Rate Your Landlord 2011 – University of Sussex Students’ Union
Recommendations On the basis of these findings, we have a number of specific recommendations to improve the experiences of students living in the private rented sector. Such improvement would not only be beneficial for students themselves, but would additionally result in a positive impact on local community cohesion.
Greater regulation of those renting out properties Given that private landlords appear to be providing a far superior service than letting agents in the local area, which can arguably be attributed to the large number of these landlords are found through StudentPad (and therefore subject to a Code of Standards based on those of Unipol), we recommend that there be greater regulation of all those renting out property privately in order to elevate standards in the sector and ensure consistency of service to tenants. As long as accreditation and adherence to key principles of minimum standards of service are voluntary, students and others renting privately will continue to be a ‘captive market’, and where demand exceeds supply, landlords - and particularly letting agents - will continue to be able to provide students with substandard service with little practical recourse for tenants.
Establish voluntary accreditation schemes as an interim measure As an interim measure before full, national implementation of a regulatory scheme, we recommend that local councils establish voluntary accreditation schemes and that these are widely publicised to students and the wider population in order to enable house hunters to be more discerning, making more informed choices about who to rent from.
Use publicised research to drive up standards Greater use of surveys such as Rate Your Landlord could serve to generate competition based on tenant satisfaction throughout the tenancy, as opposed to the current situation where the only thing that appears to matter to many letting agents is getting a contract signed. This skewed focus arguably results in aggressive marketing tactics and high levels of dissatisfaction among students. Students are often seen to be a transient community, and it appears that letting agents and landlords feel that providing an inadequate service to students once their tenancy has begun will have little impact on their future success and profitability. Greater use of satisfaction surveys and better publicity of the results could help to produce a culture change in this area.
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