BEAT THE RENTERS RIGHTS BILL - Tips & Tricks

hi I'm Elena from the online netting agents and I'm here today to talk to you about how to beat the renters rights Bill bottom line is you cannot beat the renters rights bill it is coming in whether we like it or not but there are some thoughts I have on how you can reduce some of the potential risks that are coming your way just to clarify I'm recording this on the 7th of March the bill hasn't yet come in and there might be some final tweaks that would potentially affect my advice and my thoughts once

we do know all of those final details if you haven't already done so watch my video on the wrenches Rights bill in the general overview that will give you a good idea about what's coming in what you need to be thinking about and that will help you understand what I'm going to be talking to you about now to start with tency agreements they all be going to become periodic so you need to make sure to get yourself in the best legal position that your contract says that it will become contractual periodic if you look at

your tency agreement it should say that at the end of the fixed term it becomes either contractual periodic or statutory periodic if it says nothing at all it becomes statutory periodic for lots of boring reasons that I won't go into now contractual periodic is best it puts you in a much stronger legal position once the uh tency is periodic so double check your contract if it doesn't say it goes contractual periodic speak with your agents about how they can make sure your tency agreement becomes contractual periodic the next one tenants being able to serve 2

months notice because they're going to be periodic notice periods are changing for tenants two months notice from a tenant they can serve notice as soon as the tency starts meaning in theory and a lot of landlords worry that they're going to end up with two-month rolling tencies tenant moves in so no leaves tenant moves in so leaves you can stop that or pot or reduce the chances of that a few ways firstly make it more difficult for a tenant to move in if you've got a furnished property and your tenant just needs to bring a

suitcase it makes it far easier for them to decide that the property isn't working out for them pack up their suitcase and go that's not going to be easy for everybody some lets really demand Furnishing student lets um sharers will require Furnishings but if you haven't got that sort of setup consider removing the furniture and just making it a little bit more of a considered decision for a tenant if they do decide to leave another thing is do a pre-tenancy snag list so go in say a month before the the current tenant is due to

leave or before the new tency is is due to start if you haven't got tenants in there already and do a snagging checklist make sure your extractor fans work make sure all the bulbs are working get a pre-tenancy clean to make sure it's SP and spam before they move in all the door handles are working the toilet seats aren't loose all of those silly little snagging issues that you get when a tenant moves in that can cause so much upset at the beginning of a tenancy and of course cause a tenant to think I'm going

to leave and serve their notice just deal with that from the get-go and and uh have that pre- snagging done and make sure that a tenant is less likely to want to leave as soon as they move in another thought is to um let the tenant make the property their own so this is a difficult one and I know a lot of landlords don't like tenants to redecorate and understandably so but if a tenant has moved in and they've spent time and effort redecorating the kids' bedrooms or making the living room look lovely and cozy

they're much less likely to want to leave quickly so consider letting them make it their own so that they have a home that they are committed to staying in they're far less likely to serve notice straight away and of course this all comes down to having a good relationship with your tenants having an open dialogue with them and dealing with any issu really before before they start now another um another issue which is difficult to deal with is it's going to be more difficult for a landlord to serve notice on tenants you're going to have

to serve four months notice in most cases and it's very limited on the reasons why you can serve notice so again keep that open dialogue with your tenants so that it's less likely that you will want or need to serve notice it's a really difficult one there's no real Silver Bullet to to deal with this if that relationship with the tenant breaks down and you feel like you do want to serve notice that you are getting to that point where it's a case of I'm just going to sell it I'm just going to get rid

and go consider Outsourcing your management to an agent I'm not saying go with us I'm saying get rid of that direct relationship between you and your tenants because that can take away a lot of the stress from you it takes away the personal element between you and your tenants and just having somebody in between who can mediate between the two of you will reduce your stress significantly and help that relationship and make it so that you don't need to just throw in the towel and serve them notice because let's face it that's going to be

difficult rent increases again they are a difficult one and there's no real suggestion I have for you unfortunately to to make that any easier what I can suggest is that you again keep that open dialogue with your tenants um also make sure you really evidenced to your tenants why you're increasing the rent and really just saying that your costs are increasing is isn't enough that you know the market needs to demand that there is a a rent increase due and and that you know Market rents have gone up and that they are sitting well below

that and that the rent increas is there just to bring them up to or somewhere near that um that higher rent that that you could get on the open market so really justify it to the tenants um and I think there's something else about considering who your tenants are and understanding them and figuring out the best way to approach them with a rent increase um some tenants might be better approached with more firm approach others maybe with a bit more understanding and perhaps a bit more negotiation um so really consider who your tenants are in

the best way to to approach them with a rent increase and again if you're not sure maybe think about looking into the use of an agent to help you with those sorts of elements of of the uh of the tency tenants right to keep a pet that's another one that landlords aren't very happy about so obviously tenants will be able to ask for a pet and you can't unreasonably refuse it there will be a change to the renters right uh to the uh tenant fees act 2019 currently you can't ask a tenant to take insurance

with the renters rights bill you will be able to ask the tenants to take insurance to cover their pet and damage you will also be able to take your own insurance or rather increase your current um landord insurance premium to include pet damage and charge them for that additional part of the premium my thoughts are that you would always want to take that insurance yourself that means you have control over that insurance policy that means if the um if the tenants do take the Insurance show you that they've got insurance and then cancel within the

