Misleading photos and information in description...

[drummergirl34]

I travelled 4 hours based on a description - including photos - of a house and also asked to see another house there with the agents. As soon as I got to the house, the smell of mold was prevelant when you walked through the door, the garden (of which there were no photos) was in a terrible state, and there were clear signs that the neighbours were 'problems'. The last tenants didn't last a year. I asked if there were problem neighbours and the agent said "uhm, well, ahh, uhm, well... there are lots of houses here being let so people change all the time"... The other property I saw had a garden in a worse state than the last - inaccessible - and the photos of the property were carefully taken to hide an entire wall of mold.

If the agents had not been misleading about the property I would not have bothered. I read that the 1993 misdescriptions act has been updated and agents are now required to present such information and be proactive about trouble neighbours etc rather than have to be asked about it all.

I'm fuming that I wasted money on train tickets and my time. Can I do something to get my money back? Write to the property obudsman or would it have to be small claims as the agents are clearly at fault?

So, what.. You expect the description to say 'terrible mould problem, dodgy neighbours'? You are being a bit silly. Of course they are going to focus on the positives and leave out the negatives. And you weren't mislead by the photos if they just haven't photographed the bad bits - you would be mislead if they had put photos of a better garden.

Sadly Imamouseduh, you're very wrong, bordering on "being a bit silly" infact.

www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/mortgageshome/article-2315200/Learn-new-house-rules-Estate-agents-reveal-property-problems-says-OFT.html

hoa.org.uk/2013/10/what-estate-agents-have-to-tell-you-changes-to-the-law/

If you had called and asked about problem neighbours or damp problems then they should have told you the truth. However as the pp said they are never going to put those details in an online advert as no one would go to look at the house.

I don't think they did anything wrong.

Without seeing the property ad, it's hard to tell whether you were "misled" or not - eg. many property listings that I see say something such as "requires updating" which covers a host of problems from poor decoration to near-dereliction. However, if I were travelling four hours to view a property, I would have probably emailed beforehand to check its condition, for example, if that was important to me.

Regarding the link to the updating of the EA rules, it is difficult to tell from that at what point EAs have to let viewers know of any problems - whether that it is pre-viewing, at a viewing, pre-offer, post-offer, pre-survey etc.

I agree with Imamouse that EAs are sales people and inevitably they are going to present a property in its best light. I'd say that misrepresentation at the ad stage is only if they outright lie (call a very rundown property "immaculate" or overstate its size).

Without links to the properties in question, it's very difficult for anyone else to comment on this. Mould can be down to tenant lifestyle - drying washing indoors and never opening the windows, for example, but you would expect a landlord to clean that sort of thing up before viewings and the clear the garden. At least when you see a place like that you know the landlord doesn't care so you don't want to be their tenant!

In terms of complaining, you can only escalate a complaint to an ombudsman once you have exhausted the agent's own complaints procedure and not been satisfied by the outcome.

In your position I would email them and make it clear (if you didn't do so in person) how disappointed you were with the standard of rental accommodation they showed you. List what you are looking for and ask them what do they have on the books which fits the bill which doesn't have the poor quality issues of the two you have viewed. Travelling 4 hours to see just two properties seems a poor use of your time - you need to be seeing more. Is it a case that the properties in budget are just not good enough and you need to pay more rent to get somewhere better? You really need a good agent (I know, I know) to take you round several places on the same day.

Um, OK.

Details of problem neighbours only have to be passed on if there have been conflicts/issued registered with the council, I believe, it's doesn't just apply to any neighbour you don't like the look of!

You should have phoned the agency first and asked more detailed questions. If they had lied to you flat out and then you'd travelled four hours to see the property in question you might have a case. But you didn't.

Of course I emailed before. How about you stop with the aggressive attitude Imamouseduh

When we were house hunting it was usually pretty obvious when certain rooms were 'below par' because usually there were no pictures of them. I can understand in agents particulars, but on rightmove some houses have over 20 pictures, so there's no excuse for not having one of certain rooms. If it mentions a study, utility or 4th bedroom for example, with no picture, we can deduce what that means.

We viewed a house that reeked of dogs (owner had 10 pugs) and we would have never viewed it if they had told us it was chewed and the garden was a health hazard and every carpet needed cleaned. We ended up buying it. That's why the EA didn't tell you!

The 4 hour drive would be the real crux for me though and I can understand why you feel angry that you've had your time wasted. We had so many people look round ours and the EA hadn't been honest about work needing doing- it's a waste of everyone's time

Sorry just reread, it was train fares/money wasted.

lOOK YOUR WORDS, ARE NOW A REALITY. if any agents does this type of things they should be in jail.!!!!

news.sky.com/story/two-year-old-boy-died-as-a-result-of-mould-infested-flat-unfit-for-human-habitation-12747927