Tag Archives: Professional Management

05Jan 2011

Property Landlord advice: Rental Insurance for Landlords and Tenants.

⋅ 1 Comment

By Steve Roulstone

I have used these pages before to give my opinion that all Landlords should consider specialist rent guarantee Insurance to ensure that they protect their rent at a time when the best intentioned of Tenants may find themselves unable to pay because of losing their income. At the start of the New Year it has once again come to my attention (a Landlord of our office in Stafford found there Tenant in a similar position) at a time when arrears are always at their worst because of overspending at Christmas and let’s be honest who can say they have never been guilty of doing exactly the same!

Good advice!

Is exactly what every agent should give to their Landlords and unless the agent concerned is registered with the FSA as somebody qualified to give specific policy advise, then it is very much our role to make Landlords aware of what type of insurance policies are available, rather than sell any specific policy. Like it or not, current financial legislation, set up to protect our customers, only allows the majority of agents, through best advice practises, to inform our customers, our Landlords, what type of policy they should be taking usually by way of an introduction and there after leave the selling of the policies to those who are qualified and more specifically registered with the FSA.

Rental Insurance policies

So what type of policy can or should be taken by either Landlord or Tenant? so to clarify, and again only with regard to the type of policy rather than any specific product, Landlords should of course continue to insure the building and discuss with their provider what minimum contents are included, as they should still consider carpets, curtains, bathroom and kitchen fitted furniture for example. Then of course, rent and legal expenses insurance, to cover referenced Tenants who find themselves unable to pay and to cover the cost of legal action taken by Industry specialists to evict if required.

Tenant policies

And finally the policy that most forget, Tenants! All agents should have some system to try to ensure Tenants DO take a policy to cover their own contents and with the knowledge that policies exist that will cover the Landlords contents for accidental damage, a specialist policy that unless advised about, most Tenants would not know existed, it is especially important that in giving best service to our Landlords, we ensure that Tenants are indeed introduced to such a policy at all times.

Basic cover

There are of course other policies, and other considerations and items covered within differing policies, but to cover them all would need more time and space than this media provides and would endanger me of discussing specific policies rather than in general (something the FSA regulations did not intent to include but never the less does, where have we heard that before? Sorry, I meant how many times have we heard that before!) but it is our duty to ensure knowledge is available to both Landlords and Tenants at all stages of the process, so we must make sure we foster the knowledge so that we can continue to give good advice and current advice, whenever the need arises.

24Dec 2010

Christmas Wishes to Landlords and Tenants

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Steve Roulstone

It is one of my favourite times of the Year and because I spend my time writing about Tenants and Landlords and our thought provoking conversation filling Industry of ours always provides plenty of topics to write about, I thought it right to go ‘Off Piste’ for once and wish every Tenant and Landlord and anybody else who stumbles across this Property Franchise Blog a very Happy Christmas and above all a prosperous and fulfilling New Year for 2011.

New Year new hope.

No doubt in the weeks to come, we will again have plenty of ‘ammunition’ to write about and as always, your comments are welcome, but I feel this year is going to be a good one and we are going to see the stabilisation of the property industry, with sustainable levels of transactions and some relaxation of the availability of mortgages, especially in the Buy to Let market, enabling Landlords to supply what the current Rental market requires, more properties to let. After all, market forces do have a way of finding solutions.

New Topics

This will of course bring many new topics to discuss and I will endeavour to continue to supply a point of view and hopefully some helpful ones from within the Industry. I hope that as a professional Agent (there I go with that word again!) a Landlord and a Tenant and as somebody who has been a Franchisee for ten years and is now a Franchisor for nearly the last two have some valued insights and be able to consider all sides to any topic, even if my assumptions and writings cannot always be agreed with!

New roles

So to everybody who becomes a Tenant or Landlord in 2011 and indeed to everybody who becomes a letting Agent a hope your experiences are good ones and that you receive good advice, good service and find success in your new roles.

16Dec 2010

Property Landlord advice: Unlawful Eviction supports Professional Agents

⋅ 1 Comment

By Steve Roulstone

I have constantly voiced the opinion that our Industry progressively gets more professional year upon year. I was totally behind the recommendation of the Rugg review that both Landlords and Agents should be licensed and or registered having qualified in some prescribed manner. I believe the benefits will be for all to see and enjoy and enforce the movement away from unlawful activities. I also understand the current Government saying they would not pursue this policy at the moment, with the current financial situation to deal with they have bigger fish to deal with!

