How to rent my property out?

As its your first time letting, I woudl use a letting agent. Dont forget to let your mortgage company know if you have a mortgage and your current insurer as both will likely have special conditions.

Here are some tips in no particular order.
Opt for full property management to reduce hassle. For this you need a good rental agent not a estate agent who dabbles. When your agent says he “has no idea what the detail is and what this means in practice” concerning a licensing scheme this should be a warning bell. It’s his job to know and advise you, not the other way round.
Don’t be tempted to rent out to friends, friends of friends or relatives always check references and seek guarantors and don’t be best buddies with tenants, keep your relationship a business one in case you do have to evict them at some point. A good agent can insulate you from tenants.
White goods supplied to tenants seem to have brutal short lives so don’t be tempted to provide them. If you are stuck with white goods sell or gift them to the tenants so they are no longer your property. I always provide a cooker but I know other landlords who don’t. I think this is a grey area.
While not really white goods avoid supplying electric showers they always pack up and the switches fail. It might have worked fine while you lived there but the tenants will soon put a stop to that. Also avoid thermostatic shower mixers.
You will be amazed at what things tenants can break. Mine seem to specialise in door knobs, handles latches and locks with a side-line in kitchen cupboard doors that fall off.
Remember that gas checks can unearth boiler problems that might have gone unnoticed before so you will go through boilers quicker than you might think.
Don’t rely on being able to get your house back quickly if you want to move back in or sell as you will probably have to go to court and delays of over a year are common unless your tenants are open to being bribed to leave.
Review the rent on a regular basis.
Check your EPC rating to get an idea of what you might have to spend upgrading to a C in around 2027 ready for 2028.

Reply to the comment left by northern landlord at 26/04/2023 - 15:33
I agree with all that except that because the cost of fitting an electric shower is not prohibitive I provide one (fitted by a qualified plumber/electrician). But I would add make sure that your agent provides a thorough inventory check with photos and that the tenant signs it. Tenants do indeed break lots of things. In my experience children do more damage than pets do.

thank you for everyones comments and feedback. A lot to read

The stairs are an issue for me getting up them not an issue in themselves (not sure who replied about that).

I have contacted 3 Agents now and waiting to see what they say when they come round. The issue with licencing (thank you for the link someone) is that there is no other detail. Not sure what the licence is for exactly and what I will need to do once I get it. There is no detail about anything. What I have found out is that Birmingham council were given the authority to introduce licencing by application to the Sec of State and they used the reason as 1. area of deprivation 2 crime rates. How is me paying a licence going to address that? I think they are supposed to visit your house to during the 5 years. One friend who rented a long time ago I admit said that if the tenant says no entry then even an agent cant go in so how can the council? What would they be looking for anyway?

I will have to be led by the agent on this it seems. The problem is finding one that is any good - when you dont really know what service you get till you sign up it is difficult. Another post I read today is about bad agents. what do do for the best? Do they look at the 29 areas in the HRSS before they take it on their books? I will look at the Ihowz info link.

Thanks again all. I will keep looking at this site as everyone seems very keen on doing the right thing her but I see it is far more involved that I first thought. gone are the days it seems when people rented a house and respected it or maybe just me and my age. ha ha

its over regulated, the governemt have made it all in favour of the tenant, stress stress and more stress, they have removed tax perks and are about to remove no fault evictions, so let them in and its real hard (and costly) to get them out. I would advise dont bother. i inherited a house and thought i would do a good thing in letting a dated (but solid) house out, fairly cheap. i wish i had never bothered. now selling

Hi Peter,
I hope that you have considered tax.
As you have stated that you are having difficulty with stairs, I am going to assume that you are probably old enough to own your house outright. Again, assuming that you have lived there since you bought it, you can sell it today and pay no Capital Gains Tax (CGT) if it has always been your Principal Private Residence (PPR). However, the moment you rent the property out, CGT becomes due on any increase in value. After a relatively small number of years you might still 'own' the property, but if you were to decide to sell it to move into a similarly valued bungalow, you may no longer be able to afford that bungalow as you would have to pay CGT at the point of sale of your current property.
Also you ought to consider the implications of owning a rental property if you ever need long term care. If you own a rental property you would likely get zero assistance from the Local Authority to help with personal care. Although this is also true if you had the money in the bank, at least you would have access to the money as and when you need it. If your money is tied up in a rental property you can be left in the awkward position of not having enough funds on a monthly basis to help with care, but having too much equity to get any financial assistance.
Sorry if I sound like a 'negative Norman' here, but if you are new to the idea of being a landlord, these are bear traps that you might want to consider.

Peter, let me give you one piece of advice to save you a lot of stress and financial cost – insist on home-owning guarantors for all your tenants, or a very good insurance policy. It will reduce your applicants as you will find a number of applicants can’t provide a guarantor, however the fact is that if you get a bad tenant, (which we all have had over our careers ) it will cost you £1,000s and It’s extremely unlikely you will recover any of that money