Renting out my house

Leaseholder49

seraphina wrote: »

Also how firm is your consent to let? Do you have it in writing for your specific circumstances? Although many mortgages say that consent to let may be granted for a fee, on closer inspection CTL is only granted whenever rent >> mortgage payments. This is clearly not the case.

That's a very good point. I just assumed CTL was done and dusted but it does seem quite generous of the lender.

mostlycheerful

12.5% or 10% is a lot to pay an agent, are you sure that you need one? Lots of landlords rent their places out without use of agents. What do you think an agent might do that you or your tenants can’t easily get done yourselves? How often are there problems that an agent would deal with better or quicker than you or the tenants can? Pretty much never. Tenants are perfectly capable of using their phone to call up services and normally they can be in evenings and weekends for deliveries and to let workmen in. If there is something that the tenants can’t sort out themselves then you can drive down in the evening or at the weekend, can’t you. Most problems can wait till the weekend or next week, there’s rarely anything that needs doing on the day it happens. For instance if the boiler or washing machine break down you can call up workmen just as quickly and efficiently as an agent might do it. Plus you wouldn’t normally rely on an agent to choose a new boiler or washing machine as you need to evaluate cost and quality. Otherwise if you don’t control the job then you might get ripped off with overpriced stuff or bad quality. Yeah, a lot of agents do very little and even virtually nothing for all that money.

You don’t need an agent just to receive the rents and deposits and you can certainly find tenants yourself, that’s not much effort or time, is it, and you’ll generally only have to do it once a year or two or even less, it’s not something that happens all the time, is it. Well, unless you happen to be unlucky and have a high turnover of people, but that’s uncommon. Plus you should control that yourself and choose good people, an agent will often just palm you off with anyone and the first one off the banana boat, they don’t care much if they put someone duff in there, it’s no skin off their nose to have to replace them. They’re not particularly going to care much or even at all if you get voids or damage, it doesn’t really matter to them, that’s your loss, not theirs. For finding tenants there are dozens of free websites you can use and one good cheap pay one that is worth using that I know of (and can PM you the name of if you want) plus several free newspapers and various pay ones and shop windows and notice boards in supermarkets and you can sometimes get people just from word of mouth.

As other posters highlight a lot of agents are useless and incompetent and pretty much just con artists and shysters so it would be a shame to get hammered for huge fees for little or nothing and also maybe get ripped off and messed about, wouldn’t it. If you’ve got 20 properties to look after or live 500 miles away then it may make sense to use agents for some aspects of it, if you can find a good one, as the volume of work may be too much to do yourself if you’re holding down a demanding full time job but for just one property and with two of you on the case and relatively nearby you can easily do the tiny amount that occasionally needs doing yourselves. Yeah, you really don’t need to waste 12.5% or 10% of your money on nothing and if you cut out this unnecessary expense then it’ll make quite a difference over time.

Hope this helps your decision making. Good luck.

cashorcheque

Thanks Annabee. To be honest, I don't really care about Chinese post-docs or anybody else's childcare arrangements! I'm not a 'beggar' and I do have a choice! And my choice is to be with my family.

I got flamed for thinking I might be able to do without an agent on the previous thread mostlycheerful, and if I can find a good agent I'd rather have that peace of mind. That said, I take what you say on board.

Childcare is an issue but I don't think you've fully read my OP serafina - I only have to go in to work three days a week, and we're moving to Norwich so we won't be living in Cambridge at all. Costs there are cheaper and my workplace has a tax exemption system for childcare. Of course all this means money will be tight but it also means that I will be paying £90 a week 38 weeks a year (my husband is a teacher so that accounts for the other weeks) rather than the £700 a month you suggest.

cashorcheque

PS - though that £90 a week is a lot, at the moment it costs me £40 a week in petrol to get to work and back and my husband £20 a week for public transport on the days I have the car, plus inevitable wear and tear from driving that distance. So that partly offsets the cost of childcare.

