Renting a family home short term.. and cats.

[MurderOfProse]

We're needing to relocate by just after Christmas - the timing is for school admissions reasons. For the purposes of this question, let's assume we manage to sell our house.

We may, or may not be able to find somewhere, a forever home, to buy in time (I am looking all the time but until we sell, we can't make any offers, and houses available at any given time aren't always any we'd want to buy)

There's the two of us plus three young DC - 5, 3 and 1. And two black cats.

If we can't find anywhere in time, we'll probably need to rent for a bit in the right area for the schools. Although ultimately we want a 4/5 bed place to buy, we'd be looking at probably a 3 bed unfurnished place for renting purposes so we can continue to save even more towards a deposit so the time isn't entirely wasted.

How likely are landlords of three bed unfurnished places, which obviously attract families, going to be in accepting our cats?

Thanks!!

If you speak direct the the landlord, the chances are quite high you'll be accepted, though you may have to give a slightly-higher deposit against cats scratching the wallpaper/pissing on the carpet. Some agencies work by tick boxes, which often exclude pets (and, bizarrely, children in family-sized homes!) and you'll have no luck there.

I privately-rent, currently with two cats and an aging dog. I just have to leave the place habitable for the next tenants, as I found it.

Hi, we have had no problems in finding places.

2 cats & 1 dog.

I have found the private ad's in the local newspaper better, rather than through a letting agent.

Hope you find somewhere.

when i rented out my property i told the leasing company explicitly that i didnt allow cats as extremely asthmatic and it was a short term lease and i was planning to move back in at some point. Neighbours called me to say tenants had kitten i called estate agent furious and all they said was a normal lease allows 1 cat or dog. I gave tenants notice. I couldn't go back to house and had to sell. All over a bloody cat. that said, if I was not asthmatic i couldn't of cared less, so check directly with landlord first is my advice.

Thank you all! I'd never consider smuggling a cat in or anything - the rules are there for a reason as it is somebody else's house, but I would ask to speak to a landlord direct just in case it's a blanket agency thing rather than the rule coming from the landlord.

Thank you for the tips on not going through agencies - guess that saves a bit of money too, heh. I rented for years before buying this place but it's been so long I've forgotten what it was I used to do to find places! Pop into estate agents I think maybe.

No issue giving a bigger deposit - perfectly fair.

Currently live in a rental house with a cat. Previous house they were fine with it, but retained £200 of our deposit for a month in case of fleas. Current house originally said no pets, we offered a extra £20 rent a month and to have the carpets professionally cleaned when we leave which they were happy with. Both of these were through agents. I can't imagine that short term would be a problem, most lets tend to be 6 months and then a rolling contact in which you give a month's notice.

We rent privately with two dogs and a cat, we paid extra deposit and its in our contract we will repair any damage (not that I'm anticipating them doing anything)

We did exactly the same as you - sold our house, went into rented as a family with two black cats. We've had no problem at all, always being up front about it, and we're now on our second rented house. This time we've had to have an extra two weeks rent as a deposit, but that's it.

The biggest problem has been a cat flap - this house is all uPVC windows, so we've been opening and shutting the doors a lot...

Thanks everyone! That's very reassuring. We don't mind paying a bit extra deposit or even rent. The cats are pretty good about not trashing stuff, as cats go they're mostly inoffensive except at 5am when they suddenly decide they want feeding.