Rental property gardens

Red-Squirrel_2

restless6 wrote: »

Financially things will be tight for me moving away so if I can avoid paying a gardener I would prefer not to

Financially tight is really not a good way to start out as a landlord.

I know that's not the advice you ask for, but your first tenants could stop paying after a month, what would you do if that happened?

restless6

Red-Squirrel wrote: »

Financially tight is really not a good way to start out as a landlord.

I know that's not the advice you ask for, but your first tenants could stop paying after a month, what would you do if that happened?

I would prefer not to be a landlord but the choices I have are to leave the property empty or let it out to at least cover my mortgage whilst I rent elsewhere .
If things go wrong then I will have to deal with that at the time

HampshireH

As a tenant with a garden I have never had a gardener. I am fully expected to keep the grass mowed and the garden in good order. No one ever left a mower or strimmer or equipment. All my responsibiity.

I wouldn't expect anything else. If we were leaving this property rather than buying it we would leave it as we found it which was in a mountable condition.

We have a shrubbery area. Lavender sits either end. We have a few gaps where other plants have died but nothing major. Lavender I believe will die eventually as can only survive so many cut backs. Ours is 6 years old at the moment but will probably be removed for next year.

Make sure you set your expectations out clearly when you tent it out and ensure you carry out periodic checks. This may you can keep am eye on the overall condition and address any problems as when they arise rather than it being a surprise at the end of the tenancy

lookstraightahead

Hello restless just going off at a tangent a bit but if your property has a mortgage do not forget to check with your provider that you can rent out the property x

Davesnave

lookstraightahead wrote: »

Obviously to even out the discussion some tenants look after gardens better than owners. My neighbours garden is a nightmare and the overgrow trees hang over my pathway. Who deals with that?

You do. It makes no difference if they are tenants or owner occupiers; if they annoy you, the branches can be sawn-off at the boundary.*


Theoretically you are supposed to offer these trimmings to the land owner, but you may forget to do that.


*assuming there's no tree preservation order.

Out,_Vile_Jelly

I rented a property with a very high maintenance garden (lawn plus a lot of fast-growing shrubs) and ended up enjoying taking care of it, but it was time consuming and could easily get out of control. Leaving decent equipment and being clear in the contract about the condition expected will help (letting agents know even less about horticulture than they do housing law in my experience). Lower your expectations about garden standards, and budget for getting someone in to clear jungly growth once a year.

gingercordial

The lovely big garden definitely attracted us to the flat we are renting now, but what sealed it is that the gardener provided by the landlord happened to be there during the viewing. We do not have time to maintain a big garden - it simply isn't going to happen with our working hours - and nor do we have any experience/talent with it or any tools. So if the landlord hadn't been willing to pay for a gardener we would have had to think twice about renting this place because we'd have had to pay for one ourselves on top of a very expensive rent.

The alternative would have been to let it run to jungle, but since it has front and side hedges which need cutting back from the pavement and next door's right of access, we couldn't really have left it.

John_Jones

My tenants asked if I would take care of maintaining the garden for them. I agreed to, but added a couple of hundred pounds onto the monthly rent to cover all of the expenses. It!!!8217;s a big family home that I rent out and they were happy to agree to pay for it.

My last tenants were supposed to take care of it themselves, but left it in an absolutely terrible state.

carlislelass

John_Jones wrote: »

My tenants asked if I would take care of maintaining the garden for them. I agreed to, but added a couple of hundred pounds onto the monthly rent to cover all of the expenses. It!!!8217;s a big family home that I rent out and they were happy to agree to pay for it.

My last tenants were supposed to take care of it themselves, but left it in an absolutely terrible state.

£50 a week to do your own garden??