Breaking the Law

This week, I have had two reminders that what was recommended by the review is still important and that the review was correct to recommend the introduction of legislation in the first place. I have reported in these pages that as an industry we are moving away from horror stories and that renting has become embedded in our way of life as an acceptable and in many cases preferable way of life, but what I have heard this week has reminded me that some people still believe they can act outside of the law!

Landlord jailed

The first case concerning unlawful eviction was reported back in November and was referred to this week in a conversation with a colleague. A Landlord looking to remove a Tenant who had become a Housing Benefit applicant attempted to do so without proper recourse to legal methods and then physically removed the Tenant when they refused to move out. Oxford City Council took the appropriate action and the Landlord was charged and convicted being jailed for three months. Whilst it is always sad to hear about Landlords trying to act outside of the law, at least the Law caught up with him and justice was seen to have been done. Although of course the Tenant still had to go through the indignity of being dealt with unlawfully in the first place!

Unlawful Agent recommendations

The second case was I admit hearsay, but I have no reason to doubt the source or the motivation for telling me what had been heard, as it was bought out in normal conversation and not raised intentionally. In concerned a Local (to me) Agent, who advised a Landlord when discussing the methods of dealing with Tenants who fail to pay due rent and when discussing notices served within the Housing Act in such cases, with a sideways tap of the nose saying; ‘Of course there are always other ways of dealing with Tenants who do not pay’

Legal Methods

Well there are not! Any method of eviction which is not within the Housing Acts is of course unlawful and what amazes me is that agents should still recommend some midnight knock on the door method openly to a Landlord! Perhaps I should not be surprised that the agent concerned was not a specialist Letting Agent being involved in other aspects of the Housing Industry! So bring on the legislation and I shall report such matters that come to my attention wherever possible to further legitimate professional Landlords being recognised as just that!

03Dec 2010

Franchise News: Resolving Territory problems

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Steve Roulstone

I have spent the last few weeks seeing many prospective Franchisees as a result of the National Franchise Exhibition at the Birmingham NEC held last October. This is a very busy time of year and of course very concentrated when it comes to discussing Franchising in general and the issues that affect people when they are considering joining the growing numbers of Franchisees in this country. As I said, concentrated, because I am being asked several questions on a daily basis and one of the major issues seems to be one of cross Territory trading.

Whose customer are you?

Boundaries are of course easier to define in some industries than in others. For example, we cannot insist that a Landlord only buys his property in the Territory that we ‘own’ as part of our Franchise agreement. This is easier for example if we were delivering produce, or providing a specific service at any particular address, rather than a centralised style of Management Business, especially one that the general public are associated with as Tenants, not because we are a Franchise, but rather because as a Franchised industry, we provide a service they want, such as housing.

Whose choice is it anyway?

The question that gets asked so often is how do we cope with property that falls in a different Franchised area, but where the Landlord wants to use the services of a different Franchise than the Franchisee who ‘owns’ the area where the property is situated. This will also be a problem for some service providing Indistries, especially where Family are concerned as they are bound to want to favour their own, and indeed may not even use the Company at all if it was not for this specific relationship.

Let the customer decide!

The answer is of course common sense, well it is for us, I cannot confirm for others. At Castle Estates we offer larger areas than most from the start, this means that our boundaries are always further from the central point (Office location) than others that operate within our (Management) Industry. This greatly reduces the chances of cross border problems, especially as we try to link areas that are both socially as well as geographically linked. But at the end of the day, by allowing the customer to decide and by accepting that it is the relationship with the preferred Franchisee that has given the opportunity for the business to be enjoyed by the brand in the first place, we ensure the customer (which for us means the Landlord) makes the decision.

Consequences

All we ask is the courtesy of advising your neighbour of what is happening, which again, because of the size of territory we offer, usually means co-operation in marketing anyway! Of course the other result of larger Territories is that we do not encourage cross border trading, as most of the Franchisees activity is bound to be close to the centre of operation and when borders are correctly positioned, for example, wherever possible, NOT through the centre of Towns and Cities, the risk is greatly reduced.

 

24Nov 2010

Rental Issues: Tenants Protected against defaulting Borrowers

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Mike Edwards

Tenants will no longer be at the same risk of losing their home with little warning if their landlord defaults on their mortgage, because new rules have come into force giving judges the power to delay repossessions in order to give tenants time to find a new home.

