OpenRent is a great place to advertise property for rent, accepted.
However, it would be helpful if we could have some mechanism for providing feedback on potential tenants. Specifically I am annoyed that once we go past the time and date a viewing was booked for the viewing is defaulted to viewing complete. How about a “No show” button.
Last time I used OpenRent we had a no show rate of about 60%. Today one from three has arrived to view the property. The person doing the viewings left standing in an empty house waiting for the inconsiderate individual to turn up.
And by the way, as reported to OpenRent last time, when we had the temerity to call and remind one tenant of the viewing we were threatened with physical harm.
Perhaps, if like on Ebay, potential tenants knew they would receive public feedback either way about their conduct they might turn up, or indeed not make an appointment they have no intention of keeping.
I appreciate that no-shows are less than ideal (this being quite an understatement, of course). It’s a feature we’ve considered and other landlords have shared their views on this in this thread also.
We’re always looking to improve the product and both landlord and tenant feedback is always useful in this sense. While there aren’t any immediate plans to implement such a feature, this is an area the team have discussed and it’s useful to hear of your thoughts on this.
The thread above has some guidance on ways to minimise no-shows, though should you have any other feedback on this - or any other aspect of the website - please do share.
Apologies once more about the tenants who’ve not shown for viewings.
To clarify, as far as diligence on ensuring people are coming I do as a matter of routine text people a few hours prior to the appointment. I have had people text me confirmation as little as an hour before the appointment and they have still been no shows and not contacted me to let me know they were not coming.
On one recent experience I had over 20 viewings booked, allowing 15 mins for each viewing. That was spread over quite a few hours obviously. At one point I sat for nearly two hours of no shows, several of whom had insisted they would be there. Surely OpenRent would support the upholding of simple common courtesy?
Hi Andrew, thanks for sharing your experience of no shows. We’re really aware that this is a pain point for all landlords (indeed for anyone letting properties, be they landlords or high street agents). We certainly want to solve problems like these because we want to solve all of landlords’ problems.
In general it’s quite tough for companies to find a fair way to set up a peer-reviewing system. I can list some of the problems companies like us face.
Timing: When is the right moment to allow customers to review each other? Is it at the viewing? Is it once the tenant has moved in? Is it three months in? Is it when the deposit has been returned? It’s tough to know.
Veracity: We don’t really have any way to verify the veracity of some kinds of claims reviews make. E.g. if a tenant claims a landlord has claimed one thing at the viewing then another thing on the tenancy agreement, it’s hard for us to know if this is true or not
Symmetry: There would need to be a symmetry between both tenants’ and landlords’ reviewing powers.
Fairness: With things like Uber, users may take 100 rides a year. That means if they have a bad day and get a bad review, it is diluted by all their other, good days as a passenger. But people only move or let their property once every 20 months or so on average. One bad review can make a big difference and that might not necessarily be fair.
Criteria: Some landlords may think that cancelling a viewing the day before means the tenant deserves one star out of five. For another landlord, they might think it perfectly reasonable to do that and not mind much anyway because they already found a tenant, and so give the tenant five stars for the same behaviour.
These are just some of the things we have to think about before implementing a peer reviewing system. It’s really important to get them all right if we do go for such a solution.
Hopefully bringing up these issues gives an insight into our thinking
Sam
My own perspective was restricted to the actual viewing process. I think reviewing tenants beyond that is a matter for referencing and so forth.
Why not have in the T’s & C’s on site that if a tenant needs to cancel a viewing they do so through the viewing booking system. There is then no argument as to what is late and what is not. If they do not cancel and the landlord has a button for “no show” it surely is a binary report with little room for interpretation.
People will find ways around any system (invent a new site ID for example) but not having such a system seems to encourage people to just click away as people do when “liking” something on other platforms, without recognising they are asking people to invest time and energy to be somewhere at a a certain time.
Hi Andrew as I am a tenant I have experienced open house viewing where your one in 20 people coming and only having 15 mins of your time there is your problem.
Im a person the same as you I am not a second class citizen and I would feel exactly like that if I was one of those 20.
15 mins is not enough time to get to know me as a person and as im looking round another couple turn up your attention turns to them.
After experiencing this situation myself I wouldn’t even look at a property if its open house viewing with a 15 minute slot
Make time to see me meet myself and my family its big decision for me to rent your property.
The viewing you refer to was not an Open House viewing, this was 27 consecutive viewings set at 15 minutes each across several hours, that was effectively my entire (Sun)day. I have never run an Open House viewing in the UK. Viewers never know what time period that I have allocated them e.g. 15 minutes, and is therefore not a credible reason for failing to show.
Of the 27 booked and confirmed viewings, 6 turned up and 3 texted to say they would be unable to attend. My wife and I sat in a house for seven hours to conduct about an hour’s worth of actual viewings.
On that day I set viewings at 15 minutes each for two or three reasons: a) I have never had 100% turnout, so theoretically I am only wasting 15 minutes if I have a no show, b) Most people are happy with 15 minutes, indeed in my experience most know within about 5 minutes if they plan to rent or not. c) No matter what time slot you set, people will arrive early and will arrive late and throw your timings out come what may.
The last viewing I did was last Sunday, we had viewings booked for 12.00, 12.30 and 1.30. Only the 12.00 turned up. OpenRent’s dashboard shows them all as having done the viewing…
Like me, you’ve probably been brought up to make an appointment with someone and then keep it or let them know you can’t. Sadly there is a significant number of people out there who think it is OK to make an appointment and then just not turn up. I think that’s wrong and should be flagged for what it is - inconsiderate.
