UKC

My girlfriend and I let a house in North Wales. We let the house through Reeds Rain. Reeds Rain have been completely useless and unhelpful throughout our tenancy. The local Reeds Rain office (Bangor) closed and the nearest one is 30 miles.

They seem incapable of doing anything and are PITA to contact. They don't show up to arranged visits and are supposed to have sent someone round to fix the door two week ago. They charged us £300 to arrange the let, most independent letting agents charge a fraction of this. And presumably they charge our landlord a considerable amount for letting her house out.

The landlord lives in London and we'd like to contact her to tell her how useless they are. Unfortunately we don't have her address. The letting agent won't give us it. We asked on the pretence of forwarding post to her, “Oh just drop it round and the branch and we’ll sort out. The branch is 30 miles away, gear real.”

Any ideas for what we can do?

Cheers,

Tom

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide:

I think supplying the landlords address is a legal requirement

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide:

not sure about the legalities of contacting directly and all that. However i believe a land registry check would tell you who owns it (whether you can track them from that is another matter).

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide:

"Giving the tenant certain information
Details of property agents
All landlords have to give their tenants their name and a UK contact address. If the property is managed by a letting or property agent, they must also provide you with the landlord's full name and address. Your landlord should also tell you what fees are charged by agents.

Any requests should be made in writing, you should also keep a copy of the letter and send it by recorded delivery, if you want proof of postage. If you don't get a reply in writing within 21 days of them receiving your letter, the landlord is committing a criminal offence.

Your next step could be to report your landlord to your local council's tenancy relations office, who can get involved in disputes between landlord and tenants and can even prosecute the person who does not provide this information.

You should also be able to get your landlord's details from the Land Registry. You can do this online by filling in a form and paying a small fee."

from

http://england.shelter.org.uk/get_advice/renting_and_leasehold/rights_and_r...

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide:

fairly obvious solution, and add a bit of logic to your somewhat muddled thinking.

firstly, a 60 mile round drip to drop off a fake letter to your LL (in which you make clear to your LL that his/her house isn't being taken care off, and that she/he is being ripped off by the LA), might cost you £8 in petrol.

how much has being f*cked about by the LA cost you, and how much will it cost you in future?

or, if don't want to invest that whole £8 in your living accomodation, you could wite a fake letter to your LL, post it to 'him/her' at your address, then put it into another evelope, write - or perhaps get someone who can write to do it for you - the Letting Agents address on the second envelope. then, and pay attention, because is the tricky bit: walk into your local village/town centre, where your carer will see a red, metal thing called a 'post box'. your carer may let you put the letter in the post box, and then you can go and have an ice cream.

the letting agent will get the 'fake letter', send it onto your LL in good faith (probably, but letting agents are odious, idle fcuks) and your LL will soon disvover that your LA is crap, and with luck sack them.

In reply to ballsac:

Your post is quite unnecessarily rude and infantile. The OP has already stated that the letting agent seems unreliable. Maybe your thinking is muddled, as you are assuming that the agent can be relied upon to forward some mail.

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide:

The landlords name and address will be on the contract you signed.

(unless you are subletting from reeds rain, in which case they are your 'landlord')

Good luck.

In reply to Blue Straggler:

Would be worth a go, though.

If you found they'd opened the post and not simply forwarded it, that'd be another piece of evidence to their detriment.

Neil

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide: Stop paying them for poor service, they usually get the message then in my experience. Nothing like a bit of with held rent to ensure swift polite service, they will not do anything unless not doing it will explicitly cost them. But you need decent ground to stand on if your gonna do this, we called the council and they said that various things were dangerous, like when the window fell out and smashed over the front door.

In reply to Blue Straggler:



Take the infantile jesting with a pinch of salt and actually it was quite good advice.

I'd do that, plus I'd write a letter to the MD of Reeds Rains, asking for everything that by law you are entitled to.

Also, if anyone EVER missed an appointment, I'd invoice the letting agent for wasting my time at £40 a hour. Yes it is reasonable to be in so maintentance can take place, but not reasonable to not turn up.

In reply to ballsac:

You're making the assumption that the letting agent will actually forward mail to the landlord.

They may be so incompetent/deliberately obstructive that they won't even do this...

In reply to Tom Ripley Mountain Guide: Why not post a letter stating the above to your landlord, with your address on the front to Reed Rains. Provide your contact details and hope the landlord contacts you.

Agree about Reed Rains. They were a nightmare for us too.

Good luck!

In reply to EeeByGum:

There is always a possibility that the landlord actually doesn't give a monkey's as long as he gets his rent.

Time to find somewhere else via another agent, I'd think. The ability to do that at the first sign of hassle is an advantage of renting.

Neil

You need to look at your tenancy agreement.

It is a legal requirement for your landlord's details for be provided to you (otherwise how can they enforce a tenancy agreement with you!).

You also need to ascertain whether your letting agent was acting only as agent for the landlord to introduce you as tenant to the landlord, or whether they are also managing the property. This will determine who your first port of call is.

Secondly, you need to do things in writing. If this gets worse you are going to need a paper trail and a copy of a dated letter setting out the facts is the best thing (or email conversations providing they reply and acknowledge receipt). If not, then at least keep very clear detailed diaries of what you have done and are doing.

Only when you have built up a paper trail should you think about withholding rent. If you cease to pay then they will probably have given themselves a right in the tenancy agreement to commence possession proceedings in court within 30 days of your arrears. As you probably pay a month in advance, this will be 30 days after your first payment doesn't go through. At that point the letting agent (if they are managing the property) will need to inform the landlord in any case and you may find that things start changing pretty swiftly after that.

There is lots of advice online about how to deal with these situations but the most important thing is to read your tenancy agreement and keep a paper trail. It is amazing how often I've been asked about things like this and the answer is written quite clearly in the paperwork already!

In reply to ebygomm:

I'll second that, it is a legal requirement. Point this out to the Letting Agent, and threaten to involve the Property Ombudsman if they fail to comply. I had to involve the Ombudsman in my dispute with Martin & Co, and he awarded me compensation against them for being "unsatisfactory, unprofessional and confused!"