Prior to the change           

People could previously be evicted from rental properties relatively quickly if their landlord defaulted on the mortgage and had failed to inform their lender that they were renting out the property. In most cases tenants were totally unaware of the situation until a Court Summons was received or bailiffs arrived to enforce the Court

New Legislation

Under new rules tenants with a valid tenancy will be able to attend Court possession hearings for the first time. Judges will be able to take their situation into account and delay repossession by up to two months though but even now if a lender is seeking possession under Ground 2 it is 2 months notice and only then can proceedings commence. However the tenant may be unaware that proceedings have commenced.       

Lenders must also ensure tenants know that their home is going to be repossessed by sending a letter to the property giving them notice of a court hearing date. Again however having said that lenders have been under such an obligation since the Civil Procedure Rules were changed many years ago requiring lenders to write to the property addressing the letter to The Occupier.

This letter should be sent at the earliest possible opportunity when it becomes apparent that a lender is likely to institute proceedings against a borrower but most lenders have consistently failed to do so only advising of the proceedings very shortly before they were listed or even after the event thus adding to the problems.

The end Result

Once a repossession order has been granted, the lender must without fail send a second letter to the property telling tenants they have a warrant for its possession.
The tenant can then request a delay of up to two months if they have not previously had the opportunity to do so and this is the big change introduced by the new rules.

16Nov 2010

Franchise News: New Board Launch

⋅ 2 Comments

By Steve Roulstone

Twice a year all of the Castle Estates offices get together for a Network Day and later this week we will be holding our autumn meeting in Birmingham. These are days that I always look forward to and once again we will have a busy day ahead of us, with presenters from all aspects of our Industry and new ideas being discussed whilst old acquaintances catch up with each other.

Network Day agenda

We will be looking at new Landlord marketing ideas as well as reviewing the plans discussed last Spring, discussing the Tenants Deposit Scheme with a senior representative from one of the Government approved schemes, looking at how an Insurance and Referencing Company who we do not currently employ can possible give us better service and discussing new training methods as well as catching up with the current training schedule and planning. Not forgetting to mark the progress we continue to strive for in our web profile. A busy day for all!

Board Launch

But the most exciting part of the day for me, will be the launch of our new ‘To Let’ board, pictured above. Of course, as offices have needed to replenish supplies, they have started to use the new board over the last two months, but we still need to mark that official moment in time when the old boards are no longer available and because we have advertised the event, with most offices having the ability to comment about the design over the last six months, our offices will be ready for the change and order new stock without delay.

Marking the new era.

This is what is most significant for me, as a group we are now focused with the future in mind and the new board for me is the centre of that focus, significant in its message and new style of design, it mirrors the way in which Castle Estates has changed over the last 18 months and is a visual declaration of our intent to move in to a new era of style and Management. Bring on the future!

08Nov 2010

Property Landlord Advice: Buying the right house for Renting.

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Steve Roulstone

As the property sales market begins to recover, Landlords are starting to make that decision to look at buying property to rent. There is no doubt that there are more and more Tenants looking for property as renting becomes a safer option in these difficult times, and because of the number of Landlords who rented property when the sales market collapsed, quite a number of these are in effect, first time investment buyers.

What makes the perfect property?

 Of course, not every house is right for the rental market and at Castle Estates we have noticed that many Landlords who rented for the first time are now selling the original property and looking for a better investment house to offer to the market, a property which is more liable to rent and will give a better percentage return.

Good property advice

But it is what your agent does for you at this stage, which could define the standard of agent you are dealing with, because our advice should go past a rental value and pure safety advice, we should be discussing what changes can be made to make it more attractive and cause it to stand out against other property available at any given time!

TV not always wrong.

I know that at many of our offices, we also advise on decoration and carpets, gardening and amenities, because it is not just a case of making the best of what is available, rather to make what is available the best!  There are many programmes on property at the moment all trying to look at appearance from differing viewpoints, but at the end of the day, the basic advice they give holds true. Prepare for the market, not for ourselves!

Inherited family home.

This is also true when we are asked to comment on inherited property where circumstances usually make the situation more personal and therefore more difficult, but good advice is good advice and so many times business is gained because our customers see that in the long term it is in their interest to make the changes now!

Tenants appreciate good houses.

And so we rent them quicker and because work is carried out before we rent, Tenants can also see that the owner cares about the property. To me, this is natural reaction; the better a house is cared for the better Tenants will appreciate the house. The end result, by concentrating on key areas and giving practical advice gained through experience, the better service we offer and the better the Tenant will look after the property. I call that a result!

29Oct 2010

Franchise exhibition observations

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Nick Strong, Franweb.

It was fascinating for all that attended the national franchise exhibition this year to see how the economic conditions we are going through are affecting the community.

