Landlords who manage your own BTLs....

[SunnyUpNorth]

Do you use an agent to find and reference your tenants? If so, how much do you typically pay?

If you do the whole thing yourself how do you reference them and do all the credit checks? How much does that cost?

We have recently bought a place to rent to students. We are intending to manage it ourselves but were planning to use a local agent to do the viewings, marketing, referencing etc but they seem quite pricey.

I do my own. I don't credit check because they are a waste of time. Someone can be up to their neck in debt and still pass a credit score.

I ask for 3 months bank statements, previous reference from a landlord and payslips. I always check with the employer also and never with the name I am given (just in case). When I speak to the employer I ask for the payroll department and ask if there is any chance of redundancy or disciplinary action.

I always have sufficient insurance including malicious damage cover. I am a registered landlord and I protect my deposits.

Thanks frozen.

No worries. Most on here I think do credit check but I have my reasons for not bothering. My opinion is that you can see much more from a bank statement.

We use an agent to find tenant, do credit checks and draw up the agreement and get it signed, we then manage ourselves. We pay one months rent to the agent to do this.
We tried to market and do paperwork ourselves once but we found tenants didn't want to deal with the LL direct. Silly really as the agent charges the tenant a fortune too.

Just as a note, if in Scotland, it is against the law for an agent to charge tenants any fees.

I do all my own. I don't bother with credit checks, no point. With students I get a guarantor agreement.

References with students, little point. Usually I give their last landlord a ring.

Only once had I a non rent payer. Solicitor wrote to guarantor and the whole year amount paid in one go with a ten per cent fee. Made me realise how important guarantee forms where.

Interesting that credit checks are disregarded. Do you get a guarantor for each student? Do you reference each guarantor but not bothe credit checking them?

With students, I am sure when I was at uni there was some link between not being able to graduate if you had any rent arrears. Not sure if that was just for uni accommodation or private as well. Does that sort of thing still exist?

Thanks for all the answers, we are new to student lets and not sure of the best way to go about things.

SunnyUpNorth, have you spoken to the Accomodation Officer at the local Uni? They can be a wealth of knowledge, sometimes they run in house schemes which could do what your after at low cost, they should certainly be able to tell you which agents to avoid, how contracts work in your area (10 or 12 months etc), average prices and importantly, whether there's a demand for more student accommodation.

Student rentals are quite different from an average family residential let. Again I wouldnt bother with credit checking the student I'd just have a guarantor parent who was preferably a homeowner.
The uni accommodation officer should tell you all you need to know, you may need to be inspected and approved by them, they may find you tenants, they may offer rental guarantees etc

Batty and Sunny - yes we have spoken to the local uni accommodation office and had advice from them. They can help with advertising, contracts and so on but they don't so any of the viewings, paperwork etc so we would still need someone to do that side of things. We live near enough to manage it ourselves but hoped to get someone to do the viewings as we are not close enough to go back and forwards constantly for that.

Thanks again for the comments.

How about advertising a couple of open days? You could make the trip a couple of times and hopefully find tenants yourself.

Paperwork - if you join NLA (£100pa) you get free access to all the necessary paperwork and legal advice helpline.

Sorry Sunny, just seen your last post. Thanks for that. I am going to have a look at the NLA.