How to deal with international tenants that are completely new to UK?

Landlord Discussion
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I had one enquiry from a family who will be coming to the UK for the first time.
Obviously this means reference checking won’t work.

Is a guarantor the only way to move forward?
How about a whole year rent upfront?

Any insight here?

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Thank you for your question. In my view some of the renting requirements are not applicable to tenants from overseas.

  1. They won’t have a credit history
  2. No uk rent history
  3. They won’t have guarantors please! It’s like you yourself move to the USA purely for work purposes, not knowing anyone and some one asks for a guarantor. You wouldn’t have one.

*So should such individuals sleep on the streets because they are fairly new in the country?
*How will they get uk rent history unless some landlord allows them rent their property?

In my view, if an individual is legally employed, able to get employer reference and can prove their right to rent, and they pass the affordability check, they deserve a chance.
*Stop looking at the one size fits all rental checklist. The checklist used for locals won’t fit international applicants

Thank you.

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have you taken on overseas tenants ?

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Yes I have. Three times so far

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it was all good 100%?

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No serious issues except where needed to paint walls after end of tenancy and treating a patch of mould in the bathroom. Tenant agreed to costs.

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Thanks for your reply.

I guess at the end of the day it all depends on how much risk you want to take.
Good luck with your rental!

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Thanks stt106.
I would be open to learning. If you please share what you consider to be risks in this instance. It’s likely I am ignoring what could turn out to be serious issues of contention. Thanks

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I don’t have any specific experience with this apart from an international tenant wanted to view my property but they haven’t even arrived in the UK yet.
I just thought it will be close to impossible to do any UK validation unless they can either pay full rent upfront or provide a guarantor; I am just not up to take the risk.
By no means am I suggesting they will be bad tenants; it’s just I am a bit risk-aversion!

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