rent hacking for a 16 year old?

mattwj

Hi, I'm moving to London in a few weeks so I have been on websites such as zoopla and spareroom trying to find suitable accommodation. What i realised was that you get a lot less value for your money when you only rent one room as oppose to renting an entire flat- which means its difficult to find a room at a good price. So i was thinking of renting an entire flat, taking a room for myself and then subletting the other rooms and if i get like a 4 bed flat and then divide the cost by 3 it actually works out at a reasonable price for people to rent and i would get to live there for rent free then :money: I was wondering on how people could advise me on doing this as a 16 year old?

I have read somewhere that a certain type of contract/ agreement can be made to make renting possible, plus spareroom filters start at 16

Thanks

cjmillsnun

Be aware that most landlords will not accept you subletting their property.

mattwj

hi yes i did think that, other than asking is they any way to find properties that allow this thanks

Arleen

Other than asking? No, not really. But almost all will respond with a firm "NO" to your idea. And even if they agree, you are walking into a minefield, and will quickly learn why those room rentals are a lot less value than renting the whole place. You will learn that somewhere between people paying you late, skipping on you altogether, trashing the place, not getting along and all the other joys that you will now be on the hook for.

00ec25

mattwj wrote: »

Hi, I'm moving to London in a few weeks so I have been on websites such as zoopla and spareroom trying to find suitable accommodation. What i realised was that you get a lot less value for your money when you only rent one room as oppose to renting an entire flat- which means its difficult to find a room at a good price. So i was thinking of renting an entire flat, taking a room for myself and then subletting the other rooms and if i get like a 4 bed flat and then divide the cost by 3 it actually works out at a reasonable price for people to rent and i would get to live there for rent free then :money: I was wondering on how people could advise me on doing this as a 16 year old?

I have read somewhere that a certain type of contract/ agreement can be made to make renting possible, plus spareroom filters start at 16

Thanks

using what as the source of funding?
- the wages of a 16 year old?
- the bank of mum and dad?

who is going to sign the contract? In law you are a minor. Do you have any idea at all what you would be signing up for and how you are going to manage 3 other residents, who will presumably be adults?

it is great to be ambitious, and successful people had to start somewhere (and normally that meant they also took a risk), but wise people listen to their parents and do something that they can afford to do, not have cloud cuckoo dreams

bowlhead99

Arleen wrote: »

You will learn that somewhere between people paying you late, skipping on you altogether, trashing the place, not getting along and all the other joys that you will now be on the hook for.

Although, if it looks like it's all going titsup you can just cancel the rental contract on a whim, claiming you didn't understand what you were signing because you are a minor... and that any terms or caveats that fairly protect the landlord from your bad actions might be voidable or have a court take your side if it's not too obvious you were blatantly scamming the landlord and putting him at risk of loss to make as much money for yourself as possible.

For that reason you'd find a lot of landlords won't engage with you at all once they have the evidence of how old you are, because contracts with minors can be tricky.

Likewise if I was in the market to rent a room in the house that you were offering, I would be scared off by the fact that my landlord /lead tenant was under 18. I would assume that it was a ruse by the person's parent to have their child sign the documentation instead of them so they could screw me over later; and if not, then it was literally a 16-year old sub landlord who is not going to be able to fix a leaky tap or broken window, or even have a credit card to be able to get someone to fix it quickly for him and then settle up later. The type of people willing to get into that kind of a deal are not your average people. More likely, only those desperate for any idiot to take them on as a tenant when they are somewhat high risk. You don't want those people as your housemates / co tenants / sub tenants.

So, while a "normal" adult might be dissuaded by people here from getting into some sublet deal, a 16-18 year old shouldn't even think about it. More trouble than it's worth, and very limited set of people willing to engage with you.

Just focus on finding somewhere cheap that will have you. Sharing with others might sound more expensive per square foot of personal space, but it's still way cheaper than getting a whole place for yourself.

seashore22

I'm trying, and failing, to imagine any landlord renting a 4 bed property to a 16 year old.

Under what circumstances does a 16 year old move to London alone? Care to elaborate on that op?

If this is for real, it's not going to happen.

TheGardener

I understood that you can not legally hold a tenancy agreement until you are 18 anyway?

eddddy

With a 16 year old tenant, at the very least, I suspect that a LL would want a guarantor (over the age of 18) who would be fully liable for the terms of the AST.

And the guarantor's references would need to show sufficient income/wealth to cover the full rent of the 4 bed house.

And/or perhaps offer 6 or 12 months rent in advance.

Sausage11

But whatever happens - good on you for being so dynamic and thinking outside the box!

seven-day-weekend

I too respect this young person's forward-thinking attitude and am sure it will serve them well in the future.

However, I believe that this scheme is very risky, for reasons stated above.