Landlord wants to rent directly to us

JonnyFrond

Hi Guys, Happy new year to you all.

Regarding renting the flat I am in.

The landlord called me this morning because he wants to rent the property out privately, and I suggested to him that my flatmate and I would like to stay here. We like the landlord, he is a great bloke and very considerate.

I have read on another post about the same thing that this is fine from our point of view, though the landlord is a little concerned that the letting agency (a very large highstreet estate agent) will cause problems.

What is his legal standing there, can he say to the agent that he does not want to go through them any more?

Our tenancy is up in March.

From my point of view, I would love to stay here as I have just started at Uni and the stability would be a real bonus. I also said to him that if it meant the rent would be reduced a little, then we would happily stay for another year maybe two and he agreed that that would work for him.

Thanks in advance

Jonny

BitterAndTwisted

The only party which has a contract with the agent is the landlord, not you. So if there are any problems caused by the agent the only person who will have to deal with them is the landlord.

Just ask the LL to put his request for the rent-payments to be made direct to him rather than through the agent in writing. You don't really need anything else.

slyracoon

Its not really your problem. Its between the Landlord and agent.

JonnyFrond

Thanks for the feedback, the only thing I am concerned about is that if the landlord is going to have a hard time from the agent, he would rather sell the property, which is a little extreme I must admit, and as I would like to stay here and the land lord has agreed to reduce the rent for us, it is in my interests to find this out to make it easy for him.

So will it be difficult for him to get out of the contract with the estate agent (big green sign starting with an urban animal), or is he perfectly with in his rights to say he does not want to use them any more, bearing in mind that they found us as tenants for him?

Kind regards to all

Jonny

Brb

JonnyFrond wrote: »

Thanks for the feedback, the only thing I am concerned about is that if the landlord is going to have a hard time from the agent, he would rather sell the property, which is a little extreme I must admit, and as I would like to stay here and the land lord has agreed to reduce the rent for us, it is in my interests to find this out to make it easy for him.

So will it be difficult for him to get out of the contract with the estate agent (big green sign starting with an urban animal), or is he perfectly with in his rights to say he does not want to use them any more, bearing in mind that they found us as tenants for him?

Kind regards to all

Jonny

It would as easy/hard for your LL to dump LA according to the contract your LL signed with them. Some LAs get naive LLs to sign that they are due a month's rent if their T (you) remain in the property on ast anniversary date and this fee is due yearly regardless of any work they've done or not done.

Shocker - some LAs are just as evil to LLs as they are to Ts!

Rafter

Your landlord will probably be breaching the terms of the contract he signed with the letting agent. Not going to effect you but he could be taken to court for breach of contract if the agent is particularly aggressive.

Way round it might be for landlord to rent the property to your parents and you then pay the rent to them. That way the official 'tenant' has changed and your landlord won't be in breach - just a thought?

R.

tbs624

Your LL will need to thoroughly check the terms and conds of his contract with"Wolftons". They were hauled up by the OFT for hiding away their renewals clauses - see this article

If the requirement is clear within the contract then your LL will have to cough up: AFAIAA Wolfton's subsequently changed the wording of their LL/LA contracts

DizzyDasher

We rented through that very agency a few years ago, and they were so dreadful (mucked up everything they touched) that when the landlord asked if we were prepared to rent directly from him we were prepared to do it (like you, very nice landlord and small rent reduction).

As I remember it there were no real complications. Agency wanted a contact address for us post-tenancy, and I think from memory we just gave one of our parents. I have no doubt if they found out they would probably make his life difficult - but in our case I don't think our LL ever had any problems.

JonnyFrond

Thank you Dizzy that is very useful for us, very much appreciated.

Please feel free to keep the ideas coming, I will endeavor to post back here to let you know how it ended, it might be useful for others in our position.

Regards

Jonny