Prospective Tenants not been in the country long!

clutton_2

All the professional landlords bodies' tenancy application forms include sight of a passport, in line with identity requirements - this is nothing to do with immigration.

Voyager - high street letting agents can charge hundreds of pounds for "admin and credit checking" - so £30 which OP is charging is more than reasonable. If i had £30 for every prospective tenant who filled in an application form, and then cleared off - i would have a few quid in the bank -

Had i then paid for credit checking fees, i would have been sorely out of pocket.

i spoke to one landlord today whose agents charge him 60% of the rent in "tenant finding fees" and 30% of the rent to the tenant in admin fees.

clutton_2

All the professional landlords bodies' tenancy application forms include sight of a passport, in line with identity requirements - this is nothing to do with immigration.

Voyager - high street letting agents can charge hundreds of pounds for "admin and credit checking" - so £30 which OP is charging is more than reasonable. If i had £30 for every prospective tenant who filled in an application form, and then cleared off - i would have a few quid in the bank -

Had i then paid for credit checking fees, i would have been sorely out of pocket.

i spoke to one landlord today whose agents charge him 60% of the rent in "tenant finding fees" and 30% of the rent to the tenant in admin fees.

manic

clutton wrote:

lesson learnt - that LA's are rubbish ? or that you need a little more experience in lettings yourself ?

many tenants who are not "credit-checkable" will go for small ads in local papers, rather than LA - in the hope the the LL does not do the full checks.

i don't stop showing prospective tenants round until i have a signed AST

Lesson learnt - Both (including your last point.)

I see your point about the small ads, which is probably why the first people made up a lie & pulled out after I issued them with the application forms!

manic

Thanks for all of the replies.

The reason they want to move so quickly is that they start their new jobs on 1st Feb. I didn't ask why they left it so late to look for a place. They are not local.

As for current LL & employer references, they have provided the details on the application (printed from Landlordzone) & have also paid me for the referencing & are arranging for a letter of employment from their new employers.

Should I phone the LL & employers (old & new) myself, or isn't this what I am paying the referencing company to do?

Also, bearing in mind that I will put all 4 adults on the agreement, should I get the additional adults to fill out an application form, or will the 2 I already have for credit checking suffice? (I have the additional adults names on the forms I have at present.).

For what it's worth, these people seem to have been honest with me so far. As has been mentioned, people who have bad credit, or are dishonest would run a mile at the site of an application form, let alone hand over £30 for referencing.

clutton_2

manic i met a perfectly "wonderful" couple with two gorgeous children and got them to fill in a form, i visited their home unexpectedly, luvverly, clean, etc

my first phone call was to their current HA landlord - they owed £800 rent on their current property and £1000 from the one before !!!!!!

They had each paid me £50 non-refundable fees, and i wrote saying that i could not offer them a tenancy - i never heard from them again - they had gambled £100 that i did not know what i was doing - and they lost.

These folks of yours may well be utterly honest, but, you do need to credit check all of them - if any of them leave to return home unexpectedly, you will need to know that the rest are reliable.

inmypocketnottheirs

manic wrote:

Should I phone the LL & employers (old & new) myself, or isn't this what I am paying the referencing company to do?

Also, bearing in mind that I will put all 4 adults on the agreement, should I get the additional adults to fill out an application form, or will the 2 I already have for credit checking suffice? (I have the additional adults names on the forms I have at present.).

For what it's worth, these people seem to have been honest with me so far. As has been mentioned, people who have bad credit, or are dishonest would run a mile at the site of an application form, let alone hand over £30 for referencing.

It all depends on the quality of the referencing company. I do not know landlordzone. I have however used https://www.letsure.co.uk and their subsidiary websire https://www.tenant-referance.co.uk several times over the last 10 years or so, and have never had a problem.

Please take caution, as you say 'these people seem to have been honest with me so far', they just may be very skilled con artists. You must make every safeguard to protect your property. I let my guard down once and was hoodwinked and had a property completely trashed, then an attempted arson attack. I am not scaremongering you, but please take the utmost care in who you let to as this will prevent you from a lot of hassle and expense later.

Your prospective tenants may well not know fully how referencing systems work here and may well feel that £30 could be worth risking. Especially if the £30 was come across by dubious means.

On a final note, I have had an email just this week from Letsure about identity fraud, if you pm me your email address I will forward it on for you to look at.

manic

Thanks to all people who have given advice on this subject.

After careful consideration (and a couple of nights broken sleep), I decided to turn down these people. I felt really bad doing it, but even though they seemed nice people, I wasn't happy with the speed that they wanted to move at, and through my own inexperience, I hadn't got all the people to fill out applications.

I am getting some estate agents in to talk about selling up, I don't think this landlord lark is for me!

inmypocketnottheirs

manic wrote:

Thanks to all people who have given advice on this subject.

After careful consideration (and a couple of nights broken sleep), I decided to turn down these people. I felt really bad doing it, but even though they seemed nice people, I wasn't happy with the speed that they wanted to move at, and through my own inexperience, I hadn't got all the people to fill out applications.

I am getting some estate agents in to talk about selling up, I don't think this landlord lark is for me!

Sorry if I have rained on your parade, so as to speak, in any way. Personally, don't be daunted by this experience, but just make sure you are very diligent about any prospective tenants. By using Letsure you can remove most of the dangers of being a landlord (or at least minimise them) albeit at a price. However, for me, that price means knowing I can sleep at night.

Good luck in whatever you decide to do!

manic

inmypocketnottheirs wrote:

Sorry if I have rained on your parade, so as to speak, in any way. Personally, don't be daunted by this experience, but just make sure you are very diligent about any prospective tenants. By using Letsure you can remove most of the dangers of being a landlord (or at least minimise them) albeit at a price. However, for me, that price means knowing I can sleep at night.

Good luck in whatever you decide to do!

Nobody has rained on my parade. Without advice from people on these boards, a lot of people would make big mistakes in areas that they are inexperienced in. I'm glad I asked the original question.

I think that the last 2 days have been too stressful, mainly because of the speed that they wanted to move in. If there was a couple of weeks to take references and do credit checks, it would have given me more time to deal with, when I had made the mistake of only getting 2 & not 4 applications. The other factor was that they were relocating & it wasn't easy to get new forms to them, get their ID checks etc. Also, what worried me was that they would be arriving to sign the agreement with all their worldly goods & if there was then a reason to pull out, they would be homeless with all of their stuff. Maybe I'm just too soft .

I still have the flat advertised to let & getting the EA in is to give me another option. I never set out to be a LL, I just happened to be in a position not to have to sell the flat I lived in for 15 years when I wanted to move to a house!

I will no doubt be posting again about this property in the future .

clutton_2

i think you have made a terribly sensible decision. As a LL - YOU need to be in control, not prospective tenants who are trying to emotionally blackmail you will "homelessness". I have had prospective tenants txt me 3-4-5- times a day asking if i have done the checks yet, and i will NOt be hurried in this process, it can be hugely expensive if i get it wrong.

may i suggest that you use a Letting Agent for 6 months, and in that time, read everthing on here and also https://www.singingpig.co.uk (best property website in the UK) and learn the business - then start to do it yourself - it is eminently possible for an "ordinary" person to do it, but, only after the right amount of rersearch.

best wishes