they sent someone within hours to get it fixed. they are very efficient in what they do and i knew if i had any problems they would sort it. i had to pay my rent late one time and they were fine with that once i spoke to them and let them know. They also let me move out a little bit earlier then the end of tenancy (because of a misunderstanding on my part) as long as they were able to get someone else in. I also recived my deposit back in full from them.

However i did not have to set up a standing order with them, they were happy as long as the rent was paid on time and i never had any kind of inspection from them, i didnt hear from them unless they needed to get in touch or i contacted them first.

All in all i would defently reccomend them.

shellyshoe

Many thanks for your replies guys they were very reassuring, i just got quite scared after reading the reviews of their branches in England and good rental properties are very hard to come by at the moment and i would hate to let this one pass me by! I will ring in the morning to make sure its still available and hopefully get in with my application and deposit

thanks again everyone

Shelly