advice needed on letting property

[kentmumtj]

Hi
I need some advice.
I have a property which has been let diastrously through an agent, anyways we are very cautious about another agent taking the property on as we have had to involve solicitors with the last agents and that is still ongoing.

Anyway my question is this. We have had such an interst in letting our house and are acyually bombarded with tenants wanting it theough word of mouth.
We have decided to let to and manage it ourselves. as it cant be worse than paying someone to manage it who allowed the tenants to build walls etc etc.
How to we go about drawing up a tenancy agreement. Is this something we can do ourselves or do we have to involve a solicitor.
any advice re inventory and tenancy agreements would be greatly welcomed

Can you not just dig out the inventory and tenancy agreements you had with the letting agents, and rewrite them just the same.

Don't see why you need a solicitor. If your tenants sign the agreement, they sign the agreement - what's the solicitor for exactly?

i dont know to be honest think we have been shook up by last management agency and now have a solicitor fighting our case.

i had thought about that but would need to get a copy of the old tenacny agreement back from solicitors coz they have it

You can get 'ready made' tenancy agreements in a kit from WH Smith very cheaply. There needn't be a solicitor involved. I rent through a private landlord, but I worked in a lettings agent so I have an understanding of both ways. One thing you must be aware of though is that a lettings agency would carry out a reference check. It would be worth doing one on any prospective tenants, and certainly if you want to take out rent guarantee insurance they will require you to do one. Make the inventory as detailed as possible and take photos. Give it to the tenants when they move in, let them ammend it if they need to and insist they give you a copy back after a week so that you can work out any damage that needs fixing when they leave. Ime lettings agents do earn their money as they will be up to date on all the regulations. You will need to put any deposit in a protection scheme, and will need to carry out gas safety checks every year, as well as having the electrics checked. Any failure to do so could leave you open to prosecution by the tenants if something was to go wrong.

You can buy tenancy agreements in WHSmiths, you can do an inventory yourself, just make a list of what's there, go through it with them, get them to sign it and give them a signed copy. Take pictures aswell so you can compare the condition. You need to make sure there's working smoke alarms and have a gas safety check before they move in. You can advertise on Gumtree or in the local paper.

You don't need a solicitor.

Put the deposit somewhere safe, remember your tax allowance for repairs and wear and tear.

x-post with littlelamd

great minds scrooged

Buy a ready-made one or retype the old one. Credit ref agencies are easy to find online - we used this one that got the refs back to us the same day. I would always ask to see a passport or driving licence or something that means you are pretty sure that the person you are letting to is the person they say they are. Inventory clerks are quite easy to find as well online.

Finally go with your gut feeling: we were letting to three people but one of them started being very odd and kept delaying signing the contract so we found someone else to replace her. Her behaviour since has made me think she might have been a nutter very high maintenance.

ok all your advice is great and im taking it all on board

is a 6 month tenancy the best one to have and just re new it?

the family is on benefits and i was wondering howif any additional problems this may/may not cause?

also i know about gas/elec cheks but am not sure on this protected deposit thing.
Could someone explain this to me and how do i go about doing it?

You need to put the deposit into a protected scheme, so basically you can't spend it- it is there to cover the repairs at the end of the tenancy. Them being on benefits may well cause problems with your mortgage or insurance provider if it is a buy to let so I would check that out first

i have already checked and it does not say anything about people on benefits, where would i find details of these protected schemes - hope im not sounding silly lol

here I would check the small print of all the documents relating to the property. If you are going for a rent protection policy that might be a problem with people on benefits iirc

You can get a tenancy agreement without a solicitor. It might be worthwhile joining the landlords association, we have found them very helpful with lots of things. It's £75 I think. There's an advice line and you can get tenancy agreements from them too.

very usefuyl advice thankyou.
i have spoken to the benfit/housing people and they have to pay it direct to the tenant however if the tenant does not pay me the landlord they can then overide it and pay direct to the landlord. so i am thinking even if they do defualt i can thn get it paid direct to myself.

littlelambs thanks for that will do that asap

guadalupe will look into them

heres hoping i dont have bad luck doing it myself

You have to be careful about getting it paid to yourself. If there is a mistake in their claim or they are deliberately trying to claim more than they're entitled to, or even if the HB people mess up then you will have to pay it back. Worth considering as a risk

The tenancy agreement kits are good. Inventory is just a "say what you see" list of everything in the property which you draw up and the tenant signs. Its sometimes easier to meet with your tenant on site to go through it so that you can sort any issues out there and then.

6 month AST is fine - just make sure you are aware that the tenant is still legally a tenant until either you or they serve the requisite notice (1 month for them, 2 months from you) even if the tenancy is not renewed at the end of 6 months

Finally, make sure you have your Landlord's gas safety certificate done annually without fail.

We let a flat privately. I use the contract from WHSmith, draw up our own inventory with photos to reord the condition of the flat and carry out full credit and ref checks with an online tenancy check service. If someone wants the flat we take the fee for the checks as a holding deposit. We advertise on gumtree as most of our taget audience are south african/australian. Don't forget your EPC and gas saftety cert.We also take out rental proection insurance. I think it was about £200 last time and can be put against on your tax bill.

And another thing we put the deposit in the government run scheme you can access on line.

fantastic all of you thanks very much

I had a problem with a tenant who claimed Housing Benefit. He stopped paying although he was still getting paid the benefit. I asked the benefit to be paid into my account, it took some time and the Council could do nothing to make up for the money that I lost when he was not paying, they did not chase him for it and of course, he did not pay back. I lost two months rent.

I have advertised my 1 bed on gumtree and let it out twice myself as I was not impressed with the service I got from the agency and the fees I had to pay.

Good advise here already, my letting agent friend gave me an electronic copy of a standard contract and I used experian www.experian.co.uk/creditreporttv/?sc=410006 for the credit/reference checks, the tenants paid for it. I did my own inventory check.

GL!

I used landlordzone forums, they will answer everything you need to know in much detail. You definitely don't need to buy a Tenancy Agreement, there are very good free ones available.

oooo free ones i like even better than buying ones lol

wheres the free ones??????????