My landlord friend wants to leave the letting agency that has managed his property for 2 years but now wants to manage it by himself using Open Rent as a platform. He has signed the tenancy agreement between himself and the tenants but did not sign any agreement between himself and the agency. Please can you let me know what is the procedure for leaving the agency? Would it be as simple as telling them that he no longer requires their services?
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this is a new tenant not a renewal of an old tenant?
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Sounds like friend needs some LL training if theyâve signed a new tenancy with tenants and only now realizes they have to end the arrangement with previous letting agents and that it might be an issue. Doesnât seem organized enough or knowledgeable of all the complexities of rental management to understand whatâs required to be a LL, at least yet.
There must be a contract between letting agency and LL otherwise why are they doing the managing and how are they receiving payment for their services and how does LL know what is being paid for?
If itâs a written contract it will have been signed or agreed even if itâs just a txt message or whatsapp agreeing to their âstandard termsâ.
It could be a wholly verbal contract in which case hard to prove the terms and conditions
Agency may well have cancellation fees or keep fee for latest annual period till end of the period, and may need to be given formal notice
If itâs the same tenants as before old tenancy agreement has to be ended and any deposit returned and new deposit for new tenancy and epc, how to rent etc need to be served again
Good luck
Iâm intrigued as to why someone who wants to manage something that is extremely complex isnât managing to get himself onto a landlord forum to post these questions himself.
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Hi Colin, they are the same tenants that the Letting Agency found for him. They have been in the house for 2 years and have not given notice yet.
Hi David
Many thanks for writing such a detailed reply which is very useful. It is strange but we have been searching through his emails to see if we can find any contract between himself and the agency but there does not appear to be one. I have also had a look at the agencyâs website but canât find any terms and conditions.
I find it odd as I when I have used agencies there have always been terms and conditions. I think the best way forward for my friend is to ask the agency directly.
Thanks for the info on the complications of tenancy agreement and deposit. Hopefully, the agency will be co-operative.
Clair
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There may be a contract somewhere that ties the agency into managing this tenant as long as he IS a tenant in that place . If so you can bet the agency has a copy
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Hi Tatemono, I said I would ask this forum as I am an OpenRent Landlord and always found good advice here. Hopefully, he will become an OpenRent landlord soon and will do his own posts.
Clair
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Pps Iâm told various agencies have terms which prevent (or penalize) LLs for taking over managing a tenant they found and managed.
Ppps could be an agency who provided a copy of terms and conditions on paper when visiting to do a valuation and never bothered getting it signed or sending copies by email just relied on verbal agreement when asked to do the management. Check for paper copies?
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I did ask my friend if he can recall being given any papers by the agency but he says he doesnât remember being given anything. He is going to meet with the person who recommended the agency to see if they know what the terms and conditions are. If he has no joy with that, I have suggested that he asks them directly.
Thanks for getting back to me on this, Clair.
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TBH, Iâd recommend he does that now. It should have been his first port of call.
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If there was no signed or written contract, then your friend is probably bound by the agencies standard terms and conditions as published on their website. He may find that there is a penalty for ending his arrangement with them.
Letting property is a highly complex business and about to get more so. I would recommend you suggest to him that before going it alone, he joins a landlord association and does some training. If he is still keen to self manage after that, then at least he will be informed of all the regulation and penalties for mistakes.
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I took over the management of my rental property from an agent who had originally found the tenants. They were collecting the rent and charging me a 20% management fee; however, whenever there were issues with the property, I found that they simply passed these on to me to sort out myself.
The agents were planning to end the tenancy at the end of the first year and then re-market the property at a higher rent and find new tenants, all at my expense. I realised it would be better to keep the existing tenants and receive the additional 20% of the rent, without increasing the rent for them.
When I spoke to the agent about ending the agreement, I was told that I had to give three monthsâ notice.
In any case, they allowed me to continue using the existing tenancy agreement, and they transferred the deposit to my own protected deposit account in the tenantsâ name. I also had to redo the Right to Rent checks. All the tenants had to do was start paying the rent directly to me. This was four years ago, and I still have the same tenants now.
To be fair to the agent, they did advise me on how to do this, although they overlooked the Right to Rent requirement.
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20% to collect the rent and do little actual property mgt (did they do inspections) def sounds like a ripoff - most agents charge between 8 and 14% for full mgt.
âAllowingâ tenancy to continue- if it was between you and tenant itâs legally up to you and/ or tenant to end it, not the agents so this hardly seems generous on their part - itâs less work for them to not serve a notice. And planning to end the tenancy at 1 year even tho you had a good tenant and would have void period potentially sounds like they didnât have your interests at heart either unless market rates had gone up a lot and they had agreed with you first worth the risk. (Anyway could have proposed an increase to current tenants first rather than risks of void, new tenants)
Good point about needing to redo the right to rent checks
Thanks
Agent management fees appear to vary by location. This property is in York, and when I looked in 2021, all agents I checked were charging 20%. In Halifax, where I own another property, the going rate is 12%. I carried out the property inspections myself, which I felt was a good way to meet the tenants.
It was the agentâs recommendation to end the tenancy after one year. I realised this would have been good business for the agent, as it would have created more work for them and likely resulted in at least a one-month void period for me. Although I would have said no, I instead decided to manage the property myself. I had no issues with the tenants during the first year, and they wanted to stay.
Apparently, the tenants had been fully aware that they would be leaving after one year and must have agreed to this arrangement with the agent.
When I say I was expected to âsort things out myselfâ, this typically meant that the agent would inform me of an issue and then recommend sending a contractor at my expense. For example, they suggested sending a boiler engineer to deal with an issue. So I phoned the tenants and discovered it was a problem with the wireless thermostat, I talked them through how to reset it themselves. I have no idea what an engineer would charge to reset a wireless thermostat or if they would just fit a new one. There were a few other minor issues during the year that I cannot now remember, but by that point the tenants were contacting me directly anyway.
Regarding Right to Rent, the tenants were on visas. I do not know whether the agent carried out the required checks. The only document they provided to me was a copy of the AST.
The agent recommended the first people who viewed the property. This meant there was only one viewing before they earned their fee. However, given the lack of documentation provided, I cannot be certain what checks were actually carried out. I suppose I was fortunate because the tenants turned out to be good.
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oops⌠you really should have done. I hope you no longer have the tenants. If you do, you should get their share codes and check they have right to rent asap.
When you appoint an agent, you stop managing the property and start managing the agent. You need to double check that theyâve done everything that they legally should because itâs you that will end up in court if not.
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@Nick40 andâŚ.well done sounds like you made a good choice to self manage
I think you misunderstand my post. I carried out the Right to Rent checks myself as soon as I started managing the property in 2022, and I still have the same tenants, for whom I have had to repeat the checks every year.
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No I donât think I misunderstood it. You were pretty clear that you didnât check if the agents had done their job at the time. If they hadnât, you could have been fined pretty heavily. Good to hear that youâve done them since, and I agree that you did well to take this property over.
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@tatemono your original point was a good one.
To be fair to @Nick40 lots of LLs donât realize they are often (if not always) legally responsible for the mistakes their agents make or if the agents donât make sure everything is compliant and LLs need to check agents are doing the work properly. A certain high profile MP who should have had her property licensed is a good example 
Keep telling people to help keep people out of troubleâŚ
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