LLs of mumsnet

[luckybadger]

What do you look for in a potential tenant?

I have no history of renting anywhere else and a medium/low ish income. I'm hoping to increase that but as it stands that's my situation. I'm self employed btw.

Obviously I know I'll keep the place clean and not trash it but there's no way for a stranger to know that I suppose.

I've contacted a few estate agents but they seem very fixed on the amount of rent correlating with my income which would sort of price me out of the kind of size and type of property I am interested in. I'm not talking about a mansion here, just something more than my current income justifies.

For example I was told that for one large flat that costs £800 a month you need to be earning 22K a year. Which I currently do not.

I do have savings. So I could pay 6 months or a year up front. When I try and get this across to estate agents they seem to discount me.

There's a long and unhappy story behind how I got to this point. But since I won't be sharing that with a potential LL or an estate agent it would only muddy the waters to post it here.

So, are you a LL? Would you consider an upfront payment like that? What can I put in place to make myself more appealing as a tenant?

Personally we don't use an agent, we rent out the house we own privately so that we can meet potential tenants and get a feel for them.

Would you have references?

We've been in a position renting where we've not had much money left after rent but always made sure our rent was the first paid so we don't mind renting to someone who was on a low income but had good references to show they've always paid their rent.
We are in an area though where living costs aren't really high, we rent out a two bed house, spacious with a garden for £450 a month.

We never used to ask for references and just meet people and see what they're like but after we made a mistake there and ended up with tenants in who trashed the place and never paid rent for 4 months before moving out with no notice, or letting us know etc we decided we really needed to. We personally don't do credit checks but know a lot of people do.

You would perhaps be better trying to speak to landlords direct rather than through an agent if possible!
I would imagine it will be harder trying to find somewhere just now because of how hard it is to evict someone with covid rules if it turns out you're not a reliable tenant

@Blossomtoes Unfortunately my back story is very convoluted and I am kind of blocked from a lot of options. It would take ages to explain it.

@ChazsBrilliantAttitude Right I see that makes sense, thank you for explaining. I do get the longer tenancy aspect. So in theory would there be anything someone in my position would be able to do that would sway you personally? I think if I'm barking up the wrong tree I might as well just focus on increasing income, rather than pursuing this course of action.

No one would have to evict me lol, I have a long term plan. But I'm not sure how I can convince the other party of that.

@ScaredOfDinosaurs Yikes, that sounds very stressful. I think if a potential LL met me they might be keener, I am super boring!

@Blossomtoes she can't afford £800 a month so couldn't fully replenish the savings

[quote girlmom21]@Blossomtoes she can't afford £800 a month so couldn't fully replenish the savings [/quote]
Where does she say that?

I’m a LL. I’d probably want a guarantor if you can’t meet the income requirement. It depends on the market though, I once let a flat to two SE people who paid 9m upfront as they couldn’t prove income, think they were wedding photographers so it fluctuated a lot. It was a quiet market and they were the best option.

After experience, I’m less keen on renting to people with pets so that would be a big positive.

@Twilightstarbright no guarantor I'm afraid. No pets, though.

Can I ask, what if you were renting to some people who were retired? Would that come down to pension income and they would need to prove that?

[quote luckybadger]**@SusannaM* and @Practicebeingpatient* can I ask how you got the upfront payment conversation going? I have been on the phone to estate agents and got nowhere, sorry if this is stupid but how do you connect with a LL to ask them directly?[/quote]
We told the agents who passed on the message. Something along the lines of 'would they accept £xxx a month of we paid a year in advance? '.

I’m going through something similar at the moment, I know I can afford the rent. I’ve also weighed up council tax costs, water, electric, gas and food.

I know I can afford up to £500, but the affordability calculator doesn’t agree.

I live in a working class town in the Midlands, rent is high and wages are low. I nearly went for a bedsit, but it didn’t feel safe.

I’ve hopefully got a two bed flat, but I’m just under the annual wage/ rent affordability calculator by £100. I’m dealing with the landlord directly though, and not an agency. Like you OP, I’m super boring. I work and I study.

I’m currently in a tiny box room with all my belongings - I need this to work out.

@Practicebeingpatient Ok, that's really helpful, thank you.

[quote girlmom21]@Blossomtoes she can't afford £800 a month so couldn't fully replenish the savings [/quote]
I pay £800 rent pcm on less income than OP so why do you think she can't do it?

Once my Tennant leaves I'm selling up. My house was only bought to get on the housing ladder while we was ( and still are ) renting in a extremely expensive area where we could never afford to buy.

