Putting it here hoping that there's someone who can help! Sorry it is long, do not want to drip-feed.
I am a student. I live with my partner and three other flatmates in a five-bedroom flat. It is the first time we have all rented with a private landlord, hence why we are needing some advice.
Background: our contract has no break clause. This means we are tied in until August. The landlord gave us permission to sub-let if ever we wished to move out, otherwise we must continue paying rent until August even if we leave. Rent (excluding bills) in £450pcm, so as you can imagine, it has been a bit of a struggle. The flat is ok, great location, but definitely worn out.
Last night, my flatmate informed me that she had discovered that our landlord was untraceable in the landlord registry. She had contacted him about this, and he said that he had recently renewed his number and thus there was a new one. Reluctantly he gave her the new number which remained untraceable. Our money each month goes to a business account, not a personal one. Our landlord works in a family business (so we thought nothing of it), and we also found that his parents had bought the flat that we live in, so surely that means that it is not his flat? Can someone buy a house and entrust another to be a landlord?
Our landlord has his mail continually sent to the flat, and once we got curious and opened it to see he was in massive amounts of debt. This has worried us as we have all placed down a £400 deposit which we feel we could potentially lose. There was broken furniture when we moved in, which I immediately took videos/pictures of, and they have yet to be fixed. Our move-in date was also postponed due to apparent renovations and decoration, however (I did not realise until last night) when our flatmate moved in on the allotted day, our landlord did not greet them with keys but another tenant who had been living there. He apparently left dirty dishes, was sleeping in a sleeping bag on the bed and then after handing over keys complained he had nowhere else to go. We have also had visits from past tenants to collect things several times. Our landlord has only visited once, at the start. His father has inspected twice, the most recent time we did not have 24 hours notice, and we have been told that we do not have to be present when he inspects as he has keys, just so long as he makes us aware of his visit. We have had one fire safety inspection, and no council inspection, whereas other flats we know of have had at least one council visit. Our landlord also promised an itinerary, and has yet to give us this. We signed all our documents separately, however we were later told to re-sign one page together so our signatures were on one sheet. He was supposed to provide us with the sheet, but never did, thus whilst we have all signed separate sheets we still have not signed that one together.
The more we think about things the stranger it is. It definitely seems unprofessional in any case. My parents seem to think perhaps he is illegally subletting but not sure how to check this or who to ask. AIBU to be suspicious and seek advice, or am I just confused about renting and have different expectations to reality?