Information for Landlords - Let your Property in Milton Keynes
Welcome to our Landlord information page. We have aimed to cover most of the common questions we’re asked by new landlords, however if there’s anything you’re unsure about, we’d welcome you to contact us. As a letting agent, Lanes MK is well-known for our ability to provide a high-quality, reliable service.
Find out how we have collected over 99.7% of all combined rents over the past 25 years!
Valuation
Step one of the process is usually a personal visit and a lettings valuation. One of our team will visit you at your property to view it and answer any questions you may have. On top of this, we’ll provide you with a fair, honest and realistic rental valuation. Our valuations take your property and the local market into account.
This service is entirely free and no-obligation. This gives you the chance to meet us and get to know how we work.
Service Options
Our services are packaged into three simple groups. Tenant Find, Part-Managed and Full-Managed. Most of our clients prefer the Full-Managed option, finding the cost to be more than reasonable with the quality of service provided. We’ll take you through a little more detail on each of these packages below!
Tenant Find
Want to manage the tenancy yourself but need a hand finding the perfect tenant? We’ve got the service package to suit! This service includes a property appraisal, general advice, preparation of marketing details inclusive of photos and floorplans, advice on statutory compliance and a range of other services to help you find your next tenant. We’ll even complete a property inspection prior to the move-in day and oversee the signing of your tenancy agreement.
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Property Appraisal
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Marketing & Photography
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Compliance Advice & Information
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Viewings
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Tenant References
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Contracts
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Move In Inventory
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Tenant Move In
Fully Managed
Our most popular option is our fully managed package. This leaves all the hard work to us and allows you to focus on your next venture. Let us take care of everything from finding the tenant to completing meter readings and inventories. On top of all of the services mentioned above, we’ll also deal with any ongoing maintenance issues including sourcing quotes, liasing with you and the tenant and ensuring the works are completed. You’ll get access to our Property Portal which allows you to view the status of these maintenance and repair requests, as well as view payment dates and any important documents. The portal has the added bonus of being able to view all of this information for all of your properties in one, simple place! We’ll even conduct regular property inspections and feed the results back, ensuring your property is well looked after throughout the tenancy.
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Everything in Tenant Find & Part Managed
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Maintenance
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Property Inspection
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Online Portal
Part Managed
If you’d like to manage some parts of the tenancy yourself but would like help with some of the regular tasks required, our part-managed service could be perfect for you. It takes care of everything mentioned in the Tenant Finder service, but also helps to maintain the tenancy. This may include tasks such as notifying suppliers of meter readings, registering the tenant’s deposit with TDS, preparing written and photographed inventories prior to move-in date and check-out inspections at the end of the tenancy. We’ll even help to deal with any disputes or tenant issues after the tenancy has ended.
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Everything in Tenant Find
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Monthly Rent Collection
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Deposit Registration
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Utilities
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Contract Renewal
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Move Out
Marketing Options
As the premier letting agent in Milton Keynes, we’ve got a wide selection of marketing options for your property. We offer high-quality photographs, 3D floor plans and more. Once you’ve instructed us to market your property, we’ll get listings live on Rightmove and other websites within 48 hours. We always ensure that our photos and virtual tour images showcase as many exciting features as possible. Drawing on our knowledge of local marketing, we’ll also place your listing in front of as many eyes as we can.
On top of this, we’ll also use our in-office management software and app to match your property specification to potential tenants as we have on our system. Our innovative methods often find matches and build shortlists much faster than traditional methods.
Fees
We invite you to view our full fees table on the fees page. This allows you to easily compare our three main packages, and view our ad-hoc services and charges. We opt to be as transparent as we possibly can at every turn, and a part of this is ensuring you’re well aware of our fees and charges before we enter into any agreement with you.
Our fully managed service is the most popular. This is largely down to the decades of experience our team has. We have also achieved exceedingly high levels of rent collection throughout our years of renting properties in Milton Keynes. But don’t take our word for it. Read our reviews to see exactly what our clients think of us and our service!
Landlords Insurances
Rent Protection
We can offer Goodlord Rent Protection and Legal Expenses cover to any full or part managed service.
This service ensures that if something unusual happens, you’ll still receive the income you were expecting from your tenants. It also provides you with legal representation if you end up in a situation where you need to recover your property.
Situations such as rent arrears or serious damage to your property could require more than the security deposit can cover. Don’t worry – you won’t be left out of pocket. A Goodlord insurance policy will cover 100% of the income you’re owed, as well as any recovery costs that could be incurred.
Though we fully cover you in situations like this, they are incredibly rare. Due to our stringent checking and verification system for tenants, we achieve 99.7% rent collection across our entire portfolio.
Regardless, we provide this service so that you can have total peace of mind.
Buildings & Contents Insurance
We also offer a range of Buildings & Contents insurances aimed at landlords to provide peace of mind throughout the tenancy. This insurance is the perfect solution to protect your rental property in Milton Keynes, as well as any provided furnishings from any damage or breakage. Our insurance includes full accidental damage cover and property owner’s liability cover up to £2,000,000.
Compliance
As a landlord, you have certain responsibilities.
View the policies and compliance page for more info.
Consent
Before you begin looking at letting your property, you must ensure that you have obtained consent from the relevant people or organisations. For instance, you might need to consult with your insurance company, mortgage lender or landlord of a leasehold property. It’s also a good idea to prepare for any eventuality by taking out a landlord insurance policy. Your homeowner’s policy will likely not cover you if there is damage to your rental property in Milton Keynes.
Certificates
Some of your duties as a landlord must be carried out before your tenant has moved into the property. For instance, you must carry out an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) assessment in addition to obtaining Electric Installation Certificate Report (EICR) and Gas Safety Certificate and provide your tenant with a copy of the certificates.
Safety
It’s also your job to keep the property safe.
This includes carrying out an annual gas safety inspection and keeping the resulting certificate for your records.
You must also maintain the electrics throughout your property to ensure they are safe for use.
In addition, there must be at least one smoke alarm on every floor, and a carbon monoxide alarm in all rooms. You are also required to carry out frequent risk assessments when it comes to fire hazards.
If your rental property contains furniture, you must ensure that all upholstered furnishings are made from a fire-resistant material. You can check the fire resistance of your furniture by looking for the fire safe symbol on the manufacturer’s label.
Finally, you must carry out further risk assessments for Legionnaire’s disease.
Right To Rent
Directly regarding your tenants, you must ensure that they have the right to rent before you agree to let your home to them. You are also responsible for providing your tenants with a copy of the government’s ‘How to rent’ checklist, which you can print out or send via email. Once you have agreed to let your home to a tenant, you must also protect their deposit under one of three government-approved tenancy deposit protection schemes.
Repairs
While your tenants are residing in your property, you are responsible for repairs to all parts of the building. This includes many parts of the exterior, such as the drains, guttering, walls, chimney and roof. You are also responsible for ensuring that the gas, electricity and water equipment inside the building is in good working order and safe to use.
Access
You may need to access the property from time to time for inspections or to repair broken items. When you need to visit, you must give prior notice in writing, and you may need to obtain consent from your tenants. This should be done in reasonable time.
All letting agents across England and Wales are now required to belong to a redress scheme.
For more information on your landlord responsibilities, see the gov.uk website page.
