An online blog is accusing unidentified landlords of seeking one-off payments as a way of circumnavigating the Renters Rights Act.
The London Centric substack column says some landlords seek a one-off payment, to cover bills for the duration of the tenancy.
This is despite the fact that under the Renters Rights Act, tenancies are rolling rather than of a fixed duration, so their length cannot be predicted.
The tactic is one of a number of ways cited by the article as trying to get around provisions of the Act.
It also accuses landlords and agents of staging what it calls “inverse bidding wars.”
It claims some vacant rental properties are advertised at substantially higher rents than before and – to quote one agent cited in the story – “expecting a lower offer or just taking a stab in the dark and hoping that people would pay.”
How high the advertised rent went depended on the landlord, with the agent telling a writer on the blog that some were “going crazy and putting the rent really high, and some were doing it just a little bit higher than what their current tenants were paying”.
London Centric says the intention of the bidding war ban within the Renters Rights Act was that renters would not compete.
But it adds: “What wasn’t made illegal was accepting an offer beneath the advertised price. As a result landlords and estate agents have responded by enormously increasing the advertised prices for flats.
“The landlord’s initial hope is that a potential tenant is panicked enough to pay over the odds. If not, prospective tenants are encouraged to view a property out of their price range then told to put in a bid below the asking price — creating a inverse blind auction where the objective is to try to work out how low your rival bidders have gone, then bid slightly above that.”
London Centric claims to have contacted over 12 letting agents to inquire about renting.
“We were repeatedly encouraged to view properties advertised as being well out of our stated price range. Time and time again letting agents told us that the landlord would definitely consider offers under the asking price” the blog claims.
You can see the article here.
