I rented out my house just over 5 months ago to a Tenant who actually begged me to rent to her since her family lives on same street. I agreed on compassionate grounds since she was a single mother with 3 children. Got her to pay deposit after she and her guarantor failed credit check. […]

Every summer I have to sort out the new names and contact details for my 120 plus students in all my HMO properties for the Gas, Water and Electric. Council tax is pretty easy as the University send these across to the council automatically. The process I go through is checking who the utility provider […]

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), partially taken over from the FSA, is to collect the personal information from mortgage applications for use by its policy risk and research division to monitor the lending of banks. This raises serious Data Protection act questions and we are also asked to trust another body Phoenixed out of the […]

My house is rented to students and is managed by a letting agent. Now as we know, students are generally excepted from Council Tax. However, neither my tenants nor my managing agents appear to have informed the council. I have now received a summons. Please let me know what I should do in this situation. Thanks in […]

What is the minimum amount of Landlords Life Insurance we really ought to purchase? I suspect the reason most property investors choose not to purchase Landlords Life Insurance is cost. For example, if you are 40+ years of age and your buy to let mortgages balances are £1 million plus the premiums can appear to be very […]

This week is SAFEagent awareness week. Property118 has supported SAFEagent since its inception just two years ago. The concept is very simple, a Letting Agent displaying a current SAFEagent badge has purchased client money protection and is also a member of one of the 5 best recognised professional bodies in the UK Letting Industry. What this means […]

Christine Price of Chelmsford I am a Landlord and currently let out a 10th floor studio flat in Salford, a 2 bedroom ground floor flat in Hull and a 2 bedroom ground floor flat in Bletchley (Milton Keynes), using letting agents local for the properties. The studio flat is fully furnished in a block with […]

40% of landlords visiting Property118 use Firefox as their favourite browser according to our analytics. I was quite surprised at this as I’m a massive fan of Google Chrome but only 9.9% of our visitors seem to agree. In second place was Internet Explorer and to be honest I thought that would come up number […]

The ratio of deposit disputes in England & Wales is just over one per cent according to official figures released by the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG). The Government figures show that of the Seven million (7,052,255) deposits that have been protected since the launch of the legislation in 2007, only 91,802 have […]

Rowena Turner of Didcot I rent out a two bed property and a 4 bed HMO in Didcot to young professionals. The four bed should be available from July 2013. I aim as a landlord to provide a good service for my tenants so that they stay for a long period- a win win situation! […]

Laurence Kaye of Radlett I am a Landlord and support The Good Landlords campaign

Scottish Conservative Housing Spokesman Alex Johnstone and the Scottish Association of Landlords have slammed the language employed by housing charity Shelter in its latest press release which called for letting agents to be regulated. Commenting, Mr Johnstone said “It is ironic that Shelter uses terms such as ‘Wild West’, ‘cowboys’ and ‘flagrant disregard for the […]

Part 2 of 2 written by Bill Loryman The first reactions from Property Investors hearing about Capital Allowances are that they sound too good to be true and that,”surely my Accountant has identified them for me?” Well, firstly they have been around since 1878 and are not a tax loop-hole or tax avoidance scheme. If […]

Cambridge University, as Principal Developer of its £1 billion mixed-use scheme at North West Cambridge, is seeking residential developers in this opportunity to work collaboratively to create an urban extension befitting the city. Setting new standards of quality and sustainability, the North West Cambridge development will be the first development at this scale in the […]

Part 1 of 2 written by Bill Loryman HMRC calculates that over 90% of properties have not claimed against their Capital Allowances. Recent changes by HMRC still mean that Capital Allowances can be claimed against the Plant and Machinery (such as fixture and fittings) or assets within the ‘non-dwelling areas’ of your property. These can […]

Michael Carolan of Huddersfield I have been a landlord for 14 years, and my portfolio consists of one 4 bed house, four 3 bed houses and five 2 bed houses situated in the Halifax & Huddersfield areas. I also have a 5 bed holiday let in the west of Ireland in a semi rural setting, […]

A new immigration bill that includes landlords responsibilities to check the status of tenants rights to reside or face large fines was announced today in the Queens speech. “My government will bring forward a bill that further reforms Britain’s immigration system. The bill will ensure that this country attracts people who will contribute and deters […]

Landlords in Scotland are urged to beat the deposit deadline and avoid huge penalties. Over half of deposits for private tenancies in Scotland may not yet have been paid into a legally required tenancy deposit protection scheme – with just one week to go until the final deadline to sign up. SafeDeposits Scotland, the leading […]

Auction House Birmingham and Black Country are pleased to announce that their property auction catalogue for their next auction on 6th of June 2013 is now available for download. The venue is Banks’s stadium, Walsall Football Club, Bescot Crescent, Walsall, WS1 4SA Start time 6 pm (18:00 hours)

The HMRC property sales campaign has recently been launched to encourage taxpayers who have not already done so to tell them about the sale of, or disposal of, properties that are not their main homes either in the UK or abroad, and have failed to declare any profits on which Capital Gains Tax should be […]

I was a tenant at a property that I recently left. A few issues have come up and I would appreciate any advice people care to give. The Notice: The landlord knew I would be going as I had let him know before X’mas 2012. The rent for the property is paid up and all […]