Are we being ripped off by letting agents?

butterfly72

We are about to pay a £50 renewal fee. I've had a look on the tenancy agreement and theres no mention of renewal fees. I've been paying this agent renewal fees for 5 years in various properties.

I think these high fees are wrong and the AE should be accountable for why they are charging so much. If they were regulated like the banks we might be able to take this matter up and claim some refunds for unfair fees!!

I'm not going for this statutory periodic tenancy approach as I'm paying well under the market rate (even tho its just gone up £50 this renewal). I'd like to hold the rent for another year.

the other thing, is that this agent OWES US £40 from over an overpayment last year (despite 4 letters asking for it back)!! The cheek of it asking for a renewal fee!

pinkkaz

We moved into our place in June last year, and I noticed on the contract that there was a £50 renewal fee. However I had no intention of paying it (refused to pay the £100 admin fee when we moved in too), and since June we've just slipped into periodic tenancy since we are trying to buy a flat (a saga in itself. Luckily our landlord is cool and laid-back and says we can stay as long as we need to find a flat. I think these fees are a rip off. Don't pay!

olly300

MaxxBadger wrote: »

Hello everyone, I'm kimbadger's fiance. First, thanks for all your replies...i feel we're really getting screwed here, but what are we supposed to do about it, really? Especially since we want to stay here?

The biggest problem here is that you are demanded to stay. If you realised one of the the advantages of being in a rental property is if the neighbours or landlord bother you, you can leave.

The charges if stated before hand are legal.

The fact that the LA tricked you into signing a document with the charges before you could read it shows you what sort of people they are.

Choices are:
1. Try and get out of paying- I don't think this will work since the LL and LA are in business together to extract as much money out of you as possible.:mad:
2. Ask for a longer contract and pay - I don't think that this will work since the LL and LA are in business together to extract as much money out of you as possible.:mad::mad:
3. Renew, pay fees and make sure your deposit money is put in a tenancy deposit scheme. Then when it comes to moving out make sure you clean the place using people who can give you receipts and are registered for VAT.

angelalatimer

What do you think about letting agent who charges £50 plus £3.50 a day for late payments by tenant (on housing benefit). Same letting agent warns LLs that tenants on HB can sometimes take 8 weeks for rent to be forwarded to LA. This has happened to my tenant, as LL I am very unhappy, I feel this is very unfair and do not want tenant to be put in a spiralling debt situation.

eco-friendly_2

If your willing to wait for your money tell your LA agent to get lost! or you will take your business elsewere, if your tenant gets into money problems they could walk... another empty period for you.

Delenn

I rent out a few properties and normally the LA charge both the Tenant AND the Landlord for the renewal, so anyway I now contact my tenants towards the end of the first period and ask them if they want to do the renewal privately. If you have any way of contacting the Landlord this might be an option, and its then completely free! You don't need the LA to do the contract you can type it up yourself!

LydiaJ

I just want to say that while this kind of LA behaviour may be common, they aren't all like that. I've lived in 4 rented houses during my adult life - two privately rented direct from the LL, and two through LAs. In all cases, once the AST period was up, the tenancy just went onto periodic without anybody mentioning any fees at all. They haven't put the rent up, either, and I've been in this house nearly 4 years. The LA tells me that the LL is happy to have me as a T because I've stayed a long time so there haven't been voids. (They didn't mention that my rent is always paid on time, but I expect the LL likes that too!)

So, if your LA and/or LL is ripping you off, don't assume there's no alternative. There are properties out there owned by LLs and managed by LAs who provide a decent service and don't fleece you.

ETA: Hooray - my thanked posts count reaches triple figures. Cheers to everyone who's thanked me for anything. :beer:

clutton_2

the bottom line is if you want to stay and they want a fee - you will have to pay it - you may not like it - but you seem to really love your current home - do you want all the upheaval and huge cost of moving ?

it will cost you a great deal more to move than to stay

or you could move and be "legally right" about what a rubbish LA you had ........

you could of course talk to them nicely and try to negotiate a smaller fee......

LydiaJ

True, but if they move somewhere where they aren't going to get ripped off then they will only incur the moving costs once, and then they can settle into the new place for the medium term. If they stay, they're going to get hit by this sort of thing every 6 months for as long as they stay. They're also going to find things are very inflexible about dates for moving out when they do eventually go if they have to keep committing to 6 months at a time.

OP - As everyone says, the bottom line is how badly do you want to stay in your home?

LittleMissAspie

Our letting agency don't do periodic tenancies. They serve the S21 a couple of months before the fixed term ends, and you have to pay to renew for 6 or 12 months or leave. And renewing for 6 months costs twice as much as 12 months. I think it's because they want long term tenants.

We renewed for a year but next year we might want to buy a house and you never know how long that will take. So I'm not sure what we will do then.