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How To Tell If Your Letting Agent Is An Expert

Posted on by prateek

General Manager Toby Martin breaks down exactly how to tell if your letting agent knows their onions.

If your boiler broke down, what would you do? The chances are you would find a Gas Safe plumber to fix it for you – someone suitably qualified, who you can trust to carry out a quality job.

You would be highly unlikely to approach someone with no background in plumbing or boilers – the local greengrocer, perhaps. Why? Because if they get it wrong, it could cause a lot of damage.

With over 150 different pieces of legislation to comply with over the course of a tenancy, being a landlord is no different. If you get it wrong, it can cost you dearly.

Why is it then that so many landlords place their valuable investments in the hands of unqualified and unregulated letting agents?

Consider this – on any given day, anyone can wake up, get out of bed and decide to open a lettings agency. Within hours, they can have a Rightmove page and a glossy website boasting unsubstantiated claims about their service levels. In an unregulated sector, anyone can become a self-appointed expert overnight, even if they have no real knowledge of the industry.

So to all of the landlords reading this, my question is: how do you know you’re hiring the expert, and not the greengrocer?

This is where ARLA Propertymark come in. Whenever you see this logo (right), you know you’re dealing with an agency that has chosen to be regulated, chosen to undertake industry qualifications, and has made a commitment to stay up to date with new legislation through ongoing CPD and training. In other words, you’re dealing with an expert.

With landlord regulation at an all-time high, and strict punitive measures awaiting those who do not comply, the risks of using an unregulated agency are too great.

You’re in safe hands with a regulated and qualified agency.

Reside is an award-winning independent letting agent in Bath. Please get in touch if you would like to discuss any aspect of letting or managing your property; we would love to hear from you.

How Many Legal Obligations Do Landlords Have?

Posted on by prateek

Do you know how many different laws a landlord must comply with?

A recent study by the Residential Landlords Association has revealed the number of different laws that create an obligation on landlords in the private rental sector.

Back in 2010, this figure stood at 118, but has since shot up by a staggering 32% to 156.

With many regulations carrying financial or even criminal penalties if a landlord is found to be in breach of them, this is a stark reminder of how difficult it can be for private landlords to keep up with a sector that is becoming increasingly regulated.

With this in mind, it is perhaps unsurprising that Lord Best’s Regulation of Property Agents working group recommended to the government the wholesale regulation of all lettings agents. These measures, which are expected to be implemented in the next couple of years, would require all staff – from the director to the apprentice – to obtain industry qualifications, and for the company to belong to a regulatory body.

At a time when anybody, regardless of their experience or knowledge, can decide to open a lettings agency, thorough regulation seems sensible.

With 156 separate laws to comply with, tenancy management requires in-depth and up to date industry expertise.

Reside already chooses to be regulated through our membership of ARLA Propertymark, the industry’s main regulatory body, and a quarter of our staff are ARLA-qualified. Our clients can be confident in the knowledge that their tenancies are fully compliant, and in safe hands.

Why it pays to choose a licensed Letting Agent

Posted on by prateek

We’re proud to be a member of several organisations which represent the property lettings and management industry, including the Association of Residential Letting Agents (ARLA), Safeagent and The Property Redress Scheme.

Surprisingly, there is currently no mandatory regulation of letting and property management agents in the UK, although this is currently under scrutiny by the Regulation of Property Agents Working Group (RoPA), who have recommended to the government that all residential property agents should be regulated and licensed.

Although not currently compulsory, we choose to be licensed because it’s a great way to keep up with changes to rules and regulations affecting our ever-changing industry. As membership of ARLA requires industry-specific qualifications, it also means that we access regular training and development courses to improve our knowledge.

But more importantly it has big benefits for our clients, and that is why we believe you should always choose a licensed agent. For example, ARLA has a strict code of practice which its licensed agents must follow.

ARLA provides us with expert legal advice if needed. Whenever we’ve had to call on this service in the past, it has helped our clients to fairly and legally resolve their concerns.

Being licensed by ARLA means our clients know that we comply with its professional standards. You can be confident that we take the business of managing your property seriously and will work to a professional, principled and honest agenda.

We are big believers that licensing should be mandatory for all agents, but it is currently not. With the results of the RoPA report appearing to receive cross-party support, it seems to be only a matter of time before all agents will be subject to the standards to which we at Reside already subscribe. Using a licensed agent such as Reside not only protects landlords against the issues of today, but also from the changes that our coming to the industry soon.

If you would like to let your property quickly, professionally and cost-effectively, please don’t hesitate to contact us – we’d love to help you.