The ups and downs of renting #RentalInsights

My husband and I have been renting for around 11 years and over those 11 years we’ve experienced our fair share of good and bad landlords.

When we first started renting, we did so pretty quickly. We viewed one flat and took it the same day without a moments thought!

Thankfully, we had a lovely landlady who was not only friendly and approachable, but also helpful and understanding.

If we ever had any problems with our flat such as the one time our cooker blew up, our landlady would have someone out to look at it the same day. That’s the kind of landlady you want!

Unfortunately we’ve also experienced the not so good. When my husband and I rented a maisonette it seemed like the perfect home. It wasn’t until months later when the landlord took over and ditched the letting agency that we started to experience problems.

First up, he appeared on my doorstep one day without any notice and introduced himself as an electrician. Up until this point neither my husband nor I had met the landlord. After doing a bit of digging, he finally admitted that he was the landlord. I’ve no idea why he pretended to be someone else.

When we reported problems of damp in our children’s room, he fobbed us off and refused to help, eventually deciding to sell up instead of fix the problem. No doubt he just painted over the damp in a bid to sell the property.

Moving forward a few years, my husband and I, plus our children are now very happy in our current home. Our letting agent and landlord are both friendly and approachable, we can’t ask for more really.

I recently came across an eBook online by HomeLet which is the fourth in their series of landlords advice eBooks, I was intrigued by some of the facts I read from a recent survey which asked tenants exactly how happy they were with their landlord or letting agent.

Leading landlord and tenant insurance providers HomeLet have released the fourth in their series of landlords advice eBooks and it includes some interesting facts and figures from a recent survey which asked tenants exactly how happy they were with their landlord or letting agent.

For example, overall 86% of people were either very happy, quite happy or somewhat happy with their landlord or letting agent.

75% of people surveyed claimed to be happy with the response to maintenance requests.

In all of our homes we’ve never been allowed pets, so it was no surprise to read that 43.6% of tenancy agreements do not allow pets.

12.5% of people surveyed have had their deposit withheld with 39.1% of these down to cleaning and 19.3% down to re-decorating costs.

Do you rent? What do you look for in a landlord?