10 Jan 06 Lettings Agents
It’s fairly impossible to view flats for rent and not have to deal with a lettings agent. One of the main rental listings sources here is Find a Property. You can search there for listings by area and price, then sort through the returns to find properties you like and want to view. One difficulty in sorting though is that many of the listings have notices beside them, such as:
LET - This means the flat has already been rented out.
UNDER OFFER - Meaning offers have been made on the property.
NEW INSTRUCTION - New listing.
All properties listed display contact information for different lettings agents. There are thousands of them, it seems, some more reputable than others, but I’ve discovered the volume of their listings has no bearing on quality of reputation.
The purpose of lettings agents is to list the properties, show them to prospective tenants and negotiate a rental price. Some of them also manage the properties throughout your rental term. All agents take a fee from the renter, which on average I think amounts to one week’s rent (so in our case about 300 pounds). For that amount of money I expect decent treatment, but I get the feeling most prospective renters are treated like hostile cattle.
Also, often when you call about a specific property they will tell you it has already been rented (or “let”), then ask for your requirements so they can pitch other available flats to you. In theory this would be fine, but at least two problems arise:
1) The agent will offer flats they have available, but are of no interest to you whatsoever. This very quickly becomes very tiring to deal with. For example they’ve got great, spacious modern flats for your budget but oh - they’re below-ground (basement).
2) When you reply that you are not interested in the alternatives offered, they attempt to convince you it will be impossible to find a flat that meets your requirements for your stated budget, and you will need to raise your budget - considerably - to find something suitable.
In effect this is a bait-and-switch tactic. The central London market is no doubt competitive for renters, but it is certainly MORE competitive for the agents. As a renter you need to do enough research to know what’s reasonable, and you need to have a solid backbone to deal with the negotiators - a word many agencies actually use to describe their reps (ie. “Oh, you’re interested in that property. Hold for a moment please while I put you through to one of our negotiators”). Any display of weakness will be capitalized upon.
So this has not been an easy go.
The biggest troubles I’ve had have been with the largest agency in the city - Foxton’s. Matt heard a nightmare story from a co-worker that dealt with them, so I tried to avoid contacting them at all - until yesterday. I called from the hotel about a specific listing and said so to the guy who answered the phone. While I was holding, waiting for a negotiator, I received two calls on my mobile from other Foxton’s agents pitching other properties. Later in the day I received another call, so in total they put four agents on my case. The last call I took resulted in an arguement when essentially the agent told me I had no idea what I was doing looking for a flat in London. I was able to end the call by telling him I did know what I was doing, and in fact had found a suitable flat which we had put in an offer for.
On that note, we are still waiting to hear a result for that offer, hopefully by the end of today. I just want the hell of dealing with lettings agents to end!
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