14-day cooling off period um you know nothing like that can happen because it's within your control also if the tenants leave and you find pet damage at that point it's within your control to claim on that on that insurance policy because you can charge the tenant the cost of the um additional amount on your insurance look for policies that have as close to zero excess as possible for pet damage in theory you would be able to recover the cost of that um that excess from the tenant's deposit I should I should imagine but that means

potentially a fight later on and given that you can charge the tenants the cost of of that extra on your insurance premium it doesn't necessarily matter whether it's £1 excess on that premium with a £250 excess or £150 or2 200 extra on your premium to have n zero excess go for the more expensive policy with the lower lowest excess that you can get um and that way that will minimize your losses there um discriminating against tenants who are in receipt of benefits or who have children again landlords are a little bit upset about this one

they obviously want understandably to have control over who they have in their properties and this um this part of the rent of Rights bill isn't to take away your your right to decide who is the right tenant for you but it's something we recommend already consider everybody on their own merits just because somebody's on benefits it doesn't mean that they're not a perfect tenant for you that they won't treat the house as their home and take absolute pride in its presentation and maintain it really really well consider everybody on their own merits and take rent

guarantee insurance if you're not sure as long as that tenant passes the reference checks take rent guarantee insurance that minimizes your your risks rent guarantee insurance is also tax deductible so that's an instant discount for you right there um so so really consider everybody on their on their own merits so there will be an end to rental bidding what this means for landlords is that they won't be able to accept rents over the asking price now there are a couple of solutions for this firstly why not think about advertising at the higher end of EV

valuation or maybe even just above that and then accepting offers that come in under that asking price so if I were to value your property somewhere between 1100 and 1,200 we would Market it at 12200 maybe even 1250 maybe with a banner that says that we're accepting offers and that way you can be guaranteed that you won't end up advertising at 1100 receiving offers over that you then can't accept another suggestion would be to again start high on your advertising price so start at the 1200 1250 price point and then keep in close contact with

your agent about how many clicks that advert is getting how many inquiries what sort of interest and your agent should then be able to advise you on what you need to do in terms of reduction to start getting interest flowing through now that can have benefits with your marketing when you first go live you'll have experienced a flurry of inquiries it's new on right move lots of people are seeing it they're getting an email into their inbox you get lots of inquiries if you reduce your price by 2% or more you go back up to

the top of the search results right move and your your property also gets emailed out to everybody on their subscriber list so it sort of gives you that extra bite of the Cherry of being newly listed it does show as being reduced but it means that you can just slowly drop your price down and each time if you do it by 2% or more you pushed back up to the top of right move and you appear fresher on the market because you're back up at the top of the search results and that way you can

just incrementally reduce your price until you hit that sweet spot where tenants start inquiring and again that way you know that when you get an offer through it's at the right price and that you weren't going to get more and that that will always be a pipe dream you weren't going to get more and that you've got the right price for your property uh rent in advance so you won't be able to take lumpsum rent in advance anymore um that's obviously tricky for overseas students or people who just can't pass the references on their own

merits but have a big lump sum in the bank and can pay six or 12 months rent up front in those cases maybe consider there are there are companies um refer to as rent guarantors who um essentially will guarantee the rent it's like rent guarantee insurance but it's something that the tenant pays for typically it costs them about a month's rent um but it guarantees the rent for you um so effectively it's like them taking a policy that covers you so maybe take that as an alternative that's possibly a very good one for overseas students

who are to come over but don't have a UK guarantor available um next one is the decent home standard and awbs law this is where you will have a legal duty to uh keep your property in a good in a good um condition mainly this relates to things like um damp and mold so for this one my suggestion again it's it's a difficult one right we all know that um we've had issues with damping properties and often it can be caused by just tenants lifestyle maybe an older property single glazing um and tenants just not

perhaps doing certain things like opening Windows heating fully things like that um but again this comes down to keeping your property well maintained regular inspections to make sure that if you spot damp that maybe the tenant hasn't mentioned um that you keep on top of it don't don't rely on your tenants reporting it to you um share information with the tenants on how to rce redu damp there's lots of Guides Online there's one on our website about how to um reduce damp when it is lifestyle related check the extractor fans make sure that all of

your extractor fans are working before the tency starts at your at your six monthly or however frequently you do your inspections check all those extractor fans are working if they've only got a washing machine consider um installing a washer dryer or maybe even supplying them with a dehumidifier so that they can perhaps dry clothes in one closed room with a dehumidifier running um just to reduce the amount of damp that is is um traveling around around the property so those are my thoughts on the renters rights Bill and how you can potentially just reduce some

of those issues arising from it um as you might be able to tell I'm not the biggest fan of the renters rights bill it feels like it's a a pretty blunt tool but that perhaps what it's trying to get to is better relationships with tenants and better property standards and ultimately that can't be a bad thing if you've got any comments for me pop them below um if you enjoyed the video give us a like And subscribe um we'll also pop a link in there to our video on the rentes Rights bill with just a

general overview of the bill um to help you so take a good look at that um and I'll see you all again soon thanks [Music]