My second day on the blog and getting into my stride now, managing to find time to tell you
all what I have learned over the last few months about the buy to let business. In the last blog I talked about Rent Guarantee and how I tip toed my way through the early days of getting two houses out on to the buy to let market in the UK.
Now what I will say is that the needs and requirements for landlords or landlady's like myself are the same. This means that if you have 1 property in your portfolio or 1000 the legal requirements you have put on you when you enter the buy to let market are the same.
You may also remember that I said that Landlord services in my view fell into one general heading and that was "Landlord Protection".
Read the previous blog you will see that I had settled on using LetSafe http://www.letsafe.net/ for my services and products for my buy to let needs after many recommendations from letting professionals and smaller landlords I met.
By now I had put one property (my friend Susan's) up for rent with a letting agent and was managing my own home as a landlady while learning the industry as best I could. This seemed like a good way to do it as I wanted to know how the buy to let market works. So I decided to rent Susan's out with a letting agent which gave me the ability to ask questions from well established letting pro's and then use that knowledge and apply it to my own home.
This has worked out well and I am learning alot. I also did a great deal of research and asked around various letting agents and found LetSafe on the web. I went to them after receiving recommendations from professionals in the buy to let industry. After speaking to them many times, trawling the free landlord information on their site, and being a general pain in the neck I have settled with LetSafe as they have exceeded my expectations at every stage. I have talked to many landlord/landlady providers and to be frank they have been the best.
Cutting to the chase now and returning to the point of this particular blog which is to talk about Legal Cover as promised.
I was lucky enough to find that with LetSafe my legal cover was included in my Rent Guarantee. However the site offered a bunch of info about legal services outside of rent guarantee which is very helpful. Legal cover is important and the service desk at LetSafe explained to me that there are two ways to do it. The first way is to get a good rent guarantee product which I had already arranged with LetSafe and the second is what I have called the D-Day option. This is to put it simply when everything goes wrong and you have to evict tenants. The process as explained by LetSafe can traditionally cost allot if you go direct to a solicitor but some companies offer fixed rate eviction services so you can pay set fees to evict tenants.
Of course I asked if they did this which they do. Now this seems to me to be the last chance saloon for landlords who have decided not to take out rent guarantee when renting their property. I much prefer knowing that I have Rent Guarantee which also includes legal cover for this type of event rather than not having it and then finding myself having to pay fees to evict tenants and get my property back.
Rent guarantee isn't for everyone though, I am guessing some people wont want to pay for it. So for those people who find themselves in the tricky situation where no rent guarantee is in place and the worst happens they can appoint a fixed fee eviction service specialist such as LetSafe Complete Landlord Legal Protection Services. It's a bit of a mouthful but if you go on to their site you can just hit legal services from the menu and it takes you to the eviction services section where all is explained. heres the link if you need it:
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=623
Now some of it is pretty technical and some of the writing is a bit heavy for someone like me (not thick just new to the game), if you are an experienced landlord or landlady or letting agent you will probably have no problem with it. I did ask if it could be put in simpler terms and was told that most of it is written like that for legal correctness. I accepted this and took the time to read it fully. After a while it did sink in. My advice on this would be to use it in the stages it is designed for. So for example if it is the first step to evict tenants you need then go to the legal page and look at stage one. Reading it all at once can be a bit much. Focus on the bits you need. Another bonus to LetSafe, all their services and products can be taken piece meal rather than having to put all your eggs in one basket. Although it must be said I have found that all my eggs are in their basket as I haven't found a competitor as worthy of my business, small though that business is.
I'll deal with it in stages so you will see how I worked my way round the legal cover question:
Stage 1 seems to be letters or notices going out to the tenant you wish to evict. After LetSafe receive your instruction to evict tenants on your behalf they will review the case and will then serve notices on all tenants as well as any guarantors. This notice effectively requires them to pay the outstanding rent within 14 days and/or to end the tenancy.
These are the first stages to evict tenants and I have looked around at other sites and they all say the same so I think we can take this as gospel.
Stage 2 is all about your day in court. If your tenants have not paid you the backed up rent or not entered in to an arrangement with you to pay up then LetSafe will appoint their solicitors to prepare court papers. This is done to get you a combined possession and judgment order against your tenants. Now I said your day in court but realistically they will appoint an advocate (representative) to appear in court for you at the hearing.
Stage 3 is send the boys round time. If the tenants fail to leave your property and haven't obeyed the court order, LetSafe will arrange for court bailiffs to get involved. The bailiffs who are all court registered (I had visions of men with bats until I asked) will turn up at your property and remove the tenants you want to evict from your property so you can then get on with the job of getting it rented out again. This time round get rent guarantee :o)
Now as I said this was all very informative and interesting. Have a look for yourself so you can see what is involved links below for you:
Legal Services Home Page
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=623
Information about stage 1
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=638
Information about stage 2
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=650
Information about stage 3
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=651
There are times when fixed fees cant apply so make sure you are aware of this, visit this link for details:
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=656
Now on to my situation, as I said I have Rent Guarantee from LetSafe in place on both properties I am looking after and if you have been paying attention you will have read that Rent Guarantee from LetSafe includes Legal Cover for Landlords.
A quick run down of the cover I got can be found here:
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=625
For the full fat details use the link below, it takes you to the full policy wording:
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=730
I see this as being a good deal, not only is my rent guaranteed but if the worst happens then I have in built legal cover which is great. I also feel that it is nice to know that LetSafe, the company I am using, have people in house that have expertise on the landlord legal cover side of things so If I need to call and ask any advice I can.
If you want to read a bit in landlord friendly wording then use this link which I thought was clear and not to heavy going.
http://www.letsafe.net/default.asp?contentID=635
Hope this blog has helped someone. From my point of view it is good to know that this is all there for me if i ever need to use it, feels like I have some security sitting there if i need to evict tenants :o) with the tenant referencing and everything else I have put in place via LetSafe I hope that it will never happen though.
I will cover Buildings Insurance for landlords in the next blog, and I will share my experiences with you about that side of being a landlord/landlady then.
Off to the shops now......
Tasha.
