Landlords, would you consider this if your tenants asked?

I don't know where you are but house sales are not buoyant in some areas. You have no obligation to allow viewings and I wouldn't offer the landlord extra money. Courts are loathed to remove tenants with children. Your landlord should recognise that it would be advantageous to sell to you, so he doesn't have to go through the eviction process (costly) and if he sold to you direct, he wouldn't have to pay estate agent fees. Start negotiating.

My mum and her brothers became kinda accidental LL

They sold a property that was tennanted

The tenants were given notice as per contract - they were a bit tricky and took longer to leave.
They eventually let EA take pix..
Then it went to market and eventually sold

( they were not in a position to buy and theyd had the rent with v minimal increases and didnt even ' play nice )

My nana owned half the property and sale was needed 4 her care etc

Good luck op

Would you be in a position to buy the house you are in? If you can get your Landlord to agree to sell to you for 10% less than the market value then you can buy with 0 deposit. Speak to a mortgage advisor who will be able to advise. The benefit is that the Landlord will continue getting rent from you all the way up to completion and you may he able to buy a little earlier.

@Britinme I think you need to accept that you don't actually understand the law in England and stop offering advice only relevant to your US state. You're just muddying the waters and it's not necessary when the OP is already feeling worried.

Don't underestimate your bargaining power
If he sells to you, he avoids any period of the house being empty with no rent coming in, and estate agent fees.
if you can get out of offering more rent, that gets you to your deposit faster.

Sorry but this is one of those situations where the law probably does differ enough for your experience to not be relevant to the OP

You sound like the perfect tenant and buyer, OP.

Your landlord has considerably less integrity.

You should ask, but not offer the increased rent initially.

Good luck!

If the tenant is away from home and there’s a break in, or the pipes freeze, how do you propose the landlord accesses the place without keys? I can’t speak for UK law but here in my state it is a legal requirement for the landlord to have a copy of the keys and it would be a breach of the tenancy agreement if the locks were changed without permission. This landlord has done a scummy and possibly illegal thing in entering the property without notice (they actually don’t need permission if notice is given) and to fail to give the tenant time to remove any personal items from photographs, but he is entitled to market his property. Again, the law may be different in the UK.

the landlord has to be able to access the property in an emergency anyway (which is certainly the case here)

What is the emergency here? The place isn't on fire, there's no gas leak or burst pipes. Absolutely no reason for LL (or his agents) to access without permission from the tenant.

(And do you think the fire brigade would wait for the LL to turn up with keys?)

You can always ask! We completed a few months back on the house we were renting. We had only been in it a few months and wanted some work doing - new carpets and painting. The landlord came over and told us he was thinking about selling as a heads up. We immediately asked if he would sell to us - he agreed and we agreed a price that was probably less than he would have listed for as it was a private sale and needed a little work.

It took a few months but if he sold to someone else we would have been in a lot longer until our contract was up. I’m sure some buyers would be put off too…to buy with tenants in situ.

Oh wow. I would have thought the landlord would have a little bit of decency to let you know. Whatever the circumstances (selling urgently) you have been there for that long that giving a heads up would have been nice. You should tell them that people have been knocking and that you were not aware they wanted to sell. Ask if they can hold off and you will buy it. Great if they can wait but if they didn’t even tell you i doubt they will be wanting to wait. You need to look elsewhere as a back up and hopefully another better house in your area will pop up. Good luck.

You hold all the cards.
There is no one on Earth at this present time that has more rights than a sitting Tenant in A ENGLISH PROPERTY.
If you waste time and emotions on petty things like PHOTOGRAPHS then you're barking up the wrong tree.
You need to chill. No one can do anything without spending a awful lot of time and even more £££££££££ money to evict you.
You could bend over, do as you're told, pay extra rent then move out asap, but you need not do any if these things. Landlords will and do get fined THOUSANDS for not complying with very exact legislation surrounding Property Laws. So CHILL.
Just go about your usual business and No one can do anything. You could put a huge cat among the pigeons and tell anyone who comes representing the estate agents : " I'm not moving." The LL will be monopolising your phone like a Love sick teenager.
YOU Hold ALL THE CARDS**

Just seen your post about seeing a mortgage advisor. Most estate agent advisors charge a fee which gets hidden in the small print. L&C do totally fee free advice, it's easy as it's over the phone at times to suit you and they guide you through the whole process.

