Letting a property: how it works

Quite simply, we make it all smooth

If you’re new to letting a property, we understand it can seem a little daunting.

But don’t worry, because we’ve been helping landlords – experienced and new – let their properties in Brighton & Hove since 1997, we’re pretty good at making it all as smooth as possible.

This section is intended to give you a guide to what to expect when letting out your property.

Maximising your rental value

The first step is to call us to arrange an appointment to view your property, during which one of our knowledgeable people will give you an estimate of its likely rental value, giving you comparable properties as examples.

Naturally, you’ll want as much rent as possible, and we’ll do our best to achieve that. We often find that the rent we can achieve for you varies according to the season, and we have our fingers on the pulse of the prevailing market conditions at all times.

At this point, we’ll also advise on whether any work to the property would add to its ‘rentability’, and again we’ll help you assess whether the investment would be worthwhile. Because we handle property management too, we have good relationships with local, trusted contractors who would be more than happy to provide an estimate for any work.

Since we’ve been doing what we do for such a long time, we are practised at identifying what sort of person will find your property appealing – student, professional couple or family for example – and therefore how best to make it attractive to that market.

Regulations

As you’d expect there is an ever growing number of regulations, safety and others, with which you as a landlord are required to comply. We are fully up to speed on the current regulations and will advise you on what you need to do.

Learn more about regulations and your responsibilities…

Getting going

Before we start marketing the property, you’ll need to decide which service you’d like from us:

• Tenant Finding Service, or
• Full Management Service

Learn more about what we offer and what it costs…

Once you’ve decided to start marketing the property, we will ask you to sign and complete our Terms of Business. We will also arrange an appointment to take the photographs, and prepare the Energy Performance Certificate and the floorplan.

Once we have your approval, we will then use our advanced information systems to match your property against potential tenants in our database, and possible tenants will receive an email alerting them to your property’s availability.

We will also begin marketing it on the largest property websites around and on our own website. Needless to say, people use the internet a great deal when looking for property, so a thorough web presence is vital.

Viewings

It won’t be long before we have potential tenants to bring round to the property. If you, or other existing tenants, are still living there we’ll always phone before we bring someone round.

We’ll keep going until we find someone who’d like to rent your property. This usually happens within a few days, although this can vary either way according to the type of property and the season. We will always provide plenty of feedback (whether it’s what you want to hear or not!) so that you keep abreast of how things are progressing.

Sometimes the tenants will want to negotiate a little on the price, or on the terms of the lease, and we’ll be able to advise on your best options according to how the property has been received in the market, the supply of competing properties, and the level of demand from good tenants at that time.

The tenancy agreement

Once someone has expressed an interest in renting your property, to ensure they will be good tenants who will look after the property and pay on time, we demand references, proof of employment and carry out credit checks before it goes any further.

We also apply our intuition, from our many years in this business, for who would and who would not be a good tenant, and we do on occasion politely reject people even if they pass all the checks.

Our tenancy agreements are compiled in accordance with current legislation: the 1998 Housing Act (amended 2004). However thanks to our experience, we are able to tailor it to your specific requirements (such as how long it lasts, what bills are or are not included) yet remaining within the law.

Please speak to us if you would like to see a copy of the standard agreement or if you wish to make any amendments.

Inventory and Schedule of Condition report

We also recommend that you ask us to compile an Inventory and Schedule of Condition.

This provides an independent record of what furniture, fittings etc are included, and the level of level of wear & tear and cleanliness of your property. We conduct an accompanied check-in with your tenant(s) on the day they move in and ask them to sign agreement to its contents. This really helps with resolving any discrepancies at the end of the tenancy.

The Inventory will also record that the prevailing safety regulations have been adhered to.

Moving-in day

On the day of the move, the tenants will come to our office, pay the deposit and the first month’s rent, and sign the tenancy agreement.

We will take them round to the property, familiarise them with it (you are of course welcome to be there too if you prefer) and give them the keys.

Repairs and maintenance during the tenancy

Properties being what they are, problems do of course occur on occasion.

Unless specifically written into the Tenancy Agreement, it is usually your responsibility to ensure that anything that was included with the tenancy - including any appliances and the heating system – are kept in good working order, and repaired if they break down. (If the tenants have fitted their own, say washing machine, it will be their responsibility, although the plumbing behind it will be yours.)

Who handles any problems depends on which of our services you opted for.

• If you opted for the Tenant Finding service, you will be the tenants’ contact point, and you will have to arrange any repairs or maintenance yourself.

• If you opted for our Tenant Finding and Full Management service, the tenants will be able to call us during office hours [links to contact us], or leave a message. In real emergencies such as a power or heating failure or (god forbid) a flood or fire your tenants will be able to reach our 24 hour emergcecy callout service for assistance – the fourth emergency service?

We will then contact you to understand how you would like us to handle the issue. We have good relationships with subcontractors who we can instruct on your behalf, and invoice you for any labour and/or parts costs.

It is in handling problems that our experience shines through, enabling us to efficiently and conveniently fix issues that need careful handling (ask any other agents you may speak to how long they’ve been handling lettings…)

The deposit

Since 2007, all deposits must be protected by one of the Tenancy Deposit Schemes licensed by the government, which

• provides an independent means of resolving any dispute that may arise between tenant and landlord
• means that landlords cannot unfairly hold on to tenants’ deposits
• gives all parties confidence that deposits are protected by a licensed organisation, which safeguards Tenancy Deposits against rogue landlords, tenants, and agents.

At the start of the tenancy, the landlord and the tenant are given details of how to get money returned. Should there be any breakages or damage to the property, both parties have an independent means of agreeing how the cost should be apportioned.

Learn more about how any disputes are settled…

Contact us if you have any more questions about renting your property...

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