Finding tenants - Guidance for a landlord

Hi, we are relocating to another country and we are looking for reliable tenants (defintely consider people from another country).
It is 4 bed in nice, quite area with good schools around.
It is new estate (our house was built 5 years ago),
EPC B
We can rent it furnished and leave almost everything (from cups and cutlery to duvet covers) so it would be perfect for you if you relocating from another country as well.
Dont have any nice photos yet as we are on the stage of sorting out things.
My wife and kids are leaving end of July, i will stay a bit longer.
Please reach me if you have any questions.
Btw, forgive me if i posted it in incorrect place. I’m first time on this website.

You have posted it in the wrong place. You would need to register and pay to advertise it. Very few tenants will see it here. However…

If I can offer a word of advice. The legislation governing the letting of property is hugely complex and unforgiving. A simple admin error could cost you thousands of pounds. The wrong choice of tenant will leave you with sleepless nights and unable to get to the property to sort it out. In your situation you need a full management service from a good local agent because you need someone on hand when things go wrong as well as someone who knows the law and can choose a good tenant. I would suggest you get involved in the choice too.

Hi @Jacek - Thanks for posting.

The best place to get started is our dedicated property advertising page - if you have any questions, you can post here or contact our dedicated customer support team by following the help links on every page.

We help plenty of first time landlords (as well as experienced ones!) and can guide you through the entire process. Our tenancy creation product, Rent Now, will make sure everything is legally sound and you’ll be guided throughout the process every step of the way. If you’re going to be moving to another country, then it’s certainly worth thinking what you’ll do about maintenance requests, but if you’ve got that covered OpenRent will guide you through the rest.

Completely agree - thankfully OpenRent are on hand to offer landlords guidance and handle the admin regardless of experience level. We’ve processed hundreds of thousands of tenancies now, and seen more edge cases (and edge cases of edge cases!) than any agency in the UK - and all that knowledge is baked into our products and systems.

Picking the “right” tenant is very subjective of course, our professional referencing is the best way to ensure you’ve done that though. I don’t think there is magic in a handshake / looking into someone’s eyes, although I appreciate landlords will do what works for them, but as long as you’re not skipping referencing, then you’re relying on real data (and things like RGI to protect you) rather than the subjective ability to pick a good tenant! That’s something all landlords, using an agent or not, should be doing.

Furthermore, I’d argue the skill required to pick a good high street agent is much harder, because you can’t reference an agent. And handing over your most valuable asset to a poorly performing high street agent is a much more costly mistake. So whilst I agree it’s important to know what you’ll do when there is a problem at the property, or a change of tenants, I don’t think saying “you need a full management service” is quite fair - we have plenty of landlords remotely managing their properties without any issues.

I would agree with most of what you’ve said Daz. In my view Openrent offers a comparable or better service in terms of tenant finding and letting. However, I still think that as Jacek will be in a different country, he needs someone on hand to manage the property and the ongoing tenancy. Property inspections, repairs required, accidents, tenants locking themselves out, Council inspections… are just some of the issues that can arise and need local management.

I also agree that finding a decent local agent is a huge challenge and so many of them offer a poor service. I have always managed my own tenancies for this reason, but if I were moving abroad I would rather leave a property empty than have it unmanaged.

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