ARLA asks government to reconsider regulation following census data

Not more regulation! The business has suffered enough in recent years with certification, deposit protection needs etc. What is needed is better Landlord Protection for professional “moonlight flitters” and debtors and the criminalising of these clearly fraudulent activities by tenants. We need if anything a National Scheme for government to vet tenants who must prove identity and financial honesty before they can even view a To Let property.

I agree that none payment of rent or trashing a property should be treated as criminal and not civil offences.

A National vetting scheme will NEVER happen.
Where would all the wrongun tenants go that a National vetting scheme identifies?
There would be hundreds of thousands of them and the govt would have to house them, where as no LL would take them on!
It is in govt interest to allow LL to continue to suffer the burdens of wrongun tenant and it will NEVER change.

If government will not do it then it’s up to us – watch this space!

Yep I appreciate your efforts and future ones to attempt to assist the LL market in all it’s guises.
We LL sure need all the help we can get as nobody else will bother.
You do quite well in that respect as it is; the more you can do the better for us poor old downtrodden LL!!
I tell you that is what it feels like sometimes!

Agreed!! too many get away with intentional non-payments and damage etc, landlords left to pick up the pieces almost all the time

Why would i as a landlord need to hold client money protection insurance??? The only money i hold that belongs to the tenant is protected by a government scheme already. Any other money given to me by the tenant is the rent – which is mine. So under what circumstances would i need to hold the CMP?
Michelle

Fair point, you wouldn’t. Bad wording on my part when I said “A good starting point in my opinion would be to compel the major property portals to enforce full disclosure of all fees charged. I also support of it becoming mandatory for all landlords and agents to hold Client Money Protection insurance……” I will change my quote now but in fairness I think it’s only right that I should acknowledge my error, otherwise it makes your comment look a bit strange.

I predict that within 2 years Letting Agents will be
regulated. There is no need to increase
the overheads of Letting Agents by forcing them to join an organisation they
should be licensed through a national
licensing scheme at a nominal cost and the conditions of the licence would deal
with all of the issues – not just client money protection which is very
important but not the only issue to be dealt with.

A code of conduct would need to cover

·
A written contract between the Agent and the
Landlord where there are clear agreements about who does what and how much it
will cost, how the contract can be terminated by each party, when rent will be
passed on, frequency of inspections, deposit protection, deposit disputes,
service of legal notices etc

·
Limit of spending on urgent repairs/replacements

·
An obligation to disclose a full fee structure
including fees to both landlord and tenant. Ongoing costs for renewals, termination
of contract, ending of tenancy etc

·
Full disclosure of commissions gained on all
services ie EPCs, Gas Safety Inspection, Inventories etc

·
Rules for dealing with documents, ensuring that
the landlord and tenant are given the documents that the law requires

·
Rules about respecting a tenants right to quiet
enjoyment of the property and giving correct written notice, how keys will be
held, by whom and the procedure for giving them to a third party to carry out
agreed work etc

·
How to deal with their legal obligation to
disclose the landlords address for service of legal Notices when a tenant makes
a request

·
What can and cannot be included in the Terms of
a Tenancy Agreement

·
Documents required to deal with different types
of Tenancies/occupations

There should be a dispute resolution procedure beginning
with an in-house complaints procedure and going on to independent arbitration
which should be paid for by the party that is found at fault.

In my opinion it will not be long before Shelter win and
Letting Agents are no longer allowed to charge tenants for anything other than
deposit and the first months rent. Unlike Scotland we haven’t the legislation
in place in England and Wales but I believe that Government will be forced to
bring in new legislation or tweak existing legislation to make this happen. I
believe that when this happens landlords too will be prevented from charging
fees to tenants.

Many Letting Agents will not survive these changes, because
of the enormous overheads they are carrying, and the good ones who do survive
will need to move off the High Street to reduced their cost or become online
letting agents only. There is no need for Agents who offer a fully managed
service to be on the High Street these days because the footfall aspect of
their business reduces constantly and they can still do a good job without a “fancy”
office but they will need to improve their customer service and invest in staff
who are strong on dealing with maintenance issues and ongoing tenancy problems.

2013 is going to be a very interesting year for the PRS and
this time next year we will be looking at a very different landscape. In my
humble opinion of course!

Follow me on Twitter@landlordtweets

Your humble opinion will I believe turn out to be correct and your other things about LA will also come to pass.

LA for too long have been ripping LL and tenants off alike for a very poor service.

The majority of LL can perfectly well manage things themselves.
High St LA will be going the way of IFA’s, disappearing!!
Their charging structures will not work.
The internet has been a great leveller and I believe online LA who have a presence throughout the country will occur.
You will have these people working from home as self-employed by the on-line LA to get national coverage, but without all the high st expense.
If I was a LL of a high st LA or estate agent, I would be worried.
LL who self manage don’t incur any real cost for their business.
Everything is FREE of the net.
Yes ok you have to do some admin and have printer ink and paper
The check in and out day is the only thing that will cost the LL; his time.
No LL needs to keep renewing AST’s; they will just proceed onto SPT’s.
Doing things yourself as a LL is massively cheaper than using a normal LA.
They have basically priced themselves out of a job, more fool them.
It would be great to see the likes of the big F—— with egg all over their face finally punished, where it hurts for all their greed, in the bank balance!!