Strings

why dont you have the baby, take the maternity leave and see what happens in a year or so.
Also use the £5k to pay off the mortgage or keep as a slush fund.

cashorcheque

Forgot to say that we had a meeting with our lender in February and it is pretty standard at C&G. You pay £225 - the bank manager said this was usual practice and that he did it all the time. You're right to point out that it isn't done and dusted though and this would absolutely depend on their written consent.

Strings - in effect, that is what we will have to do anyway because we haven't saved a full £5k yet and my husband doesn't have a job in the area. So we will be waiting and seeing, but I want to get to grips with everything with as much time to spare as possible so that if we do decide to move after maternity leave it won't be a rushed decision and we'll have weighed it all up.

I don't think anybody has been doom and gloom for no reason, by the way - all the advice has been more than helpful and I'm really really grateful for it! Thank you all.

seraphina

cashorcheque wrote: »

Thanks Annabee. To be honest, I don't really care about Chinese post-docs or anybody else's childcare arrangements! I'm not a 'beggar' and I do have a choice! And my choice is to be with my family.

I got flamed for thinking I might be able to do without an agent on the previous thread mostlycheerful, and if I can find a good agent I'd rather have that peace of mind. That said, I take what you say on board.

Childcare is an issue but I don't think you've fully read my OP serafina - I only have to go in to work three days a week, and we're moving to Norwich so we won't be living in Cambridge at all. Costs there are cheaper and my workplace has a tax exemption system for childcare. Of course all this means money will be tight but it also means that I will be paying £90 a week 38 weeks a year (my husband is a teacher so that accounts for the other weeks) rather than the £700 a month you suggest.

I presume you're working from home the other two days a week? Check whether your employer is happy for you not to have childcare in place for those two days a week. I'm an academic in Cambridge and have seen colleagues fall foul of this - the uni (correctly) states that if no childcare is in place those two days then they don't believe the employee is capable of putting in a full day's work whilst children are rattling around the home. If you have pipe dreams of bashing out papers whilst your kids play at your feet then let me disabuse you of that now:rotfl:

You may not be able to pop children in and out of nurseries at the conveinience of your OH's job - this is worth checking before you start to rely on your figures. And £90/week is still around £400 for a 4.5 week month, so not much cheaper than £700/month full time. Do the nursery fees include nappies and milk? You cannot just phone up a nursery and say "my kids won't be in this week, I'll not be paying you"

I wish you all the best but I hope that, combined with other posters, the advice given will help you go into your decision with your eyes wide open. TBH it sounds like you've already made your decision and I suspect if you'd asked for help on how to make it work, rather than ask whether it was sensible or not and go ahead anyway.

cashorcheque

Seraphina, until 2 days ago I was also an academic in Cambridge. Perhaps we have crossed paths.

Again, I think you did not read my original post! I actually DID ask for help on how to make it work! I DID NOT ask people whether or not it was a sensible idea, and I made it clear that I HAD already made up my mind! I appreciate your advice but please do not tell me off for not having asked a question that I did in fact ask, or for having asked a question I did not ask!

Thank you for your attempts to 'disabuse' me of notions I have never claimed to have. I am capable of working out my own childcare and work arrangements, and I do not have visions of writing papers with a baby at my feet. The nursery does include nappies, food and milk. The nursery in question has 2 fee structures: all year round, and term-time only. I made absolutely no assumptions that I could swan in and out at my own convenience and I did not ask for any help regarding how I do or do not wish to bring up my child. I simply asked if there were additional costs involved in renting my house out! I appreciate your concern, but I did not ask for the advice you have given and I am capable of working it out for myself.

cashorcheque

Also seraphina, on what planet is £400 a month not much less than £700 a month? It's almost half!

cashorcheque

cashorcheque wrote: »

Hi there.

I have two questions (sorry for the long post - wanted to explain it all clearly). Firstly, will we have to pay tax on our income from the rental, despite the fact that we will technically be making a loss? And if so, how much? Secondly, what other costs (apart from maintenance and possible gaps in tenancy) will we incur? We have gas and electric safety certificates already.

Thank you in advance.

Just to remind people, this is what I asked in my original post. Not how to bring up my children or how to juggle work and home life. Sorry to be blunt.