Tuesday 16 June 2009

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Strange days indeed. The sun’s turned blue, and in Norfolk, a three headed cow was born. Also: our busy politicians have condescended to (half-heartedly) spend some time discussing private rented housing.

Forgive me for not floating on a lilac cloud of joy, but I don’t believe anything will change. The current situation is labyrinthine and chaotic. We need a powerful agency to monitor and regulate renting, while standing up for tenants. Until then, in order of effectiveness, here’s who you can call now, for all the good it will do:

The landlord? Fine unless the problem is the landlord themselves (which it generally is.) Don’t worry if they’re based abroad - they’ll fly over on their private jet and fix the toilet themselves, pronto. Alternatively, they could ignore you, or commence possession proceedings immediately. Either, really.

The local council? Councils can refuse HMO licences and take action if property is unsafe. First they’ll say: “….keep a diary.” I wonder if this ever leads to housing officers confronted by the following:

“Day begins, as ever with a crafty Jodrell, but still the world seems dark, so very dark (dark!) Nobody understands me (except maybe The Smiths) so I’m running away from home.”
You’re supposed to be recording the misdemeanours of crooked proprietors, like leaking pipes, lack of HMO licences, dangerous appliances, and nefarious neighbourly fly-tipping and drug farms. But thanks for sharing.

Rent officers? In the old days, tenants could ask for a ruling on what was a fair rent. Such a lovely idea. Nowadays they spend their days finding the cheapest rent in any area in order to keep Local Housing Allowance at a permanent low, and they are mighty good at this.

The National Federation of Builders? Royal Institute Of British Architects? Planners? “Hello! This buy-to-let newbuild dovecot I am renting is crap. Please send round a squad to rebuild it and remodel the interior, at no extra cost.” Oh, wouldn’t it be nice…

The police? Horses for courses, obviously; don’t alert the persons in blue if your roof is leaking. They don’t care (and why should they?) The police are the bouncers, the door security-staff of the legal world. They don’t know the rules, they just do the arresting. So even if you are being threatened/harassed by neighbours and landlords, don’t expect too much.

Your spiritual advisor? By your side for all the unpleasant things in life, like exorcisms, funerals and weddings, or worse – when you finally go postal and kill your flatmates/landlord/letting agent. (NB – the last one? Don’t. It. Would. Be. Wrong.)

Relate? There should be some sort of support-group or mediation-service for house-sharers. The low number of flatmate-on-flatmate murder leads me to conclude that humanity is less warlike than previously feared. Isn’t that nice?

Random people on the streets? It doesn’t work. They look at you funny, and afterwards they run away. I know this.

The letting agent? Oh, perrr-leez… No; wait a minute - let’s have ourselves some fun. You could complain, for a laugh, and play letting-agent-repair-response-bingo, where you tick off their most inventive evasion. Big boys did it and ran away? The dog ate the deposit? Ask the landlord? And around we go…

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Apologies in advance, because you won't like this.
Only one word to sum up the majority of content on this site'pathetic'
Actually there are several including sad. Especially when you recognise the times of the day in which some of this nonsense was published.
I have no strong feelings towards letting agents, but have experienced good and bad.
The problem is when your all dead and buried letting agents will still be here. At least their time (as much as you may disagree) has been spent achieving something. That may be making money to improve their lives, trying to change the views set by bad agents, being involved in raising thousands for charities, or indeed supporting your ever so required regulation. You however will have spent an enormous amount of time moaning in an idiosincratic fashion, and unfortunately for you, changing nothing.
That reminds me. I dont want to appear too much like yourself. So time to say goodbye. Before I go I just want to say this......'blog awards' 2007 was a long time ago (todays chip wrappings)......and have some dignity and don't be predictable by responding to this either in a catty continuation of all of your previous drivel, or in a pretence that you have some intellect as in some previous posts. Just stay quiet, and perhaps you will get some support from your very few followers. They can even call me names if they like, I won't mind.........And to think I came across this when looking for something constructive.

RenterGirl said...

At roughly 9.40pm last night, you found my blog by googling: "how do I market my letting agents," and afterwards spent about 50 mins reading. Which means - you are a letting agent, aren't you, eh? And as for your assertion that letting agents, rather than being venal, dishonest and stupid are angels who do work for charity, I mean, come on - really. You are the vampires of the property world, nobody likes you and you deserve to be regulated into non-existance. Thanks for reading though.

Anonymous said...

"At roughly 9.40pm last night, you found my blog by googling: "how do I market my letting agents," and afterwards spent about 50 mins reading. Which means - you are a letting agent, aren't you, eh? And as for your assertion that letting agents, rather than being venal, dishonest and stupid are angels who do work for charity, I mean, come on - really. You are the vampires of the property world, nobody likes you and you deserve to be regulated into non-existance. Thanks for reading though."
Ha ha ha - good comeback

Anonymous said...

(the other) Anonymous said: Ha ha ha - good comeback

yea, yea actually I thought renter girl did make a good comeback there .

StuM82 said...

Letting agents, eh? Gotta love 'em. Far from being useless drivel I actually find your postings very useful and informative and have been reading the site for over a year. Keep up the good work.

Stu

RenterGirl said...

Thanks everyone. I understand why letting-agents are so worried, and why they lash out. The days of their 'creative' fees, lies, incompetence, laziness (did I mention the laziness?) are numbered. Even the informal body that speaks for them agrees they must regulated, the days of parasitical, duplicitous, untrained, smarmy wide-boys (and girls) making up charges as they go along are numbered. Thanks for reading, and I'm glad to be of help.
Penny

Shoe said...

Interesting comments on letting agents. I am not sure about the UK, but in Ireland there is no regulation of letting agents. They simply not legally recognised as having any part in the entire sector, yet they play a huge role in it.

Some years ago myself and and ex came across an "agent" rented a fairly nice and cheap house from at the time. We eventually discovered why it was both nice and cheap - it was the agency propritiors wife's amateur investment property (and to be honest the "agency" were as bad as any amateur landlord) which she was not declaring for tax puposes. However once we knew about this we were able to twist arms with the agency due to the non tax declaration (how foolish they were!) but it did go to show the barefaced cheek of these so-called "professionals", that they were willing to let their own personal properties out "under the counter" on the black economy.

The whole debacle over withheld deposits was a lesson in why there was a desperate need for proper regulation at all levels - it was clear that significant levels of landlords were gouging tenants out of deposits, and it should have been realised that this was probably happening at the level of overinflated rents, unfair extra charges, poor conditions such as low quality furnishings, white goods and minimal heating or air circulation.

RenterGirl said...

Well put Shoe. Landlords and agents are objecting to the proposed regulation, trying the civil liberties argument; hypocritical when they check references, see if you're on the electoral roll and peruse two years worth of bank statements. Letting agents make up the fees as they go along, and do little (okay nothing) to earn their cut.