DS plans to leave his central London flat totally empty for a year

I agree it's risk, partly squatters, but also flooding or other stuff. If he doesn't like the idea of renting it out, and it has 2 bedrooms, he could get a lodger? Lodgers don't have all the rights of tenants, so it's a way of keeping the flat occupied without the same levels of risk. I'd have thought he'd be able to find one quite easily for a central London address.

Fortunately for him, he is allowed to do just that with his private property.

Rents in london on that sort of property are £4000 plus a month!

nearly £50 a year and he can travel the world on that alone.

Utter madness

Air B&B?

If the flat is that price i doubt you’ll get slum tenants - he needs to reconsider with the housing shortage.

Thats a lot of money wasted on not receiving rent and assume he’ll still have to pay rates etc

Renting out is a total pain - paperwork to sort, compliance with all the regulations, do self assessment to pay the tax, deal with any issues the tenants have etc and then potential hassle if they break stuff or won't leave etc
However house insurance won't be valid if it's empty that long (most have 30 days unoccupied max clause) though there might be something specialist
Air BnB? Through a management company?

You are not being unreasonable but purely because we are in a housing crisis and no one should be leaving properties empty for long periods if it can be avoided.

Whether the flats is empty or not is irrelevant

It is not a requirement to insure its contents.

I certainly didn’t bother with contents insurance for any of the flats I have lived in and I only have it today for my house as my buildings insurer gave it to me for free.

Have you ever arranged buildings insurance for a block of flats ?

No, I thought not.

@BreadInCaptivityand one of the reasons there's not enough homes is that there are so many vacant properties - it's scandalous and it's not hard to join the dots up.

Agreed. It sounds ridiculous, and it is very sad given the number of people desperate for decent housing, but a 12 month tenancy could be a real balls ache. I've had a property in the past that was empty - post financial crash, flat housing market - and all the insurers asked was that it was checked weekly. If I was planning to be out of the country for less than 18 months I'd be unwilling to go through the hassle and expense of renting. Potentially it is a big up front expense which you'd recoup but only over a 3-5 year period

I wouldn't feel the same about my place if someone else had been living in it. I know it doesn't make sense financially but I don't blame them. I wouldn't get roped into going to check on it though. It wouldn't cost them a lot to come back to do that

It isn’t obscene. It’s sensible. Read the other responses.

But why would it be empty? They are going travelling? So presumably would still need contents insurance.

I also be surprised if there weren’t restrictions on occupation in a flat. But obviously it would depend on the policy.

He's not being ridiculous not to want to rent it out.

If he were asking me for advice I would recommend either paying a trusted friend or family member to visit on a regular basis or working with a vacant property management service - it may cost £150/month but can save a lot of potential trouble and insurance issues.

But he's not here asking and it sounds like you will be best served by not offering any opinions or unsolicited advice. He's a mid-twenties adult, your relationship is already strained, and it's extremely clear that you disapprove of him ever purchasing this flat so your further input now will be particularly unwelcome. Stick to expressing excitement about his travels.

Show him what can happen if you leave a property empty for long periods:

BBC: Man whose house was 'stolen' gets possession back

It took almost 4 years for this man to get ownership of his property back after it was 'stolen' and sold when he left it empty due to work commitments.

I own a flat in central London but am in the process of moving to the countryside with DH.

If all goes as planned, I'll have a friend staying in the flat. The idea is that DH and I will have the guest room at our disposal for whenever we need to stay in London, and we won't need to clear out the flat in the same way we would for tenants (i.e., we'll leave all the paintings, furnishings, kitchen gadgets, some "city" clothes, etc.). Most importantly, we'll have someone on site to keep an eye on things - it's an old building, so there's always something going wrong. Just last week, there was a leak from the flat above (unbeknownst to the tenants), and I dread to think what would've happened if no one had noticed it for a few days, let alone weeks or months.

In return, my friend gets serious mates rates (we're mostly concerned about covering building management fees rather than turning a profit), and doesn't have to deal with the whole circus of finding a flat, or deal with letting agents and landlords they've never met.

We know a few other people who have similar arrangements.

Of course, it only works if there is someone in your son's circle who he trusts and knows well enough to have this kind of arrangement with, but I'd say it's definitely worth having a think about - if he's mid-20s, he probably has a good amount of friends who are still in the market for this kind of thing!?

His flat, his choice. My mum went from her London flat to a care home at the beginning of 2017, and as I live abroad but wanted to stay in the flat when I came back, and airbnbing it wasn't an option, it has been empty for much of the time until now when I now have an arrangement to share it with temporary tenants. It's been fine.

I think it depends on the agency.

When we left our tenancy, the agents were anal about the inventory and cleanliness checks. (Our tenancy agreement said we had to pay for an end of tenancy clean). We left it spotless

But the issue I had during the tenancy was never addressed despite raising it a few times.

It’s for him to decide whether it’s worth it for him.

Or he can let it for a reasonable and fair rent. Maybe to a couple of healthcare workers at the nearest hospital.

What he should not be allowed to do is leave it standing empty or make a huge profit on it.

Homes are for living in.

People are allowed to go travelling without giving their home to someone else to buy.

The letting agent doesn't do 'the landlording'. They find tenants and they manage the rent collection. They'll also organise the annual gas check. But in my short experience, not much more. Their annual inspection isn't worth the paper it's written on in my experience. The property that I've just spent £1,000 pounds on just to get the rubbish cleared and it cleaned (as far as is possible) was inspected eight months ago, and the report mentioned none of this.

Nice idea if it would work

If I were him I would definitely be renting it out but if it is potentially going to cause a fight then just leave it.

He could probably make at least £25k possibly a lot more

Do you know how much stamp duty would be for a property of that value?? It would be over 43k, then you’d have to add on the cost of storage for the year, and rental while looking once back. It’s hardly an inconsequential cost (and he may actually really like his current property).

Unless they damaged it / accidentally set fire to it

The insurance company want to know when a flat is empty and so the freeholder needs to be told. The premium may rise.