Hi - Last time I let through rent now I selected a tenant who then put a deposit down.
On this occasion a prospective tenant heard the property was coming up, viewed through the existing tenant and put a deposit down.
I want to see some other tenants before I proceed with this person I have never met, but viewings aren’t due for another fortnight when the current tenant moves out.
The rent now notice I received expires in 3 days.
What’s the advice - I’m not sure what the implications are if I proceed to collect references and eventually decide to let to somebody else.
dont take deposits off anyone until you have personally spoken to someone and done the checks. If somone pays a deposit to an agent and you have not spoken to them give it back to teach them a lesson
##Update##
If the Rent Now offer times out, then this usually means the landlord has already found a tenant. Therefore, timing out means we delist the advert. Therefore, you should reject the Rent Now offer for now to prevent a time-out delisting of the advert. Once you have done this, the tenant will be able to renew it in the same way they first made it (i.e. pressing the Rent Now button).
We always recommend communicating what each party plans to do in this situation as opposed to merely leaving it for the platform to handle. This will, for example, prevent the tenants believing that their application has been truly rejected, as opposed to merely being rejected so that the offer can be renewed.