For any landlord, firstly making the decision to use a letting agent is enough of a difficult decision. Choosing which one to use can be even more so.

Whilst the type of services offered by agents tend to be the same, just how much experience each company has and how it organises its business can vary greatly.

Reputation and personal recommendation definitely count, but there are a few other things to consider when choosing.

First of all, don’t go on the market with more than one agent! Choose the best agent for you and if they’re not right because they won’t return your calls or they haven’t let your property in three or four months, then dis-instruct them and go back on the market with just one, new agent. This is really important as prospective tenants are more sophisticated nowadays and will either steer well clear of properties being marketed by two, three, four or even five different agents (we see this quite often) and they will often think there is some desperation on the part of the landlord and will offer reduced rents as a result!

You won’t let your property any quicker by having more than one agent; this is because all agents will pretty much use all the same websites for marketing your property. The only difference is how well the different agents use the sites and the quality of the marketing, which will vary greatly. It also matters greatly just how the agent deals with responses; whether they contact all enquiries and really get a good feel for the short list they come up with or whether they just let to the first person who comes along and hopes for the best.

If you’ve opted for a fully managed service, there are some big differences in cost ranging from 6% nil VAT from new start-up agents trying to get noticed and get market share, right up to 17.5% plus VAT often from franchised networks where they have to pay a % of revenue to Head Office. Most people tend to opt for a mid-range of 10% plus VAT which tends to be the norm. You don’t want to pay “over the odds” for an equal or better service you can get elsewhere for less. You want excellent, outstanding personal service for what most agents charge.

The actual set up fee or fee for just finding the tenant can also vary widely. These fees can range from £39 plus VAT as a fixed fee for just a tenant-find, right up to 75% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT. Again, the same rules apply about the quality. The norm in the industry is 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT.

Choosing a small professional team that work seven days a week and are expert in lettings is better than deciding purely on price where the people may not have the necessary skills or experience to do the job.

Find specialist letting agents to let your property rather than estate agents who might just simply see it as renting it out whilst its on the market to sell.

Choose a smaller independent company. You may receive your rent quicker when it’s a small local team paying you by Faster Payment, rather than a potentially cumbersome Head Office at the other end of the country sending out cheques by post once a month.

Make sure the letting agent has Client Money Protection (CMP) in place. You need to be aware that if the agent is holding the deposit and goes into administration for whatever reason, its still you, the landlord, who is liable to pay back the tenant’s deposit.

Finally, and probably the most important piece of advice when choosing a letting agent, is to choose the agent who you trust, and who you feel is the most willing and the most capable of putting things right with your property, should things ever go wrong, explain what could go wrong and what measures they have in place to prevent things going wrong in the first place.

Our most comprehensive service package is called “Fully Manage Plus”.

What we do

We’ll provide you with a free, no obligation valuation. We’ll advertise the property across all the main property websites. We’ll arrange viewings, accompany viewings and give feedback. We’ll carry out credit checks, employment and previous/current landlord references. We’ll arrange to meet your new tenants at the property and we’ll sign the tenancy agreement, conduct the video inventory and take meter readings. We can arrange an EPC, EICR or Landlord’s Gas Safety Certificate if you need them. We’ll protect the tenant’s deposit and pay you the first month’s rent, less our fees, the same day your new tenants move in. We’ll send you a rental statement either by first class post or by E-mail to your nominated E-mail address.

This package includes a rent guarantee insurance feature, subject to the final outcome of the tenant’s referencing.

We’ll collect the rent each month thereafter, deduct our professional fees together with any other agreed deductions, and send you the rental income by Faster Payment. We’ll provide your tenant with an Emergency number to call outside of office hours and if there are any maintenance issues we’ll investigate them and if required arrange free quotations by suitably qualified and experienced contractors. Once these costs have been agreed by you, we will oversee the work and then pay the contractor within seven days, deducting the agreed cost from your next rent payment.

