Agents throughout London are being placed on standby today for a major one-day crackdown by Trading Standards.
Officers from 15 Trading Standards offices in the capital will today be visiting letting and property management agents – and scouting for evidence of compliance, for example on the display of fees.
Failure to comply could result in fines of up to £5,000 per offence.
Today’s crackdown is part of London Trading Standards Week, which focuses on a different area of activity for each day – yesterday it was knives.
However, London Trading Standards have already been vigilant, fining letting agents a total of £370,000 in the last three months.
James Murray, deputy mayor for housing and residential development, said: “We very much welcome London Trading Standards’ crackdown on letting agents who break the law, and we believe Government must ensure this vital work is properly resourced in the future.”
Isobel Thomson, NALS CEO, said: “Trading Standards play a vital enforcement role in the lettings landscape, ensuring agents trade fairly and consumers are protected.
“We are delighted that London has taken a lead in increasing their activity and raising awareness so that rogue agents should not simply slip under the radar”.
Martin Harland, lead officer and chair for London Trading Standards Letting Agents Working Group and principal officer at Camden, said: “We won’t allow letting agents flouting the law to get away with it. It’s simply not fair to the consumer or the substantial part of the letting industry who go out of their way to do things right.
“If you want to be a letting agent, the message is clear: you must comply with the law.
“London Trading Standards wants to protect London residents and the businesses that trade fairly here.
“If you know an agent who isn’t publicising their fees or who isn’t complying with the law, let us know about it.”
A reporting hotline is on 03454 040506.
Rightmove could do more, after all they allow rogue agents to advertise on their portal.
Why don’t they implement a feedback tool where customers can leave feedback about agents ?
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Because that would have to be free?
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As an experienced landlord who has also been a renter in the past I think most letting agents, whether they are breaking the law or not, charge outrageous fees. Firstly they rip off landlords by charging at least 15% for ‘Full Management’ and then there’s the totally unjustifiable repeat charges for when the tenant simply remains in the property and agent has to do almost nothing.
So, taking an annual rent of say £18000, 15% is £2700 plus VAT and assuming they reduce the fee to 12% the next year for doing nothing, that’s another £2160 plus VAT. So letting such a property on ‘full management’ will cost that landlord a massive £4860 plus VAT over two years. That’s for visiting the property, taking details and pix and mostly just advertising it on the main portals, showing it to prospective tenants and completing the Tenancy Agreement.
On top of this, letting agents charge either tenants or the landlord for ‘drawing up ASTs’ (10 mins work), checking in, checking out, admin fees, referencing (justified although always inflated) – the list goes on. I once spoke to a tenant who had been charged near to £1000 by an agent for made up fees. And one trick that is really scandalous is the taking of a hefty deposit from a prospective tenant to hold the property and stating that in the event that their references are not satisfactory that the deposit is withheld!
Obviously there are good agents out there and there are times when a landlord really needs an agent’s support but I reckon it’s been the greed of the majority over many years which has finally drawn the government’s fire.
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LandlordsandLetting
SEPTEMBER 26, 2017 AT 9:44 AM
As an experienced landlord who has also been a renter in the past I think most letting agents, whether they are breaking the law or not, charge outrageous fees. Firstly they rip off landlords by charging at least 15% for ‘Full Management’ *what would you like to be charged and can we help you to a free holiday at the same time?* and then there’s the totally unjustifiable repeat charges for when the tenant simply remains in the property and agent has to do almost nothing *our firm does not do this*
So, taking an annual rent of say £18000, 15% is £2700 plus VAT and assuming they reduce the fee to 12% the next year for doing nothing, that’s another £2160 plus VAT. So letting such a property on ‘full management’ will cost that landlord a massive £4860 plus VAT over two years. That’s for visiting the property, taking details and pix and mostly just advertising it on the main portals, showing it to prospective tenants and completing the Tenancy Agreement *‘Full Management’ does a lot more than this*
On top of this, letting agents charge either tenants or the landlord for ‘drawing up ASTs’ (10 mins work), checking in, checking out, admin fees, referencing (justified although always inflated) – the list goes on. I once spoke to a tenant who had been charged near to £1000 by an agent for made up fees. *we do not charge anything in the same galaxy as this amount* And one trick that is really scandalous is the taking of a hefty deposit from a prospective tenant to hold the property and stating that in the event that their references are not satisfactory that the deposit is withheld! *we don’t do this*
Obviously there are good agents out there and there are times when a landlord really needs an agent’s support but I reckon it’s been the greed of the majority over many years which has finally drawn the government’s fire.*no it’s cheap political point scoring when the government have nothing left to offer*
Next.
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I thought this would stir up a hornets’ nest here. 15% full management in most cases is ridiculous and if it’s my property yes I would expect a free holiday. Most of your other replies show that you are probably good agents and among the minority that don’t rip off landlords and tenants alike. As to Addressing your last point, I agree that certainly the government is very keen on cheap political point scoring at the moment. It assumes all landlords are rogues because of the behaviour of a minority and it plays to the gallery on this. And because for a long time most now letting agents’ fees have exploited both landlords and tenants it has, as I said, drawn their fire.
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Landlordsandlettings.
Sorry – Do not believe you have ever been a landlord looking at your comments unless you think subletting a room is being a landlord. You talk complete tosh.
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I have been a successful landlord for 18 years with numerous properties inside and outside London and I can tell you that most landlords feel this way about most letting agents. If I am local to the property I NEVER use an agent.
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Well the figures you spout are total tosh. so sorry i think you are looking to force an agenda on here.
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About time, Trading Standards. Long overdue. Still, better late than never.
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LandlordsandLetting
I think 15% is value if they provide you a good service and keep you out of court and prison. Personally I feel I’m worth 20% but it’s not until a landlord experiences what bad is they truly appreciate the value of an EXPERT. There are very few experts out there and the bad spoil it for the good. Plus I’d rather pay a higher management fee that’s tax deductible than spend that on tax which benefits me in no way shape or form. Although when they ban tenant fees you’ll be looking at paying more anyway so it only stands to get worse. I just wish the government were doing more to clampdown on the bad agents
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