Letting agents: the cruel, the criminal and the crazy

With around a fifth of the UK population renting properties, bad letting agents are a thorn in millions of tenants’ sides. Katharine Hidalgo speaks to some angered tenants about their experiences with some of the worst of these letting agents.

Many renters across England suffer at the hands of inexperienced, untrained or criminal letting agents. Tenants are all too often threatened with illegal fees and eviction, lied to about the state of a let property and are provided with little redress when faced with these issues.

Image: Ryan Stefano

The Property Ombudsman, which does not currently regulate letting agents, released a 2015 Annual Report around complaints. It found that the top causes of complaints were surrounding management, repairs, maintenance, communication, record keeping, end of tenancy issues, deposits, disputes and damages. The fact that this list includes almost every aspect of a letting agents’ job description could suggest a systemic issue with the industry.

The government has been reticent to pass regulation. There is no mandatory training that letting agents must complete or a code of practice that agents must work to. Indeed, a letting agent is not required to have any A-levels. There is also no cap or direct regulation of letting agent fees in England.

Basic measures such as requiring agents to join a client money protection scheme or to publish their fees on their websites and in their offices have only been passed in the last decade.

Having recently dealt with a London agency that can only be described as nefarious, I set out to hear more from other badly treated customers.

One tenant had an anecdote about a letting agent who involved him or herself in the management of a property. Dom said: “They contacted me about renewing my lease, which was up for renewal at the time, but they actually hadn’t been appointed by the landlady or myself. I went through the whole process for around two months before the landlady got in touch with me to ask what was going on with the renewal. When I forwarded her the email chain I had with the wrong letting agent she went mental. I never heard from that letting agent again.”

Maha’s letting agent made the tenants move all of their furniture and belongings off the property so that the agent could do an inspection because one new person had been added to the contract.

New tenants seem to be a regular sticking point between tenants and agents. Natalie’s letting agent asked for “a fixed fee for compensation to the landlord” of £300 to put a new tenant on the contract following the departure of one of her housemates. Not only was the fee not permitted under the Tenant Act 2019, but the letting agent had not updated their fees on their website, as they are legally obliged to under the Consumer Rights Act 2015.

Following extensive communication with the agent questioning the legality of their request, as well as a discussion of the fact that the tenant’s bedroom roof had already been leaking for some time, the fee was “absorbed” by the landlord.

It is important to note that the only reason the tenants were not illegally forced to pay this fee was because of Natalie’s perseverance in questioning it. Not all tenants have the knowledge or the time to fight these battles.

Students could be part of this group. Knowledge and experience, not only of a new city, but also of basic processes such as contract signing, is unfairly skewed towards letting agents.

One former student, Bethany, mentioned one particularly overbearing agent. “This guy is notorious in Manchester and insists that guests have to be cleared by him 24 hours prior and that he can come over and use the shed whenever he wants.”

Another former student, Ellie, spoke of one letting agent’s extreme incompetence: “He told me he would only tell me if the place was furnished or not after I put down a deposit, and when I later said there was no room for a dining table he told me space was just a concept really.”

Lack of information about a property is a vital concern, especially for students looking for a property over their holiday period who need to be able to move in when they return.

Ellie continued: “He was not malicious, just kind of an idiot. He was the bane of my life for the whole week he was in it.”

While some of these stories may seem amusing, they amount to undue stress on tenants and a general distrust of the industry as well as landlords themselves.

Helena, a tenant recently moved out of a City of London flat, had a leak in her ceiling for six months prior to her departure, which the letting agent ignored and then accused her of not notifying them sooner. It later transpired that the ceiling contained asbestos, despite that the letting agent had assured her of its absence upon viewing.

Feeling forced to move out, a handyman contracted by the letting agent told her that he had been asked to fix the leak with no safety wear or training on how to do so.

“The entire experience was traumatic,” said Helena. “Asbestos was falling from the ceiling for months and they didn’t even care enough to tell us it was there. We had a horrible time moving in too. They left mould, which they had agreed to remove and we didn’t have beds for the first month when we moved in. We paid for an Airbnb, which they refused to reimburse us for and we paid that first month’s rent.”

In some cases, the damages from a negligent letting agent can reach the hundreds of thousands. Should a letting agent fail to protect rental deposits and go bankrupt, all that money will be lost. One such case occurred with a company called Whitefield Properties where £123,000 of customers’ money went missing.

Bad letting agents can wreak havoc with tenants’ lives, savings and health. The government should be paying more attention to this issue, but in the meantime, here are some things you can do.

Image: eduard-militaru

Ways to combat bad letting agents

Choose a good one. This, of course, is easier said than done. Renters do not choose between letting agents, they choose between properties, which is why there is little competition or transparency in the industry, as research by Citizens Advice shows.

Google reviews can help. I wish I had paid more attention to the abominable ones for my own letting agent. Another helpful indication is that the letting agent has been ARLA Propertymark Protected. These agents have voluntarily chosen to be regulated and are required to operate transparently, providing services that are subject to independent scrutiny.

Complain about the bad ones. Write your own terrible Google reviews where you have cause to. The only way future tenants are going to know to avoid a particular company, is if you tell them.

Know your rights. Only 4% of renters participating in another Citizens Advice survey knew the name of the redress scheme their agent had joined. Ask for more information from the letting agent themselves about deposits, dispute resolution and management of the property before you move and if they are not being responsive, count that as a red flag. The government also offers a “How to rent” guide on its website and Shelter is an invaluable resource with a free, quick-to-answer helpline, which I found immensely helpful.

Furthermore, do not be afraid to dig into the legislation. The Tenant Act 2019 is particularly noteworthy, and you can find a full list of permitted and prohibited fees on Gov.UK, which can be very useful in a battle with your letting agents.

Remember your rights. Be bold! This is your house and your life. Some of the tenants above were certainly nervous to push back against their letting agents. Confrontation can be nerve-wracking, especially when you have a full-time job and their job seems like it is to make your life a living hell! You have the right to live in safe conditions that look like the listing and to be treated with respect like any other customer. If a letting agent is treating you worse than a waitress might, then that is already cause for concern. Sadly, many tenants have anecdotes stemming from letting agents simply trying to get away with as much as they can. Annoyingly, it is your job to push back.

Say goodbye to a property, to say goodbye to a letting agent. The fact is, before you move into a house, there is little you can do to displace or change your letting agent, and they have significant sway over your life. While it may be painful to decide against moving into your dream home because of an annoying letting agent, it may be the best move, especially when that agent seems untrustworthy. They could steal your deposit, put you through immeasurable stress or house you in unsafe conditions and all that may not be worth even your dream home.

Write to your MP. On 18 July 2019, the Regulation of Property Agents working group presented their findings to the government and formally advised that a new regulator for letting agents in England be created. The timeline for this regulation to become law is currently unknown. Fair enough, government officials certainly have a lot on their plate right now, but life for tenants has become harder during the coronavirus and we need change from the government as soon as possible.

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Words by Katharine Hidalgo