Lettings 101 Property Portals: How do landlords find tenants?

So, you have a rental property to let out. Now to find the tenants to rent it. So as a landlord how do you find tenants, well step 1 you need to advertise. Property marketing involves many elements including photography, viewings, property adverts and enquiry management. For today we are going to focus on advertising through property portals. You can think of property portals as your magic access to tenants.

Where can you advertise your letting property?

If you are working with a letting agent then they will advertise your property in two main ways. Firstly, through their company channels, this might include their website, social media, existing tenant list or indeed their network. Secondly, they will use property portals. Most agents will use a mixture of portals which might include:

• Rightmove
• Zoopla
• Prime location
• On the Market

There are many more to choose from, but these are some of the biggest and most common choices. As letting agents, we are often asked which portal is best and if your property needs to be on all portals. Firstly, most of the portals are much of a muchness, some tend to be slightly more focused towards one property type or more popular with different age groups, etc. But these variations are very minor. Secondly, no, you don’t have to be on all platforms. Many potential tenants will search on multiple platforms and hence will see you regardless of which one you are on. It is not uncommon for us to receive an enquiry from the same person, about the same property but from two different platforms. That said if you are working with a letting agent, they will often look to put you on a few different ones to get plenty of exposure and interest. This doesn’t mean you need to be on every single property portal.

The other common question we get is whether different portals attract more or less favourable applicants. The harsh truth is, no, it is the quality and standard of your property which impacts the type of applicants you receive rather than the property portal you use. As above, we often have the same applicants contact us on multiple portals.

Advertising your rental property privately

As a landlord, if you wish to advertise and rent your property privately, i.e., not through a letting agent, then you have a different set of website choices. If you are going it alone then you will need to advertise through landlord only advertising options such as Open Rent. You will not be able to advertise through most property portals. There are lots of options here, and many are targeted to suit specific types of rental properties or setups, for example, student-focused sites, or lodger focused sites such as Spare Room.

You could also advertise through social media on groups or similar. If you use social media already, particularly Facebook, you will have seen a massive number of people asking about private landlords and looking to rent directly rather than through a letting agent. Many of these requests seem to focus on avoiding letting agents altogether… now why might that be?

It may be a simple case of they have had bad experiences with letting agents in the past and worried about going through that again. There are plenty of unscrupulous letting agencies out there, although much legislation as been brought in to combat this. Or it could be that they still think that letting agents will charge high fees for tenant referencing and the like, however, legislative changes brought in a couple of years ago now means letting agents aren’t allowed to charge for these things. Or it could be that the person has a reason for wanting to avoid an agent such as something in their credit file or due to a falling out with the previous landlord.

In fact there could be any number of reasons why someone is looking to avoid the careful checking process of a letting agency. Many of these reasons are harmless but some could be hugely detrimental to you as a landlord either due to an issue with rent payment and income or due to damage to the property or similar. What if they are a hoarder? What if they have a track record of leaving properties with rent arrears? What if they are an axe-murder? Ok, that last one might be unlikely but without proper due diligence and checks, you won’t know.

If you wish to rent your property privately and without any involvement from a letting agent, then my top advice is to make sure you have done every check you could possibly think of. And my personal advice is simply don’t risk it, use a letting agent.

To find out more about how we can help give us a call or get in touch today.