Letting your property out to tenants can be a stressful process – finding suitable tenants, making sure your rent is paid every month, maintaining the upkeep of your property and sorting all of the legal paperwork are just a few of the factors involved in managing your own letting. If you feel you could do with a hassle-free letting then you should consider hiring a letting agent to help you with the demanding process.

The first step to take if you are considering an agent is to find someone you can trust and who is reputable. You should try and find an agent through word of mouth and personal recommendation – if you know others who are happy with an agent’s services then you’ll be confident in paying them to look after your property. Make sure your agent has your best interests at heart.

Your agent will cover as much of your letting as you decide – the more the agent covers, the highly their monthly fee will be. If you only want your property partially looked after you will probably be paying about 10% of your rental income in fees, and if you are looking for a complete service from an agent you can bump that figure up to around 15-20% of your monthly rental income. Some consider upping their rent to cover agent fees and to ensure they are making a profit from their property. Make sure you also consider what you are actually paying in the fees, this should all be clearly labelled in the contract and if it isn’t, be sure to find out. For example, some agents may cover minor maintenance repairs in their monthly fee whereas others may not. Simple factors like these are easy to forget but could end up saving you a lot of money as an end result.

What can your agent do for you?

If you are opting for the full services of your agent they will begin by marketing your property and finding suitable tenants. Agents will have access to a large variety of mediums to market your property and from previous experience will know which places to promote your property to find the right tenants for you. The chosen tenants will need their references checked and some are now credit checked to make sure they are reliable at keeping up with payments. Agents will also sort all necessary legal paperwork, saving you the hassle of working out all of the letting legalities.

Agents will also be able to give you invaluable advice on letting guidelines and keep you in the know regarding your property and how much the going rate is to charge your tenants. As well as legal paperwork, they’ll also deal with all house safety checks. By law, houses need annual gas and electricity safety certificates, so your landlord can ensure these checks are kept up and your property is in a safe condition for your tenants.

A letting agent will let you get on with your own life without having to worry about the time and hassle of looking after your own tenants, and everything else that comes with letting a property. You need to weigh up the pros and cons of hiring a rental agent – if you can afford to pay the fees then it’s definitely worth it but if not, maybe you could consider finding an agent to do just some of the work and carry out some of the work by yourself?

Clair O\’Hara is writing on behalf of Shepherd Gilmour, specialist letting agent Manchester.

Clair O\’Hara is writing on behalf of Shepherd Gilmour (http://www.shepherdgilmour.com), specialist letting agent Manchester.

Author Bio: Clair O\’Hara is writing on behalf of Shepherd Gilmour, specialist letting agent Manchester.

Category: Real Estate
Keywords: letting agent Manchester, letting agent, letting agency Manchester