aibu to be annoyed letting agent dropped rent by £50

[toohoottoday]

I have just found out my letting agent has dropped the rental for the property I rent by £50. This rental income represents over half my income, and I can't really afford a drop. He had chatted with me about rental but we didn't agree to drop it. He had said we may have to, but then rents had increased since our last tenant came in, so the drop due to the covid situation may even it out to the current rent level, and that he already had three households interested before it was even advertised. So given that, and being as we never agreed a decrease, I wasn't expecting it to be dropped. There are now several tenants who all want to rent it and he has asked me to choose this weekend. I am therefore surprised therefore after checking his website to see he has advertised it as lower than the previous rent.

AIBU to be annoyed about this? I don't suppose there is anything I can do about it now. That is £600 a year that I will be poorer off and I am already on a low income with two kids to support.

Is it written on an email or something the price you wanted to achieve ? If so I would put the ball in his court on how he will deliver it or explain why a £50 drop was necessary

Ditch the agent and go direct. Estate agents are overpaid telephone operators, and a complete ripoff. Have a look at the prices on OpenRent to see what it actually costs to let a house.

We've let a house since 2017. We've had three years of perfect, happy tenants, and have saved over £5k in agency fees.

We've let a house since 2017. We've had three years of perfect, happy tenants, and have saved over £5k in agency fees.

We've been doing it since 2004 and I've lost count! There is also a huge bonus in proper communication with your tenants rather than through an intermediary who tends to lie to both sides, the ability to choose and vet your own tenants, not having someone insisting that tenancies need to be signed again every six months to no one's benefit but their own, and generally not having to have an ongoing relationship with someone entirely untrustworthy!

OP - don't forget, this is Mumsnet. Everyone wants good property to rent at a reasonable price, but all landlords are shit and going straight to hell, even the decent ones.

Back to your question:; the agent should have come to you and said 'I've had an offer from Mr & Mrs Smith for XXX... here's their circumstances. We've got two more viewings for Tuesday - what do you want to do?'

If they haven't, that's bad practice. Pull them on it and get a reduction in letting fee, or re-market.

And people have said that shelter is an essential. Not that it's an essential service. A roof over your head isn't a service, it's a thing that exists. It's like someone buying up all the air and arguing that the right to breathe is a service.

@thedancingbear I'm not sure how this tracks - you think that housing is a 'thing that exists' but ignore the fact that it only exists because a builder / developer spent hundreds of thousands of pounds to buy the land and build it.

Are you saying that building houses should be non-profit too? Or just the person who buys it from them and rents it out? Which should be a public service - both or none?

Because residential development would grind to an immediate halt if there was no profit in it. Then please do try and find a cheap rental to buy!

@EinsteinaGogo no, by the time Mr &Mrs Smith made their offer the property had already been advertised at an incorrectly low price. So Mr &Mrs Smith would have made their offer based on that. And the other two viewings lined up based on that incorrectly advertised rent.

OP can I offer a slightly different view?

Given the current extension to the notice period for removing non-paying or bad tenants (asb etc...) the back log in the court system and the potential for section 21 to be gone shortly - I would be looking really carefully at the three applications to see if any of them were absolutely watertight in terms of credit history, landlord references, employment sector etc...

I would let my assessment of the applications determine whether I asked the agent to put the property back on at the higher price or not I suspect. For example if there was an absolute watertight application I might proceed at the lower rent to avoid losing them and possibly ending up with a slightly higher monthly rent but less convincing applications and the potential for more problems.

I am not a landlord myself but work for one and know from experience that if you do end up with a tenant who can't or won't pay, or is a problem for another reason, then removing them (if it comes to that) is very difficult, costly and time consuming and in the current circumstances that will only get harder for the moment. Therefore quality of applicants would be the driver for me deciding what to do next.

YANBU however for feeling let down by your agent.

It seems a bit concerning about the tight budget.
If you are in receipt of tax credits,when you change over to Universal Credit you will not get any as you have another property you don’t live in.

QuizzlyBear, that's an easy one. The builder and the developer contribute to society by building a house for people to live in. They create something useful, and profit from that. A BTL landlord does nothing of the sort. He or she just skims off the top.

It's remarkable how many people have accused anyone challenging the validity of BTL landlording as a form of income of 'jealousy'. I can't speak for others but I disposed of my mortgage a few years ago. I'm concerned about the effect this exploitative practice has on others. However some others clearly can't understand the idea of someone thinking or acting out of anything but self-interest. I find that pretty instructive in itself.

I'm happy to take 'bitter' on the chin however. For the short period I rented in my life (1999 to around 2004), I engaged with four BTL landlords. One - who rented out the flat above the shop he owned and ran - was a delight to deal with. The other three conducted themselves like a shower of unrelentingly abusive shits - randomly withholding deposits, charging for a broken washing machine door which they broke whilst removing a malfunctioning fridge, refusing to fix a boiler that pissed out rusty water, using my fucking drive as storage for scrap cars.

