The ban on letting agents charging fees

[LOVELYDOVEY05]

I recently read that agents will no longer be able to charge for start and renewal of rental agreements so unless they get full management how are they going to make any money?

They won’t be able to charge tenants. It will be a cost of doing business for the landlords (who I expect will then raise the rent to cover it.)

It's not coming in for a while. Was supposed to last Autumn I think but Brexit has pushed a lot of legislation back.

landlord fees will double. easy solution- no fixed term after the first six months. legislation backfire.

I think that's the general idea - that LL will sell up if it's not profitable.

I'm in Scotland, where there have been no tenant fees for years, and where minimum 6 month tenancies have recently been abolished (so a tenant could give notice after 3 weeks & LL has to pay for readvertising, referencing & credit checks at around £400 each time).

Many LL are getting out the business & selling because of this & other increased legislation. House Prices have not dropped. 1st time buyer homes have not increased. And where all the renters who are not in a position to buy are going to go, I don't know.

But it looks good on paper & is popular with younger voters/LL haters.

gosh. so half arsed legislation didnt work? surprise!

and the student politicans want the same in england.

I’m in Scotland. The sky has not fallen. Our letting agents do just fine without being able to charge extortionate fees to tenants for all sorts of things (often while also charging the landlord for the exact same things, which used to happen more than you’d think).

The law change in Scotland only came into play from 1 December last year. Bit early to say it "doesn't work".

www.citizensadvice.org.uk/scotland/housing/renting-a-home-s/renting-from-a-private-landlord-s/#h-if-your-tenancy-began-after-1-december-2017

I agree that that tenants should not be charged these costs directly; but unfortunately they just seem to have been passed in indirectly through higher rents.

Not really. Rents have gone up in Scotland over the past few years, but not disproportionately more than in the rest of the UK.

This is largely because letting agent fees were massively over-inflated bollocks in the first place.

Letting agents were also angry when regulations about tenancy deposit schemes came in, but that seems to have worked out just fine too - if somewhat less profitably for the agents.

Figures on rents in Scotland: beta.gov.scot/publications/private-sector-rent-statistics-scotland-2010-2017/

“landlord fees will double. easy solution- no fixed term after the first six months. legislation backfire”

I don’t understand this logic- probably missing something- but it’s not up to the agents how often the property is relet, it’s a landlord decision. Few would be stupid enough to agree to new tenants every 6 months!

Also, Shelter commissioned research on the impact of the fees change in Scotland. england.shelter.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/834832/6636_Scottish_letting_fees_report_v9.pdf

Although some landlords and commentators presume that the ban on fees must have inevitably driven an increase in rents, the evidence suggests that, if this has occurred at all, the increase is small and short-lived. The research shows that landlords in Scotland were no more likely to have increased rents since 2012 than landlords elsewhere in the UK.

perhaps not clear. first tenancy always has a break at six months in case you get the deal./ trash/ dont pay. after it ends, no need for a new lease, goes rolling with two months not ice fr om landlord, one from tenant.

no se curity for tenant.

ezcuse spaces, mn are shit at coding.

Yes if you don’t sign an agreement for longer. But that’s the way it is now- 6 months assured then rolling. What changes?

Lots of agents push landlords and tenants to sign new fixed term deals once the initial one is up. Lots of landlords don't know their business as well as they should and lots of tenants are threatened with eviction by unscrupulous agents if they just want to go onto a rolling contract.