Posts tagged ‘Landlord’
Sell my home blog: When selling turns to renting in a landlord’s market
This is a legacy post from the findaproperty.com blog which is now maintained as an archive within the Zoopla blog. Links have been preserved.
After reading the diary of a first-time buyer and sympathising with her on so many issues, it’s sad to think we also might be staying put till the spring.
We’ve at least finished the decorating and the flat is looking very show home and fabulous. I have to recommend painting your wooden floors light grey – although only in small spaces that have no windows. We’ve also been able to hang the pictures that have been collecting dust about the place for years.
With all the work finished our plan is now to get as many estate agents as we can over to value the property from a sales and a rental perspective. After a little research on the rental side of the fence, we’ve realised that we may be able to rent a home that’s much bigger with the rent we will be getting from our current flat. Rental values close to tubes are huge so moving a little further into suburbia may let us upscale but without all the costs.
This is quite a departure from our original plan, but mortgages are still working on the three times your salary rule so even though we have a big deposit we can’t borrow the amount of money we’d like to. Apparently their underwriters might consider it but the lady at the bank sounded very suspicious.
Everything now depends on the estate agents’ valuation so I will be baking bread and sweeping leaves from the street on a daily basis. They are coming soon and so after that we will know more of what the future will hold.
£4.75m to be Damien Hirst’s landlord, anyone?
This is a legacy post from the findaproperty.com blog which is now maintained as an archive within the Zoopla blog. Links have been preserved.
If a mud-strewn houseboat mooring could ever be described as glamorous, then the patch of Thames embankment put on the market this week for £4.75m comes pretty near. ‘Dragon’ Simon Woodroffe and pop artist Damien Hirst call it home and previous residents have included actors Sir Laurence Olivier and Nigel Planer and musician Nick Cave.
These starry residential moorings are opposite Chelsea‘s Cheyne Walk – which itself has been home to celebrities such as Keith Richards and Mick Jagger – and comes with a a boatyard and work shop, offices, a car park and one of the most lucrative advertising hoardings in London (which can bring in a million on its own, it is claimed).
Do you fancy a slice of this? The iconic Chelsea Yacht and Boat Company residential houseboat moorings are on the open market for the first time
In general houseboat moorings on the Thames offer a bohemian atmosphere, sometimes bordering on the hippy but this one is the most famous, glamorous and from a practical point of view, safest.
But who would want to become the landlord here for £4.75m? The main attraction is that it’s a potential money marker. As one of the most prime locations in London, this is a unique opportunity and revenue streams include lease renewals and standing charges, the advertising hoardings, houseboat repair and maintenance work and the opportunity to rent out the site as a film and TV shoot locations.
These houseboats suggest an easy existence living the louche lifestyle but it’s not just the ‘arty’ types but a growing number of wealthy professionals, entrepreneurs, doctors, architects and writers moving in. It’s easy to see the attraction as these floating homes have changed dramatically over the past twenty years from basic tubs to floating luxury pads costing as much as £300,000.
They’ve come a long way: The view towards Battersea Power Station in the 1950s
If you’re interested in buying a residential boat there are a number of costs involved including mooring fees – at Cheyne Walk this can cost approximately £1000 a month; the annual car-parking fee, the insurance and a mooring license (which can be difficult to come by in London-you can pay £20,000-£50,000 every ten years). Then there’s also the cost of maintaining your floating home – the boats have to be dry docked every decade and the hull cleaned and resealed.
Is ID fraud another reason to hate your flatmates?
This is a legacy post from the findaproperty.com blog which is now maintained as an archive within the Zoopla blog. Links have been preserved.
They steal your milk, eat your chocolate stash and leave their stuff all over the living room floor. Now, it turns out, your flatmate might be doing more damage than you thought.
Young people, particularly those in shared rented homes, are more than twice as likely as the rest of us to fall victim to identity fraud, according to some disturbing research that crossed FindaProperty’s desk recently.
And a quarter of identity fraud victims suspect it’s their flatmates or lodgers who are responsible for stealing their personal details.
The survey of more than 5,000 victims of identity fraud was conducted by Experian’s ProtectMyID, which offers insurance and support against ID fraud.
“Flat sharing and rental is fast becoming the best option for millions of Brits unable to provide the necessary deposits to make their first step up the property ladder,” says ProtectMyID’s Peter Turner. “In the majority of cases this is a great option to meet new people and experience living away from home for the first time.”
But as one of the fastest growing groups targeted by both professional and amateur fraudsters, flat sharers who live in rented accommodation need to be more vigilant to the dangers and effects of ID theft.
“By sharing your home, flatmate fraudsters have all the access they need to a vast amounts of your personal information in the way of post, personal documents and photos,” Turner warns.
He says there are a number of simple ways flatmates can rent a room without opening themselves up to ID fraud.
- Don’t publicise where your personal banking statements are kept in your room
- Make sure unused credit cards and cheque books are well hidden or locked away
- Keep PINS and passwords private – memorise security information rather than writing it down
- Don’t leave unopened mail lying around the house
- Delete your cookies and history when using a communal or personal computer
Great British Workmen
This morning, I got woken up, not by the familiar sound of my alarm, but by a series of thumps on my front door. Not knocks: thumps.
By the time I’d recovered from leaping out of bed at high speed, scrambled for my dressing gown, and stumbled down the stairs, two workmen were emerging through the door.
Fortunately – otherwise I’d have zoomed back upstairs and been onto the police pronto – I remembered that the meter was due to be checked, and the landlords had given out the spare keys.
That, I’d presumed, was because the meter people would be coming when I was out at work – but this was 8.15 in the morning, for god’s sake.
Anyway, all was fine, no police time was wasted, and I headed back upstairs to get ready.
About twenty minutes later – it seems meter checking is a long process – one of them hollered up to ask if he could use the bathroom facilities.
Our bathroom is next to our bedroom. We have thin walls. Cue an immense amount of whistling, humming and banging on my part in a desperate attempt to avoid hearing any untoward noises.
Shortly afterwards they bade a cheery goodbye, leaving me to continue my morning routine uninterrupted.
Or so I thought. Just before heading out, I went into the bathroom to check on the position of the toilet seat – men, y’know – and found a farewell token.
Mercifully, it was of the liquid variety, and he’d obviously been embarrassed that it hadn’t flushed away – there was toilet paper and the lid was down.
But honestly – rude awakenings and lasting impressions – and there was nothing wrong with the bloody meter in the first place.
Have you had any unfortunate experiences with workmen?
We’d like to hear your horror stories…
Straight ‘A’ Landlords
As of today, Energy Performance Certificates become mandatory for all new tenancies, and landlords will face charges of up to £200 per property if they don’t provide them.
The certificates, which will be valid for a period of ten years, must be issued by an accredited energy assessor, and provided free of charge to tenants.
EPCs rate a property’s energy efficiency using an A-G system of grading, with an ‘A’ rating being an all-singing, all-dancing top score and a ‘G’ being the equivalent of a ‘see me after class’ scrawled in red ink.
The certificates were introduced last year for homebuyers, and so far, the average rating has been a ‘could do better’ ‘D’.
While recommendations to improve a property’s efficiency rating are given as part of the EPC, landlords are under no obligation to carry out any improvements.
However, if tenants are faced with a choice of properties with different ratings, it seems likely that they’d opt for the more energy efficient one, as their fuel bills would be lower.
We’d be interested to know what you think about EPCs:
| Tenants: |
| [poll id="4"] |
| Landlords: |
| [poll id="5"] |
| [poll id="6"] |
