Negotiating the rent rate

[Diablos-666]

Am looking at getting my first place to rent.

I've seen a perfect property that suits me fine i.e has a garage and close enough to a station with links to London.

The only problem is it's a bit out of my budget.

My budget is £800 per month and the place is £895. Is it unrealistic to expect the vendor to drop that much.

[illmonkey]

Ask them.

[andy400]

Not totally unrealistic, depends on whether the landlord is 'trying' the rate to see if he can get it, depends how much interest he's had, how long it's been marketed etc.

He might go for it, but if not can you stretch to meet him half way or something?

[Alfa numeric]

My place was up for something like £1,250 and we offered £1,150, and it was accepted. Of course it helped that we knew the previous tennant was paying £1,125... You don't lose anything by asking.

[Landlord]

Definitely negotiable. We negotiated down on our current place.

This like being able to move in quickly also help with movement in rent.

Edited by Landlord on Thursday 9th September 12:10

[sidekickdmr]

If my memory serves me correctly I managed to get my last place down from £2,225 PCM down to £1,800, £425 off asking price!

However the place I'm in now wouldn't budge a penny!

My conclusion, ask and try your luck, but don't make it sound like a cheeky offer, make it sound like that's all your going to pay or the whole deal is off,

Edited by sidekickdmr on Thursday 9th September 12:17

[10 Pence Short]

Living in the sticks is great for cheap rent.

Huge 2 bedroom flat, Victorian with each room enormous. Bank below us, just one tennant above. No noise side to side. Large garden to the rear.

£375 a month, no water to pay for, either.

[sidekickdmr]

10 Pence Short said:

Bank below us

What's your floor made out of?

On a completely unrelated note, could I borrow your flat for a weekend?

[Diablos-666]

Thanks for the replies. I'll view the property and put an offer in of £800 if i like it.

They are also asking for a months rent in advance, £1400 deposit, £60 credit ref, £105 Checkout Inventory (whatever that is) & £118 Tenancy Agreement

Does all that sound about right?

Seems a lot to me.

[soad]

These are letting agents fees, right? No wonder they are steep

[Diablos-666]

Is the deposit negotiatble? £1400 is a lot of money and have heard many cases where people don't ever get this money back.

[Timberwolf]

My experience so far is that private landlords (i.e. BTLers with one or two properties at most) will accept offers, professional landlords won't but will have the property priced fairly in the first place.

London can be different as in some areas of the market there are more tenants than properties; obviously varies according to the area and property as I recall friends negotiating their rent downward on most reviews when they lived in E15.

(Although the justification of, "for that price, we'd rather move somewhere where half the street hasn't fallen into the CTRL and we don't get woken by a 3am car alarm every day" may not be all that universal.)

Still worth trying as the worst that'll happen is you miss out on a couple of properties finding out that there are people willing to pay asking - and if they were otherwise beyond your budget, then no great shakes anyway.

Edited by Timberwolf on Thursday 9th September 13:12

[Karyn]

Diablos-666 said:

Thanks for the replies. I'll view the property and put an offer in of £800 if i like it.

They are also asking for a months rent in advance, £1400 deposit, £60 credit ref, £105 Checkout Inventory (whatever that is) & £118 Tenancy Agreement

Does all that sound about right?

Seems a lot to me.

A £1400 deposit seems fairly substantial for a £895 rental price? For most of the places I've rented, the deposit has usually been the value of the rental price plus another couple of hundred or so. Yours seems VERY high!

The rest of it is pretty usual though - squeezing money out of you for every conceivable "service". We paid £130 for our inventory.......... the house was unfurnished. £130 to tell us that no walls had holes in, and there were a couple of paint chips.

makes a note never to rent near London