We’ll write out to your tenant after they have been in the property three months to conduct a Client Service Visit. If there are any issues, we’ll report back to you. We will agree with you further regular visits to the property subject to our recommendation and our agreement. This is usually every three, six or twelve months depending on the property and the tenants.

We’ll also write to your tenants a month before the end of their tenancy to ascertain whether they wish to stay and renew the tenancy or leave and give notice. We’ll recommend any further tenancy duration based on their payment history and how well they have looked after the property and we’ll serve any required section Notices if you decide to want the property back or if you decide to increase the rent.

What it costs

There is an initial one-off set-up cost of 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT (and a minimum charge of £350 plus VAT or £420 including VAT). This covers the duration of the relationship with us.

Thereafter, we charge 12.5% of the monthly rental amount, plus VAT.

If your tenant wishes to renew the tenancy agreement at the end of their initial tenancy, we charge £125 plus VAT (£150 including VAT) to carry out a full annual tenancy review and to arrange either a new six or twelve month tenancy agreement. You’ll receive up to date valuations for sale or letting as well as Section 13 Rent Increase notice if a new fixed term tenancy agreement is not required.  If there’s a new fixed term agreement to be put in place we do that, too.

If your tenant wishes to leave and you’d like us to re-find you a new tenant, we charge 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT (and a minimum charge of £350 plus VAT or £420 including VAT).

What you’ll need

If it’s the first time you’ve let your property, you’ll need an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) and a landlord’s gas safety certificate if the property has gas. You’ll also need smoke alarms on each level and a CO alarm if there’s a gas boiler or wood burning stove in the room. If you don’t have any of these, we can arrange compliance for you.

In some of the areas we cover you may need a Selective licence from the local authority to let your property.  If this is the case we can advise you. Licences are often granted for five years.

What next?

Call us on 0333 772 0222 or E mail support@H2L.co.uk to arrange a free, no obligation, valuation of your property at a time to suit you.

Another of our comprehensive service packages is called “Fully Manage”.

What we do

We’ll provide you with a free, no obligation valuation. We’ll advertise the property across all the main property websites. We’ll arrange viewings, accompany viewings and give feedback. We’ll carry out credit checks, employment and previous/current landlord references. We’ll arrange to meet your new tenants at the property and we’ll sign the tenancy agreement, conduct the video inventory and take meter readings. We can arrange an EPC, EICR or Landlord’s Gas Safety Certificate if you need them. We’ll protect the tenant’s deposit and pay you the first month’s rent, less our fees, the same day your new tenants move in. We’ll send you a rental statement either by first class post or by E-mail to your nominated E-mail address.

We’ll collect the rent each month thereafter, deduct our professional fees together with any other agreed deductions, and send you the rental income by Faster Payment. We’ll provide your tenant with an Emergency number to call outside of office hours and if there are any maintenance issues we’ll investigate them and if required arrange free quotations by suitably qualified and experienced contractors. Once these costs have been agreed by you, we will oversee the work and then pay the contractor within seven days, deducting the agreed cost from your next rent payment.

We’ll write out to your tenant after they have been in the property three months to conduct a Client Service Visit. If there are any issues, we’ll report back to you. We will agree with you further regular visits to the property subject to our recommendation and our agreement. This is usually every three, six or twelve months depending on the property and the tenants.

We’ll also write to your tenants a month before the end of their tenancy to ascertain whether they wish to stay and renew the tenancy or leave and give notice. We’ll recommend any further tenancy duration based on their payment history and how well they have looked after the property and we’ll serve any required section Notices if you decide to want the property back or if you decide to increase the rent.

What it costs

There is an initial one-off set-up cost of 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT (and a minimum charge of £350 plus VAT or £420 including VAT). This covers the duration of the relationship with us.

Thereafter, we charge 10% of the monthly rental amount, plus VAT.

