early surrender tenancy fees

peppapig14

I signed a 12 month let with an estate agent from Nov 18 2019 for £900 per month.
we now want to leave the property as we have found a house to purchase, discussed with the landlord and he said it's fine as long as he incurs no charges for remarkering etc.
we are fine with that, and after reviewing the estate agents fees I agree with them except the commission ( landlord pays £10% of first 6 months rent ) . The landlord will not be out of pocket as we won't leave untill a new tenant is in place so are these commission fees valid?
set up fee £160+vat
inventory £160+vat
TDS deposit £50+vat
references £200+vat
% of commission £230+vat

oldbikebloke

it is not a question of validity 
it is a matter of you have been made an offer of a list of fees you will pay - either you accept the offer, or you reject it.
Your ability to negotiate terms of the offer is zero since legally you are required to pay rent until Nov 2020, so the LL has nothing to lose by playing hardball, given how far away that date is, and therefore the lower chance the LL would be stuck sucking up costs during a void period if you left when the fixed term ended and he had no tenant ready to replace you. 

SpiderLegs

The LL will be out of pocket on the fees because he has to pay six months commission on the replacement tenant, whereas if you were staying he would have three months left to pay.

Retired_Mortgage_Adviser

SpiderLegs said:

The LL will be out of pocket on the fees because he has to pay six months commission on the replacement tenant, whereas if you were staying he would have three months left to pay.

This. The expectation with an early surrender is that the LL is not out of pocket in any way by the tenant leaving early.

The 2019 TFA caps the fee to the actual loss that would be incurred by the landlord for permitting an early surrent (and reasonable agent fees). Anything above that is a prohibited payment.