I dont care much past the paperwork on the vetting process. It tells me nothing more than if you can afford it. Affordable it doesnt even tell me if you will pay the rent as plenty can afford to but choose to prioritise not too.

Good references mean more but you rarely get them either. I have had horrendous tennants attempting murder in my house, great tennants and ok but annoying tennants who dont realise without their rent I cant pay the mortgage so they will loose their home.

You never know for sure. So I can see why landlords try to go for the least risk if there are a few possible tennants lined up. Unfortunately most landlords have a tennants from hell and it spoils it for the next tennant. You learn to be pessimistic

@CaptainMarvelDanvers It's tough isn't it? I hope you find a better option. I find it pretty frustrating tbh because I can pay the rent in the bracket I'm looking at but on paper I'm not a good prospect. I can see now the long eviction term is an aspect in the situation, might have to think about that.

Have you tried OpenRent ? You can message potential landlords directly through their advertising portal. No agent to go through.

[quote girlmom21]@Blossomtoes she can't afford £800 a month so couldn't fully replenish the savings [/quote]
It’s based on the affordability calculator, but the calculator is to minimise the risk of tenants missing rent not necessarily that they can’t. afford it.

I can afford £500, calculator says I can afford £400. I do overtime (which is available all year) but that isn’t taking into consideration, but even without that overtime I can afford £500, I know my costs to a tee.

@luckybadger I’d consider it, if they had decent references.

Honesty counts for a lot. I had prospective tenants who didn’t declare a CCJ. I wouldn’t have minded if they were honest, but they weren’t.

Paying up front or paying the last few months of the fixed term up front seems to be very common in London house shares/student flats to avoid the need for guarantors. That doesn't really help you if EA's aren't accepting that where you live.

A landlord might prefer the upfront rent being for the end of the fixed term though? It gives them the security that if you don't pay the rent, they at least have the rent covered for the time it would take to evict you.

I believe the affordability criteria are set by shelter, and circumventing them is pretty hard.
Also a lot of LLs hate rent upfront, it’s usually a red flag for money laundering or growing cannabis…

@luckybadger

We were already having the conversation with the land agent, when it came out that DH's job wouldn't be suitable, as he was on a temporary 12mth contract. So we offered the whole year, as we were getting desperate at that point. Land agent didn't think it would be acceptable, but said he would speak to the owner. Turned out that the owner needed a decent injection of cash for another project, so we were just lucky I guess.

We also had very decent references.

@lastqueenofscotland I can see how it might be a red flag but also because of my own situation I know it's not the only explanation.

@AnyFucker I did not know about that, thank you very much.

@SusannaM Ok, the references seem to more important than I factored in.

[quote luckybadger]@CaptainMarvelDanvers It's tough isn't it? I hope you find a better option. I find it pretty frustrating tbh because I can pay the rent in the bracket I'm looking at but on paper I'm not a good prospect. I can see now the long eviction term is an aspect in the situation, might have to think about that.[/quote]
I just want somewhere that is safe, secure and clean that I can make into a home. I’m on the council housing list but yeah that ain’t happening anytime soon.

But I also understand that landlords don’t want to be in a situation where the tenant isn’t paying rent.

We need more housing 🤷‍♀️ I’d be happy living in one of those tiny homes 🙈🙈

My last tenant didn't earn enough to rent my property but was a primary school teacher with a good amount of savings so I decided to rent to her even though I had other offers (which, for other reasons, were less appealing). She did leave after a year though, I suspect because she either decided to buy or didn't want to exhaust her savings. If you can't afford it on your income alone, potential LLs may consider you less likely to stay on, and changing tenants is expensive and disruptive.

@mobear What makes an appealing tenant? Do you mean after meeting in person?

I do understand that LLs lose money when they have someone move out but on the flip side, not everyone is going to stay on a long term basis. Is there a minimum time line that you guys consider reasonable?

Sorry for the Spanish Inquisition there!

I use an agent and they sent me details of the 3 best applicants i.e income, children, pets etc and whether they passed the affordability check, (2 did 1 offered a year up front as retired and pension income was low but had savings) and why they wanted the bungalow, I went with the one that failed affordability, not because they offered a year up front, because of what plans they had for the garden and how they envisaged living there (it was my parents former home that I had to rent out to top up nursing home fees)

So may be worth asking the agent to send this to the landlord because not all of us are just in it for the money some of us become landlords by default, they have now been in there 6 years and consider them part of the family, my old family home is well looked after which is much more important to me and as such never even considered putting the rent up.