Letting Agency Fees any information/suggestions :)

CasperSmokey

Hi everyone new to boards so hope I am doing everything right!

My mother is thinking of using a letting agent to rent out her property for her. Could I get a bit of information from people if you don't mind. I would love to hear from landlords or anyone who works in the estate agency sector.

I have done some research and a lot of places charge a certain % or fee for finding tenants for a landlord and everything that is involved in that process but they also offer to manage it for the landlord too. One such example I found is as below.

The letting agency says that to find a suitable tenant and sort out the marketing the admin the lease signing etc will cost the "First month’s rent (includes vat)" which is the "quivalent to 6.8% of gross annual rent (excludes vat)". I am not sure how these too work out the same but that is what they say.

They then go on to say that they will manage the property including inspections collecting rent Provide quotes for reasonable maintenance work etc and the fee for this is 7-10%+vat of the monthly rent.

So can someone enlighten me here, say the rent is 1000 for arguments sake. Will my mother have to pay 1000 for them to find a tenant and then pay say 7-10%+ vat on top of this for the first month also and then 7-10%+ vat for the remaining 11 months. It all seems very expensive.

Also if say the fridge breaks while they are managing the property will they have guys to fix it? and I assume they charge for this also but maybe it work out cheaper using their guy than if I had to get an engineer out myself.

I have also read that landlords can get tax relief on the letting agency fees at the end of the year. This obviously helps if I understand it correctly.

I would really appreciate it if anyone could give me some info on any of these questions and just some general info on how letting agency's they used have worked. Any examples of how the figures work out would be great.

Thanks everyone

HelenT

We have used a letting agency for a hse in Dublin over the past 5 plus years. Please be careful when choosing one!! We had one shower of cowboys that let the house out (they were paid to get tenants and do maintenance). They completely let the house fall into disrepair.

We did a house inspection ourselves and were really shocked with the condition of the house (carpets ripped up, paint work all dirty, garden full of rubbish, mould all over one of the bedrooms etc) so moved the tenants out and brought the house back to a good level of repair.

We then engaged with a different letting agent - one we actually rented from previously - and this has worked out really well for us. We pay one months rent annually and for that they keep the house occupied, deal with collections, deposits, contracts. If there is a fault in the house they send maintence crew in to check it out and we pay additionally for any fixtures / fittings that need replacing.

They are very responsive and work to ensure our tenants are happy. If you are looking in the Dublin / Kildare area I will happily recommend the company to you in pm. Best of luck! It would also be wise to educate yourself on landlord responsibilities / tenants rights etc