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Property Firm says Letting Agent Fees are Excessive
This article is an external press release originally published on the Landlord News website, which has now been migrated to the Just Landlords blog.
Charity group Shelter has recently condemned what they called rip-off letting agent fees being charged to both landlords and tenants. After winning their campaign to have the charges abolished in Scotland, they are presently calling for similar measures to be taken in England.
Minimum fees
Property Firm says Letting Agent Fees are Excessive
However, Shelter is not alone in advocating for change. The Happy Tenant Company, who will recently have completed their first year as an operational property management firm, claim that they have achieved a multi-million pound rent roll by charging minimal fees. In addition, the firm claim not to be a letting agent, but instead an alternative choice.
Management service
The Happy Tenant Company offer a management service to landlords for a fixed fee, which is frozen for two years. Additionally, the firm charges no renewal fees and there are no mark-ups.
With clarity essential, the Happy Tenant Company ensure that tenants have no registration or administration fees to pay. Furthermore, the firm offers no increase in services such as cleaning or maintenance issues, which are given to their tenants at standard trade cost.
CEO of the Happy Tenant Company, Jonathan Monjack, said that the practise of charging extortionate fees to landlords and tenants is unacceptable. Monjack said that his management team “includes landlords and tenants,” and they “realised some time ago that the exorbitant fees letting agents charge today is simply not acceptable, nor is the level of service tenants say they receive.”[1]
Monjack says that the Happy Tenant Company’s business model “includes using our size to secure our landlords and tenants the best possible deals on maintenance and third party services.”[1]
Additionally, he said that the firm pride themselves “on not being a letting agent,” and instead challenge the payments that have been “enjoyed by these agents for the past three decades.”[1]
Unjustified
The Happy Tenant Company are, like Shelter, unhappy that the charges are still allowed to hit tenants and landlords in the pocket. Monjack said: “We believe paying a letting agent more than 20% of the annual rental income year after year is unjustified, while paying administration fees on top of this, which according to Shelter can be as high as 600%, is scandalous, and despite this, many landlords and tenants receive a substandard service. We formed the Happy Tenant Company as a direct challenge to change this.”[1]
With a growing number of would-be buyers being priced out of the housing market, Monjack believes: “The excessive fees that agents charge today is now being highlighted due to the vast number of people having no other option but to rent.”[1]
Concluding, Monjack stated: “Both landlords and tenants have been paying too much for basic management and maintenance services and it’s time that this was changed.”[1]
[1] http://old.lettingagenttoday.co.uk/news_features/Property-management-firm-says-agents-fees-are-excessive