Far from being negative the mood of franchisors on their stands and delegate visitors considering business format franchising as their future was brisk and buoyant.

Steve Roulstone, MD of Castle Estates, commented, “The show has been very busy as has our stand.  We have noticed for the first time an increased number of would be franchisees aged thirty years old and under.  We are excited about the focus and quality of visitor and have already set up some very promising meetings”.

Other franchisor exhibitors I spoke to echoed much of what Steve Roulstone had to say. 

The increase in activity at the national franchise exhibition in both exhibitors and visitors is also reflected on line.  Fro my own business www.SelectYourFranchise.com we have seen a huge increase in buyer visits to our websites and a steady increase of franchisor advertisers in recent months. In fact, buyer visitors to our websites in September 2010 increase by 50% compared to the same month in 2009 and more leads were generated than in any September going back to 2006.

 The economy may be flat but franchise business certainly is not.  The franchise department leaders of the banks have made it clear that they have money to lend to well qualified franchisees and suitable franchisors. Clearly every franchisor should select suitable franchisees carefully and every franchise buyer should go through personal and franchise system due diligence before entering into contract, training and trading.

 It is great to see a go ahead attitude and the franchise community is clearly demonstrating this.  Franchise community leads are cautiously optimistic about the future.  The key is to work hard, follow the proven system and work together for the common good.  This is good franchising.

 

29Oct 2010

Franchise News: Franchising successes

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Kendall Braddock HSBC Franchising Department

Out with a Bang

As the year draws to a close we look at how the UK franchising sector fared during 2010. Now the nights are drawing in and bonfire night is just round the corner – a sure sign that the end of the year isn’t far away.  I thought I would reflect on how the UK franchising sector has fared during 2010.

Hard Times?

There is no denying that 2010 has been a difficult year for UK businesses.  The economic recession forced sweeping changes in strategy for many businesses, add to this the uncertainty of a general election, increased unemployment and reported lack of available credit and it’s not surprising many firms have struggled. However, franchising has remained fairly resilient during these difficult times.  This is mainly due to the wide spectrum of industries covered by franchised businesses, the strength of the business model and the support provided by franchisors and other franchisees within the same networks. 

Evidence of Hard work

Nowhere is this success more evident than this year’s bfa HSBC Franchisee of the Year Awards.  Financial stability and growth, innovation, creativity and the relentless pursuit of success were just a few traits demonstrated by this year’s finalists.   The overall winner, Gerald Thompson of McDonalds showed that the key to his success is building a relationship with his local community. 

Achieving results

Despite being part of a global corporation, he has successfully created local restaurants for local communities through his involvement with a number of local youth football teams, contributing to local prison programmes and proactively engaging with young people with activities such as a Midnight Basketball Initiative. This is just one example of the strength of franchising and HSBC has seen this repeated many times during the years we have been involved with the sector.

21Oct 2010

Franchise News: Franchising appealing to younger entrepreneurs.

⋅ Leave a Comment

By Steve Roulstone

I have been attending the National Franchise Exhibition for several years now and there is no doubt in my mind that the age of those attending is dropping year by year, with for me, a definable difference this time around. I have already commented in these posts that the quality of attendee was very high this year and therefore having spoken to many people between twenty and thirty years of age, it confirms that the younger entrepreneur is no different in researching the potential offered by Franchising than anybody else.

Recognition for the Industry.

I have searched the internet for proof of my beliefs through the written word or quoted statistics, but can find nothing to back up my feeling, but for me, being convinced through what I experienced myself, it looks as if the facts behind the ability for Franchising to offer such a higher success rate for new Business is beginning to be seen and hopefully appreciated by a younger market.  

New Initiatives?

And with new initiatives supporting  the Industry due to be announced  in November as well, although as yet the context and content is not known, good support schemes can only legitimise the Franchising route to being the owner of your own Company for a wider market of would be entrepreneurs.

Age should be no barrier.

It is of course just as important for us to treat everybody in the same way when as Franchisors we look at the attributes of every applicant we see, regardless of age or any other definable characteristic. But experience has to be taken in too account and without being ageist, I will continue to consider the individual qualities of every potential Franchisee I meet. It would be a tough call if like the X Factor, I had to recommend to somebody that they ‘Came back next year’ or something similar but because Franchising is very much a two way street, I would continue to take this approach with everybody who approaches us.

Franchising will be the benefactor.

But normal evaluation aside, I firmly believe that a younger more dynamic age group seriously considering our market place has got to be good for the whole industry. Whatever sector is considered, a drop in the average age of Franchisees has got to be welcomed.