Getting My Deposit Back On My House..

[Krisboats]

It's called a booking fee or a holding fee. In 99% of cases it is completely non refundable. It's basically the estate agents way of making money and stopping people messing them and landlords about. The fee is to cover the cost of them setting up the deal in the first place and to cover them in the possibility of having to re-advertise for a new tenant, which in this case they will do.

If you think £150 is bad, take a look at the private letting side of life.

£100 booking fee (non-refundable)

£125 referencing fee (per person, non-refundable)

Months rent up front

Deposit equal to 1 and a half months rent (refundable subject to t&c's)

2 People moving in would lose £350 and never get it back for the effective privelage of the estate agents spending 2 minutes on the phone with your old landlord/employer and saying "hi, Mr **** is moving in, can you please forward a reference to this address?"

Even if you find someone else i wouldn't be entirely surprised if they keep your £150 and still charge the new person £150 too.

[ellingtj]

Man things are different for you guys than when I went to uni (96-00), we paid a month's rent deposit upfront and that was it, no references, no booking fee, just 27 pounds per week plus bills (which weren't much as I was mean with the heating). Seems that over the years the vultures have moved in and are now taking chunks out of you guys left right and central.

[dann2707]

Looks like that's it then. I'm such an idiot! Can't believe i've lost £150 just like that.

And I think it's because it's a student village and not like an actual house on the street. It reminds me of a Holiday camp like Haven holidays, you can tell it's cheap and there isn't a one to one communication between the tenant and landlord as it's all owned by the one company.