Member Article

“Embrace ethical lettings”, landlords told

A leading property expert has called on the lettings industry to embrace the growing “ethical landlord” movement if it ever wants to improve its public image.

Ajay Jagota of North East lettings business KIS Lettings believes it is in the interests of landlords to improve the reputation of their industry, not least as “being a good landlord is good for business”.

The call comes as statistics show eviction from rental properties reaching a five year high, with a 9% year-on-year rise in the numbers of landlords repossessing properties.

It also came in National Gas Safety work, with research by Shelter claiming that one in ten landlords are failing to carry out basic gas safety checks.

Ajay Jagota of KIS Lettings, who manage properties for 700 landlords from branches in Sunderland, South Shields, North Shields and Welwyn Garden City, said:

“Landlords perform a socially-vital role – providing a roof over the heard of people who can’t afford to buy their own homes or who don’t want to buy their own homes. If landlords didn’t exist, it would be necessary to invent them.

“The idea of an ethical landlord is misleading at it implies landlords aren’t ethical when the vast majority are – sadly landlord is a dirty word to many people and we need to take action to change that perception for a number of reasons.

“Firstly, an industry which makes a firm public commitment to the highest possible standards is one which is less likely to need constant reorganisation and new regulations.

“More importantly though it is completely in landlords’ financial interests to treat tenants well. The key to a success as a buy-to-let landlords is long term tenancies, and a good tenant-landlord relationship is key to a long term tenancies.

“Being an ethical landlord is not just the right thing to do morally - being a good landlord is good for business”.

Ajay has the following tips on being an ethical landlord:

Be transparent about fees

“Hitting new tenants with all sorts of hidden fees is just daft. It can leave them out of pocket when it comes to the actual rent and gets your relationship off to exactly the wrong start. At KIS not only do we not ask for a deposit, all our fees are upfront and easy to understand and it really works for us.”

Keep your properties in good condition

“Ask yourself if you would live in your property? If your property is lovely to live in not only will it be more likely to find good tenants – they’re also more likely to treat it like their own home and to stay there longer.”

Don’t be too quick to evict

“Sometimes you have no choice but to take steps to evict tenants – but it’s a fact of life that even the best tenants will sometimes fall on tough times and need a little flexibility.Long term continuous occupation is always more profitable than properties which are often empty.”

Don’t dismiss housing benefit tenants

“I appreciate that the upheaval of government benefits changes is very off-putting to some people but they are also contributing to a greater need for private rental housing. Often people are only on receiving benefits for short periods of time due to temporary circumstances like unemployment and even when they are aren’t they have often in my experience proved to be the most reliable tenants.”

Author: Ajay Jagota

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ajay Jagota .