As you have said, the very first thing you need to do is speak to a mortgage advisor as that will determine the amount you can borrow. Without doing this you can’t really plan a way forward with this property.

Haven't RTFT but I've read your responses. Don't go into this like he's doing you a favour selling to you, you're in a really strong position here. House sales with chains are lengthy and stressful and can easily fall through. You're a hassle free buyer with no chain, and a known quantity who is highly unlikely to pull out - that's worth loads. You've also been reading up on your rights, if he's trying to sell to someone else with vacant possession, you can cause no end of problems and probably drag the whole thing out way longer than 6 months if you felt malicious. Seek mortgage advice now, find out how much you can borrow. House purchase will take a few months anyway so your deposit will grow over this time. Put in an offer based on what you can afford now, if he rejects it offer more but specify the time frame that works for you. Don't offer more rent, you shouldn't have to - my last house sale went to sealed bids, I didn't accept the highest bid because they had a chain, I took a few grand lower offer because they had no chain and were far more likely to complete the purchase. Good luck!

"The listing has included items I own like the dishwasher, fridge, shed."

Take screenshots of the listing including the photos and description. Email the agent (for the sale, not the lettings agent) to inform them that the photos were taken without your knowledge or consent, that the listed items belong to you and are not for sale, and politely request them to remove the photos and those items from the listing.

And if you're going to put in an offer you should get valuations from several estate agents, nothing to stop you arranging this, since you live there!

Are you sure the property is even worth asking price? Are you sure you want this property and not another one in the area?

I advise you get an agent or three to do a valuation (free). Also do a proper property hunt. Maybe you'll find better.

Tbh a close call gas inspection sounds like large costs in the future... new boiler installation etc. Suggests the place is not in good repair...

Why hasn't the OP come back?

I’m not sure if anyone has suggested it but you can always negotiate the percentage of the deposit. 5% is not unheard of

I'd also say, do try not to antagonise your landlord by being over-aggressive with him and/or the estate agents about the latter entering the house. Be nice - yes, I know! I'm generally very much not a "be nice" woman, but it might make the difference between him thinking with a cool head - that this would be an easy and convenient sale - and him thinking with grumpiness.

Have you seen a mortgage advisor yet? My advice would be speak to one and see what kind of mortgage you can get with your deposit now and potentially what you would have in say 3 months time, you might actually be surprised. prior to buying my house I had saved for awhile but I was a few months short of my target deposit spoke to a mortgage adviser anyway, they told me roughly how much I could get and very quickly I found a house however it was more than the mortgage advisor had told me I could get, I again spoke to my advisor within a day or two she got me a mortgage in principle agreed, deposits aren’t paid until exchange.. the purchase took about 5 months which gave me time to save up the rest of the deposit and for the fees ect. I would say the estate agent did want proof of deposit and mortgage in principle before marking house sold subject to terms, my deposit wasn’t quite what the estate agent wanted but my mortgage advisor spoke to them and sorted it but mortgage principles last a few months and you can always just get it updated if u increase your deposit… just try not to panic and just start the ball rolling good luck!

I might add that my DH is thinking of selling the property he owns, because he needs to release the money tied up in it, and the first people he will offer it to is the family who lives there. Nor would he dream of putting photos of the interior with their possessions on the internet without their knowledge and consent.

@SpringViolet - I am a landlord but I live in the USA and my rental properties are here so I accept the laws may be different. In my state, tenants are certainly not allowed to change locks without permission from the landlord and giving the landlord a copy of the key. But from what the Shelter website says, the landlord has to be able to access the property in an emergency anyway (which is certainly the case here) so if the tenant for some reason needs to change the locks, the landlord must have to have a copy, surely?