★★★★★ 1/5
View AgentsDisgusting Letting Agent
Stay away. NOT recommended at all. Rubbish and disgusting. Rented two properties over 8 years. They are completely biased towards the landlords and extremely negligent towards the tenants. If I hadn't moved out of UK, I would have taken them to court. You can't expect to be paying £1200/month rent and live in a dilapidated property with unwanted mould mushrooms growing in the house. My partner and I ended up suffering witn respiratory problems for years. I have rented properties in third world countries with far better experiences. This review is solely to warn people against this flouted concept of letting agents who after signing the contract are only concerned about rent. This review is not false. I have lease agreements from both the properties. Rowley Roche Associates Solihull are the worst agents in the history of mankind.
RB · 17 December 2015
Agent replied · 14 January 2016
So disappointing to see a comment like this and that clearly contradicts itself! If we were not a good agent then you would not have rented another property through ourselves. Its very sad that a tenant is upset at the end of a tenancy but unfortunately a property needs to be left clean and tidy at the end of a tenancy as they would expect it to be when they move in.
★★★★★ 2/5
View AgentsWatch Out!
Don't be caught out with this agent, when renting - substandard property in Solihull at high rental price and spurious admin charges, Make sure you're not paying top £££ for a literal sh*th0l3. Make sure you take a well-detailed photo inventory (at least 50 pictures per room - you'll need it later) on move in day and have it added to the formal inventory with written evidence. Ensure they do not fob this off - get it recorded with evidence i.e. photos on a CD with move-in date stamp.
Check the first draft of their inventory THOROUGHLY, it will likely be substandard with lots of errors and most things recorded as grade 1 (new conditions) when they're not. The onus is on you to highlight this otherwise it will come back and bite you at the end of tenancy. Have every single details recorded on the inventory no matter how trivial and get photo-evidence. That faint light grey streak on the wall that don't seem to mean anything, get it recorded and take a picture, trust me, they will want the whole wall repainted at end of tenancy (plus £40 admin charge) for this. Rule of thumb - record EVERYTHING, I mean EVERYTHING!
DO NOT rely on any phone discussions with this agent, if you have a complaint or need something fixing, send every request via email or follow up every discussion with email. and be sure they confirm via a reply. it is not trivial, it is not pedantic, YOU WILL NEED IT.. Do not accept excuses for not replying to your email.. Even when they call you regarding the email, still get them to send an email response.
Your deposit, remember this is your money. Ensure you get proof this is in a deposit protection scheme and get evidence with the scheme being used the money has been deposit at the appropriate time, not 6 weeks later. Watch out when you do end of tenancy cleaning, charge against your deposit will be tried on regardless of how well the cleaning has been done (see earlier point about well documented move-in pictures). Your deposit is not meant to improve the property after tenancy end!
On move out day, allocate the whole day to go through the check out with them, DO NOT DO a quick tour, hand over the keys and leave with their assurance that "everything seems ok" - this will come back and sting you. Get them to check and record every single details and complaints on the check out date and insist they sign this as the final record. DO NOT BUY the line about camera running out of battery and needing to come back the next day - your move out day is when you stop being responsible for the property!
Chris · 6 February 2016
Agent replied · 29 April 2016
All tenants have 14 days to add any comments and notes to the original inventory and we are happy to accept additional photos to the inventory as you provided Chris. However as previously mentioned we ensure properties are of the best standards possible at the beginning of a tenancy and expect them to be of the same clean condition at the end of a tenancy. All our deposits are insured with The Deposit Protection Service which is there to protect tenants deposits and also offers a free dispute service should you not agree to any requested deductions at the end of a tenancy.
