I have used Rent Now once before but the tenant ran into a problem when trying to place the holding deposit as it it would not accept a non UK account.
He was in Switzerland and I am not sure what work around he used but he sorted it in the end.
Now I am letting again and receiving enquiries from international students.
I have a German lady who is unable to place the deposit and now an American who is very keen to proceed but just come against this problem as well.
Does anyone know what advice I can give them to get things moving?
It is annoying as I am continuing to receive fresh enquiries while these two are trying to get their deposit down.
So far I have suggested they set up an internet acc such as Starling which I use but I don’t know how easy or otherwise that might be for them in their respective countries.
Are there any other work arounds? eg. Can we skip the holding deposit? They are both able to do a direct transfer but this will not initiate the Rent Now contract creation etc. so things may get complicated getting OpenRent to proceed.
I believe that RentNow does let you skip the holding deposit section. If you really want to take one, source a decent holding deposit agreement and do it separately.
I’m not aware of that, but this same post has come up a couple of times recently. I’ve recommended posters contact Openrent which is easy to do through their ‘need help’ section.
Rent Now does not let me proceed without the holding deposit. It is just greyed out and there is no option to do anything other than wait for the deposit to be paid or cancel the request.
I did contact OpenRent who responded in good time but unfortunately not much help.
“Hi Lewis,
Unfortunately, we do require a UK phone number to request a viewing with OpenRent, and a UK debit card to place a holding deposit with us - this is the only way to proceed.”
No mention of the reason for this. Presumably some sort of money laundering prevention.
My flat is in an attractive position for international students and this is becoming a recurring problem.
I’ll just have to hope they manage to sort a UK account.