- The most common places to look for a property to rent are the popular online portals of “Zoopla” and “Rightmove” but there are plenty of other portals that might be more appropriate depending on the type of tenant you want to attract.
Most people’s searches for property usually start online nowadays and most visibility for a property will be on the aforementioned major sites. You cannot add your property to the main portals yourself so you will need to use one of the large numbers of online agents to do this on your behalf. It’s a fairly easy process with you providing the required information regarding the property to the agent for a fee of usually between £50 and £100. For this they will upload the details and pass tenant enquiries onto you. There may be extra services they can provide for additional fees such as registering the deposit and drawing up tenancy agreements etc. Remember that your advert needs to be of the highest quality to stand out from the crowd on the listings pages and get sufficient views
- This is a resource that you can actually upload to yourself and currently costs around £25. It is extremely popular in areas such as London but a lot less so in others so depending on where your property is it may or may not be worthwhile.
- You should be aware that Gumtree attracts a wide variety of types of applicants good and bad. So it will be necessary to weed out the scams and time wasters from the genuine applicants. It tends to be more popular as the lower end of the market so if your property is in this area it may be worth a go.
- A Facebook group for properties to rent can be found in most towns in the UK. Facebook. Marketplace also allows property listings. Much Like Gumtree the quality of applicants can be varied, and you must be prepared to spend time weeding the good from the bad. These groups tend to be popular with tenants on benefits as they know that individual landlords tend to be more flexible in regard to references and credit checks than letting agents.
- DSSmove ( www.dssmove.co.uk) is a site for those tenants on housing benefits. It’s free use and a private landlord can add properties directly to it. If your property is suited to this sector then it’s worth a try.
- This is a site for renting out rooms within a property. It generates consistent results for those that use this route for rental. It’s a free service for its’s basic use but there is the opportunity to pay for more exposure.
- Your local student accommodation office maybe worth contacting if you are planning to rent your property to students. They usually have their own portal, local advertising and events through which your property can be marketed. You may need to become an accredited landlord with them to promote your property which usually means signing up to a code of practice.
- DSSmove ( www.dssmove.co.uk) is a site for those tenants on housing benefits. It’s free use and a private landlord can add properties directly to it. If your property is suited to this sector, then it’s worth a try.
- The local paper may seem outdated but this and other “old fashioned” channels like cards in shop windows may be worthwhile if you are trying to appeal to older tenants who may not be happy using the internet.
- A tenant being recommended to you by family and friends can save the time and cost of advertising, but you must apply the same standards that you would for a normal advert. In some ways you should take more care as a familiar tenant may feel they can take advantage of you.
- A If your property is in a desirable location, accurately priced and in good condition it should be relatively easy to find tenants to rent from you. Don’t feel you have to go with someone recommended to you as you will find someone to rent your property sooner rather than later. In some ways it is better to rent to someone you don’t know rather that a friend as a separation can be kept between you and it is easier to keep everything (especially finances) on a formal footing.