The conclusion I drew was that it was very, very difficult to do something exploitative in a decent manner. There clearly are good landlords out there but they are, in my lived experience, in a definite minority, and the 'profession' has the reputation it has for a reason.

And I still haven't got a clue how the OP is going to fix that broken boiler.

I'm concerned about the effect this exploitative practice has on others.

That's capitalism! And that^^^ I suspect is pofaced hypocrisy. I daresay that you're involved in at some level.

@bigdecisionstomake excellent advice.

Haven't bothered to read the full thread but he's a letting agent OP so will know what he is doing and is obviously trying to make sure the property gets rented out.

If you can't afford a dip of £50 I would seriously reconsider even being a landlord - what if the house needs major repairs or the boiler breaks?!

what if the house needs major repairs or the boiler breaks?!

The tenant can just manage with a leak or no hot water for a little while, surely? It's industry standard, and the tenant is unlikely to be in a position to sue.

@infivemins - don’t ask! You’ll get some convoluted answer

@GoatyGoatyMingeMinge landordism is more parasitic than capitalism, the landlord is doing nothing for no effort and expects their cut while expected to be lauded for their benevolence and receive the reward of profit for exploring a human need and right to a home

*exploiting

This is the sort of thing that is always going to divide opinion; I think the OP is greedy personally but it is what it is.

justAnotherPOster00 has put it more clearly than I would have, so thank you. We all sell our hard work in one way or another (making stuff, driving lorries, unblocking drains, whatever): except for a hand full of 'professions' including casino bankers and BTL landlords. There's a clear distinction between genuine capitalist endeavour and just skimming a living off teh top.

I've no idea whether the OP is greedy or not, but she called me a wanker upthread, then dishonest and a hypocrite. Then, someone else called me a cunt and another poster a dried up hag. So the BTL crowd really are showing their true colours here.

landordism is more parasitic than capitalism, the landlord is doing nothing for no effort and expects their cut while expected to be lauded for their benevolence and receive the reward of profit for exploring a human need and right to a home

Hi @JustAnotherPoster00

That is capitalism! Do you lend your money to a bank? Do you have a pension? Do you do anything for the reward you get for letting financial institutions and businesses use your capital? Something tells me you might be "doing nothing for no effort and expecting your cut"! But I might be wrong. You might be down at Barclays one day a week cleaning their windows, and helping counsel staff with stress at British Telecom

Well more houses on the marked as there is less landlords mean more people have a chance to get on the property ladder as the house prices would likely be forced down.

Actually that still dosent mean a majority of people could afford to find somewhere to live without rentals.. me and DH currently dont earn enough for a mortgage, and even if we did we couldn't afford any repairs or the boiler breaking or a new oven. We actually pay £50 more per month then the average in my area which Is a lot for us as were very low income, but we dont mind as our LL is brilliant and is usually out the same day if theres a issue (such as oven stopped working/bath leaking), or will send his workmen out the same or as soon as when we've had other issues such as boiler breaking.

We would love to buy but even without the cost of mortgage, often the cost of maintenance and everything else isnt affordable. If we have owned our home we would have had to go without a boiler for months over the winter when it broke, or without a cooker, or had to keep towels around the bath until we could afford a plumber...

I'm sure OP is saying that the £50 represents half the "profit" after paying the mortgage and setting aside a contingency. OP is getting £600 for the property... OP tell them to relist, you didn't agree. Also ask them for the lost rent.

Imagine an income of £2k per month @thedancingbear, after tax and mortgage. £1k from your charity job, £1k from your rental income.

From that rental income, as a responsible landlord, you save £500pm for repairs, void periods, accidents etc. leaving you a total of £1,500 to live on.

Your income now drops to £1,950 pm. You are a responsible landlord, so you still save £500pm - so you now have £1450 in your personal budget and need to find ways to cut this back.

See how easily that works? The OP can very easily be both concerned about her own budget and confident that she can pay for a new boiler.

That is capitalism! Do you lend your money to a bank? Do you have a pension? Do you do anything for the reward you get for letting financial institutions and businesses use your capital?

With respect, that's just sophistry. There's a world of difference, practically and theoretically, between having a current account and a pension (which will generally provide capital to companies that make and do stuff) to buying a BTL and getting someone in a less fortunate position to you to pay their mortgage.

LittleFoxKit I'm really glad you've managed to find a good one, as it's a total lottery out there. I'm sure you've looked at the numbers but often, in cheaper areas, a mortgage can actually cost less than the equivalent rent if you can scrape a deposit together, and the difference would provide you with some savings/security around things potentially going wrong. Of course, the cost to you would be lower if it wasn't for BTL types driving up demand and thereby prices.

And if you found yourself with a less good landlord, you'd be likely to find yourself with towels round leaking pipes or whatever else with no prospect of a fix, in any event. I know, I've been there (a long time ago).

Due to unfortunate genetics goaty I'm disabled so a member of the underclass, so I'm more likely to be exploited by a BTL landlord