Renting house but not the garage

HelenFlowers

We are about to rent a house but not the integral garage which the landlord is keeping.
Its only just dawning on me that there may be some issues to look at here, such as electricity and proportion of Council tax. Would anyone have any advice when talking to the landlord/agent? All thanks! 

elsien

What’s the landlord wanting to use it for, and what are the arrangements for access? There’s a bit of a difference between them keeping it for storage and turning up twice a year giving you 24 hours notice, vs them expecting to use it on an almost weekly basis.

DullGreyGuy

HelenFlowers said:

Its only just dawning on me that there may be some issues to look at here, such as electricity and proportion of Council tax. Would anyone have any advice when talking to the landlord/agent? All thanks! 

Council tax is neither here nor there... if the contract makes you 100% liable for the tax you just need to consider if the rental is reasonable if you dont have access to 100% of the property.

Utilities are a more legitimate concern given they may only access it once a year at day time and never use any power or it may contain their laundrette business using significant amounts of utilities.

How much do you like the property? Have you seen what's inside the garage at the moment? Depending on what's in it at the moment it wouldnt be too hard to put appropriate clauses that limit utilities to a minimal amount.

chrisw

Cannabis farm?

ThisIsWeird

If this is/was the LL's home and they are only renting it out on a mediumish term basis, then good chance it's as innocent as it being used to store their own goods and furniture.

But, I think it's reasonable to ask if there will be any power consumption from it, and how often they would anticipate requiring access to it. That might also elicit the 'reason' for it.

I wouldn't assume anything untoward.

If this is, however, a long-term rental - they have been, and will continue to, rent this place out for the foreseeable future- then I'd be more annoyed. Although, again, they can surely do as they like? As can you.

ProDave

We did exactly this with our last house.  We were self building a new house so kept the double garage just for storage of our furniture.  After about 18 months we had the shell of the new house built and moved our stuff out and with agreement with the tenant gave them access to the now empty garage with a rent rise they agreed to.

One more important thing however is check the location of your consumer unit.  In some cases that is in the garage, so even if the LL was using the garage he would have to give you a key to the garage and leave access clear to the consumer unit.

caprikid1

I am a classic car fan and have done this for the last 20 years, stored a car and normally swap them once or twice during the year I normally give over a weeks notice and can often access the garage without the house being accessed.

The garage is quite rickety so would not really be suitable for use on a daily basis. Garage has no power and rent is always fair so no one has ever cared.

Ditzy_Mitzy

Council tax is, I imagine, neither here nor there.  Houses are placed in bands, in the main, rather than being individually assessed and the bands are derived from estimations of value.  A garage is a nice thing to have, but I doubt that an otherwise identical house without a garage in the same road - because that is effectively on offer - will come up a band lower than the house as it exists with the garage.

You need to find out what the landlord intends to do with the garage and, if it was me, I wouldn't enter into such an agreement without being given a key and agreement that the tenant can enter the garage at any time, without restriction.  An integral garage is part of the building, so the tenant ought to have the right to check the thing over now and again for safety reasons.  It will also be necessary to find out if there are any restrictions in relation to parking in front of the garage.  

theartfullodger

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

Council tax is, I imagine, neither here nor there.  Houses are placed in bands, in the main, rather than being individually assessed and the bands are derived from estimations of value.  A garage is a nice thing to have, but I doubt that an otherwise identical house without a garage in the same road - because that is effectively on offer - will come up a band lower than the house as it exists with the garage.

You need to find out what the landlord intends to do with the garage and, if it was me, I wouldn't enter into such an agreement without being given a key and agreement that the tenant can enter the garage at any time, without restriction.  An integral garage is part of the building, so the tenant ought to have the right to check the thing over now and again for safety reasons.  It will also be necessary to find out if there are any restrictions in relation to parking in front of the garage.  

Think if tenancy is not for whole of property then council tax is landlord's responsibility.  (I'm a landlord btw).

I'd certainly want access to all meters and water stop !!!!!!.  

searchlight123

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

  It will also be necessary to find out if there are any restrictions in relation to parking in front of the garage.  

excellent point as presumably directly in front of the integral garage is a parking space?

macman

If the boiler is in the garage (not unknown with an integral garage) then you'll need to have access.