Renting Admin Fee?

macymoo

We have found a house that we want to rent, but another family are interested in the same property, the agent has said if we can both fill in a referencing form and send £155 admin fee then the owner of the property will decide who he wants for tennants, and if we are unsuccessful we will get our fee refunded.
Is this normal practice, It seems to me that the agents are just trying to get 2 lots of £155 for no particular service???

roguebrogue

But, the have said they will refund whoever isn't successful, so surely won't be getting 2 lots.

Admin fees are normal practice, unforunately.

Lavendyr

Most letting agents charge a fee, ours on our current tenancy was £90 and was non-refundable if we passed the reference check, refundable if we didn't.

£155 sounds quite high but it's nothing out of the usual. They won't get 2 lots of £155 if they have to refund one, which they will. Just get their T&Cs in writing before you hand over any money so that you have proof they will refund the money - any decent letting agent should be able to provide these on request.

izzybusy23

macymoo wrote: »

We have found a house that we want to rent, but another family are interested in the same property, the agent has said if we can both fill in a referencing form and send £155 admin fee then the owner of the property will decide who he wants for tennants, and if we are unsuccessful we will get our fee refunded.
Is this normal practice, It seems to me that the agents are just trying to get 2 lots of £155 for no particular service???

Admin fee's are the norm (we paid £200 for ours so count yourself lucky) but what I would say is that normally LA take admin fee's and you fill out the reference forms to SECURE that house so nobody else can view it. We viewed this house and went and paid admin fee's straight away so nobody else could swipe it and I thought that was how every LA worked..

Ask them IF you pay the admin fee in cash before the other family, could they promise not to let anybody else have the house unless you don't pass the references.. worth a shot.

olly300

macymoo have you checked out ALL the charges of the letting agency? You may find 6 months down the line you have to pay more money to renew the contract.

peter999

macymoo wrote: »

We have found a house that we want to rent, but another family are interested in the same property, the agent has said if we can both fill in a referencing form and send £155 admin fee then the owner of the property will decide who he wants for tennants, and if we are unsuccessful we will get our fee refunded.
Is this normal practice, It seems to me that the agents are just trying to get 2 lots of £155 for no particular service???

Surely Agent/Landlord have enough patience to choose a tenant for referencing & take only 1 fee.

If you give the fee, you expect to proceed.

They're taking the mick.

peter999

cats!

Agents are covering their backs in case applicant 1 fails the referencing!

Make sure you get it in writing about the refund!

Debt_Free_Chick

It sounds sensible to me - they can't know in advance if one of the applicants is going to fail the credit check. So they'll check both, just in case. And has been said, if they (the LL/Agent) choose not to progress with one applicant, then that person's fee will be refunded to them.

Usually, however, the fee is not refundable if the applicant passes the credit check but then changes their mind about renting the property. So be sure you want to proceed, if your application is successful.