If your tenant wishes to renew the tenancy agreement at the end of their initial tenancy, we charge £125 plus VAT (£150 including VAT) to carry out a full annual tenancy review and to arrange either a new six or twelve month tenancy agreement. You’ll receive up to date valuations for sale or letting as well as Section 13 Rent Increase notice if a new fixed term tenancy agreement is not required.  If there’s a new fixed term agreement to be put in place we do that, too.

If your tenant wishes to leave and you’d like us to re-find you a new tenant, we charge 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT (and a minimum charge of £350 plus VAT or £420 including VAT).

What you’ll need

If it’s the first time you’ve let your property, you’ll need an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) and a landlord’s gas safety certificate if the property has gas. You’ll also need smoke alarms on each level and a CO alarm if there’s a gas boiler or wood burning stove in the room. If you do In some of the areas we cover you may need a Selective licence from the local authority to let your property.  If this is the case we can advise you. Licences are often granted for five years.

In some of the areas we cover you may need a Selective licence from the local authority to let your property.  If this is the case we can advise you. Licences are often granted for five years.

What next?

Call us on 0333 772 0222 or E mail support@H2L.co.uk to arrange a free, no obligation, valuation of your property at a time to suit you.

This is a tenant-find package only. We call it “Find Only”. Some letting agents call it “Let only”. It’s the same thing.

What we do

We’ll provide you with a free, no obligation valuation. We’ll advertise the property across all the main property websites. We’ll arrange viewings, accompany viewings and give feedback. We’ll carry out credit checks, employment and previous/current landlord references.

We’ll arrange to either meet your new tenants at your property if it’s within our area, or at one of our offices or we can send them or you all the required documentation and keys by “Signed For” delivery, depending on your requirements.

We’ll pay you the first month’s rent, less our fees, the same day your new tenants move in. We’ll send you a rental statement either by first class post or by E-mail to your nominated E-mail address.

What it costs

There is an initial one-off set-up cost of 50% of the first month’s rent, plus VAT (and a minimum charge of £350 plus VAT or £420 including VAT). There are no further costs unless you require us to provide you with additional, chargeable ‘bolt on’ services which require that the property is compliant.

If your tenant wishes to renew the tenancy agreement at the end of their initial tenancy, we charge £125 plus VAT (£150 including VAT) to carry out a full annual tenancy review and to arrange either a new six or twelve month tenancy agreement. You’ll receive up to date valuations for sale or letting as well as Section 13 Rent Increase notice if a new fixed term tenancy agreement is not required.  If there’s a new fixed term agreement to be put in place we do that, too.

What you’ll need

If it’s the first time you’ve let your property, you’ll need an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) and a landlord’s gas safety certificate if the property has gas. You’ll also need smoke alarms on each level and a CO alarm if there’s a gas boiler or wood burning stove in the room. If you do In some of the areas we cover you may need a Selective licence from the local authority to let your property.  If this is the case we can advise you. Licences are often granted for five years.

In some of the areas we cover you may need a Selective licence from the local authority to let your property.  If this is the case we can advise you. Licences are often granted for five years.

Additional “bolt-on” services that we can provide

If you’d like us to hold the tenant’s deposit in our audited, segregated client monies account, we can protect the deposit and issue certification for £70.00 plus VAT (£84.00 including VAT). Otherwise, we’re happy to send you the tenant’s deposit but you must protect the tenant’s deposit within 30 days and issue your tenant with the necessary protection certificate, Scheme booklet and Prescribed Information depending on the Deposit Scheme that you use.

We can conduct a full video inventory of the property when the tenants move in, for an additional charge of £80.00 plus VAT (£96.00 including VAT).

We can take meter readings (gas, electricity, water and council tax) and provide you, the tenants and the utilities with the tenant details and meter readings, for an additional £70.00 plus VAT (that’s £84.00 including VAT).

As part of our additional ‘bolt-on’ services we can also provide landlord gas safety certificates, EICRs and EPCs. The price depends on the area and the work involved.

What next?

Call us on 0333 772 0222 or E mail support@H2L.co.uk to arrange a free, no obligation, valuation of your property at a time to suit you.