Visiting tenants

[Wonderwoman]

Hi:D
Do I have to give my Tenants in writing or a phone call when I am coming to view my property to see how they are looking after it?
Or can I just turn up unannouced?
Also what is considered the minimum of time before I can do this?
Kind regards
WonderWoman

[Worldlife]

You should not be in business as a landlord or letting agent if you do not know the anwer to these elementary questions.

Perhaps visit you local library or bookshop and read some books about letting or managing property.

Some members of this forum organise training courses for landlords and agents and you might wish to consider this approach.

You will find much useful information on these forums and some extensive reading here would avoid you making expensive errors.

The answers to your questions are:-

Do I have to give my Tenants in writing or a phone call when I am coming to view my property to see how they are looking after it? YES - preferably in writing for this particular purpose involving an inspection
Or can I just turn up unannouced? NO - THIS COULD BE CONSTRUED AS HARASSMENT
Also what is considered the minimum of time before I can do this? AT LEAST 24 HOURS NOTICE IN ADVANCE AND IN WRITING - ALLOW TIME FOR DELIVERY IF SENDING BY POST

[Wonderwoman]

Because I am doing this business through a "course of sorts"and yes I fully appreciate it now ..........that having work experience in a letting agent would have been far the better thing to have done but unfortunately was not possible,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,I did try many local agencies advertising for staff experienced or not .......but who takes on 55 year olds??????NOBODY,none of which even had the curtesy to reply to me. You are here as a forum for me to ask advise and you did reply,therefore I received a reply which I can use .So kind of you!

[SteveP]

Wonderwoman,
Yiou should also be aware that you cannot have access at all if the tenant does not agree to it when you ask.

[Worldlife]

Wish you well Wonderwoman.

Hope from your previous business experience you will appreciate the range of skills, experience and knowledge required to run a successful enterprise.

If you set up in business prematurely with insufficient knowledge of the law business practices and proper market research your project could result in a financial loss rather than profit. You may find knowledgeable landlords questioning your decisions or wondering why you cannot give them reliable information or answers.

This will give you a poor reputation. Is it sensible to devote considerable time and effort to setting up a business before you have more legal and practical knowledge of what is required?

Whilst I would normally use an agent registered with a professional body on my last letting I used an agent who had the initiative to approach me with incentives (much, much lower fees than the competition). He suggested that he had clients waiting for property and could obtain £75 per month than my proposed competitive rent.

Took it with a pinch of salt when, in my presence, he made two unsuccessful calls to clients on his computer database (Think of the dodgy car salesman who allegedly deals with a phone call from a customer who just happens to be interested in the vehicle you too are thinking of buying!)

However the third call secured an appointment. Property let the same day.

Although this agent had a shop front and was an associated with an established property Company I was somewhat concerned that the deposit and one year's rent in advance were paid by the tenant to an organisation that was not bonded. Was not happy with the situation until the agents cheque had been cleared by my bank.

I just would not consider an agent operating from a home address or with website facilities only. If the agent has insufficient funds to set up a proper business organisation should tenants or landlords trust that agent with substantial sums of money?

Hope you find this useful in considering the obstacles you may need to overcome.

[Worldlife]

Wonderwoman,
Yiou should also be aware that you cannot have access at all if the tenant does not agree to it when you ask.

Good point Steve...... so Wonderwoman will need to look up what to do when the tenant refuses access

[justaboutsane]

I am gobsmacked that you purchsed a "business" without doing any form of research.. and that this package you have does not even give you the basics in property law.

When I started out almost 4 years ago i knew nothing.. but then this was not my job, we had 2 properties which were let to long term tenants. Over time and crap letting agents I built up a knowledge, even now I do not know it all.. I am considering attending and or running a course with Paul_F.

THe deed is done now, you have bought the package and now the best thing you can do is soak up as much research as possible, scour this forum and the internet and hopefully you won't go bust before you have even started.. I wish you luck.

[Wonderwoman]

First of all may I make it straight that I actually do own properties to let and do not normally have problems ..........maybe I should have explained why I wanted to know about this particular visit a bit better .I have 2 properties in Bulgaria now which my family over there take care of and 4 properties here.The one in question is here,I wanted to know about when to visit re: checking the place out is ,as this has dss tenants and we haven't had them before .We obtained this family through Worthing Borough Council and the Housing officer who placed them with us had arranged that Worthing Borough Council pay their rent directly into my business account otherwise I wouldn't have had them.How ever when I checked online last week to see if their 2nd rent payment had been paid in.....you've guessed it. It hadn't .Both parties....... the council and the tenants blamed this oversight on each other.
I am told that the rent should be in the business account today.What I should have asked you and didn't in hind sight ................. do you visit dss home more often..........as I was just a wee bit cross that the money hadn't gone in and no-one had the curtesy to let me know until I rang the council to see what's happening ( I actually think it is the council's fault was the late payment)she didn't even contact me to say anything about it being late due to some paperwork not being done .........only had 4 weeks to sort this out!......Which she have made sure was as it's with the council we have the direct debit and are getting the money from.She also was supposed to do her own inventory and did not.
Now I have put my question with more detail................maybe I will not get such sarcky comments but instead some useful ones.
If you do not have anything constructive to say...... join Big Brother I am sure you will be at more home there and who knows as you are so clever maybe you can let it out.:rolleyes:
I am here for genuine advice not put downs .

[Worldlife]

I have had a mix of tenants on Housing Benefit and tenants who have not.

The key criteria to the frequency of visits has been in connection looking into issues raised with tenants or meeting admission of a contractor (with he consent of the tenant) if the tenant is working.

Although this involves a little more time and effort I find this procedure helps build good landlord/tenant relationships.

At no time have I had need to arrange a formal inspection to assess the condition of the property except on an expiration date of a S21 Notice when I did not know whether or not the tenant was leaving (he did!).

Our 'business' account for property income and expenditure is a standard current account to which we have internet access. If we did not have internet access we would check the account at a cashpoint.

I suppose the problem you are facing on these forums is that we accept that as landlords we don't always know every detail of the equivalent of 'The Highway Code' for legal procedures and good practice. We share our experiences.

The problem here is that a person entering business as an agent should have an elementary grasp of 'The Highway Code' equivalent and that is possibly why some of the posts here are a bit down to earth.

I believe you owned something like a fabric and curtain making shop. How would you feel if you set up a forum to discuss technicalities such as British Standard colour codes for fabric, safety issues concerning the make up of curtains and someone joined the forum and because of lack of experience or reading was asking elementary questions such as "What is a running stitch?"

What do you think the response of that forum if that person then said they wanted to set up in a fabric business and then asked "What is a running stitch?"

Well maybe this is a bit of a Dragons Den because I have spare cash to invest in more property or even to set up a partnership with someone with recognised qualifications in rental property management. You are located near to my base in West Sussex.

On your demands to and responses to this forum I would not at this stage invest in a business project with you (not that you would necessarily want to work with me!)

Let's hope you continue to learn from this Dragons Den and avoid making costly mistakes.

[Mike H]

Wonderwoman
Please stop posting disparaging remarks and asking stupid questions on this forum, and read my response to you on your other thread entitled 'Newbie to letting'.
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