Letting Agents Poole Dorset need more rental property

Tailor Made Lettings the rental agents & property managers for Bournemouth & Poole urgently need more property to offer applicants.

Jamie Rolls of Tailor Made says "there has been a real upsurge of inquiries from applicants registering with us via web portals rightmove.com & zoopla.com Poole really has become a lifestyle destination as more people migrate from other parts of the country to work in Poole & Bournemouth. There is a tendency for people once living here to try and remain in area permanently, a reflection of the superb manner in which both towns have evolved socially as well as environmentally & sympathetically around its beaches and Harbour"

The good news for landlords is that so often you land a good tenant who feels settled and remains renting long term. The main demand is for unfurnished as people working in Poole tend not to be so transient. Tailor Made Lettings of Poole town centre is proud of the fact that they have remained a dedicated lettings specialist.

Landlords contact Tailor Made Lettings and ask for their Rental Report Analysis for the properties in the same Street as your own or if you want a wider report we can create by postcode simply supply a brief description of the type of property you have to rent. Francis Payne www.tailormadelettings.co.uk

Social media big boost to Tailor Made Lettings 3 years of intense promotion and still learning

Our Letting agency uses Social media to promote property and letting services as well as promote the beautiful town of Poole Dorset.Unfortunately its no longer possible to simply sit back behind a shopfront and wait for the customer.

If your going to live in the UK then Poole on the South Coast has to be one of the best lifestyle moves a family can make. The town has been carefully developed and great care has been take particularly around the harbour areas to maintain recreational grounds and in particular trees and tree lines, a great feature of the town is its leafy roads and stunning beach,harbour locations.

Three years ago I set out to work hard on social media promotion of my business in the knowledge that the biggest asset i had available to promote are the town's of Poole & Bournemouth. By this point in time having worked hard to gain a good presence on various media including facebook, twitter, linkedin, pinterest, google plus,flickr, panoramio & blogger the results have been very effective.All the social media are of course all used in support of the two websites we operate tailormadelettings.co.uk and sandbankslettings.co.uk yet they are there to create a public interest in what you have to say and I find myself very well supported when pointing out what a great towns Poole & Bournemouth are. Just stating this fact is an attention grabber

The results of plugging away at this form of promotion has shown a steady growth year on year and now within a time span of 24 hours a single promotion put out on the world wide web by Tailor Made will be seen not only by our followers but often by the people we follow. The results in 24 hours are around 400 views per feature or property either directly promoted or indirectly featured via links. Throw in a regular run of Photographic promotion of the area as well as our physical literature scanned to the internet and coverage is immense particularly when items are sent out daily, from early morning until late night.

In our industry there is a tendency not to train for internet promotion and often many source the job out resulting in regular robotic promotion done by persons who do not understand the industry or the business they are assisting ,therefore there is no message, instead they put out news items of national and local property interest where maybe a prospective customer raises an eyebrow then forgets within a few minutes. Most of the time the reports submitted contradict each other and are not in keeping with the message your business wants to get across. Do these agents think that retweeting every news property item in the UK will get people on board. In my opinion such practice is more likely to be viewed as spam.

In addition to social media agents use web portals. Tailor Made Lettings use Rightmove and Zoopla, property information for these portals is automatically fed from our own websites directly into the portal feed which in turn provides a good source of inquiry. Tailor Made lettings are seeing possibly 18 to 26 inquirers a day from these alone. The key at the moment is to target the Landlords as demand out strips supply by far. Agents struggle to provide choice of property for the variety of inquiries that come in. Its here that Social Media works best and the larger the following the clearer the message the better chance of attracting the Landlord with the property you need. All said and done finding the Landlord then matching property with tenant is the final result where personality rules yet spare a thought for the amount of time effort and process that goes into the many forms of promotion that an agency follows to achieve the end result.This next photo shows a cheeky promo on a friends Ferrari our magnetic promotion was on there for couple hours outside the tennis club then once we mentioned it to him, it was ordered to be removed immediately

Gone are the days where an agent sat on a busy street with a sign saying property for sale and a bunch of keys. Social media web promotion newspaper advertising need an expertise and for people like myself it has become second nature to follow internet trends and look to stay ahead or keep up with the game yet continue with physical processes to gain public awareness Francis Payne Tailor Made Letting agents The dedicated rental agency in Poole Dorset

Fast moving rental market in Poole Dorset say Poole town centre Letting Agency Tailor Made Lettings

Try finding a property to rent in Poole Dorset The task is not an easy one as anything that is left on the market for more than 7 days tends to be very over priced or simply not of a standard acceptable to the price range its in. A quick glimpse at our website is a good indication of the residential letting market today. Our Tailor Made Letting agents website only has two properties available and we anticipate both will be rented to fully vetted tenants by the end of this week. The average time to rent out a house or apartment in Poole or Bournemouth for this market is now 7 days.

These figures are based on our Poole & Bournemouth operating area over the last 6 weeks during which time we have placed tenants in 14 properties from Westcliff to Sandbanks and as far West as Lytchett. Of course in this market where demand far exceeds supply finding a tenant is easy but Landlords should still be wary as in a market where there are few properties it normally means there are a lot of dubious people seeking to rent and rigorous vetting is still the best way to eliminate risk. Historic checks and credit checking is a must no matter who the person is check them out properly and ask your agent to provide details of the checks. The other check that a property owner should look into is the actual rental value. Many agents who do not specialize in renting homes do not keep their eye on the ball and we seen last month similar property rented out next door to each other with a discrepancy of One hundred & fifty pounds a month simply because it was easier for the estate agent to offer it at the same rent it had been let for for the past 18 months. Essentially the property came vacant and because of the agent it cost the landlord owner 1800 pounds for the 12 month rental. Are you getting the correct rental This is why at Tailor Made Lettings when a property comes up for renewal we use a market rental analysis system to create a written report for that particular street and the immediate surrounding location. The analysis creates a report dating back 12 months. Essentially you feed in property details bedrooms street detached etc and stats are produced and sent to the property owner for a decision on how much rent should be asked. The system works well where a tenant is due for renewal and when faced with a report detailing surrounding similar homes and the rentals for those homes the tenant is more inclined to accept an increase or at least negotiate, whereas without such proof a request to increase rent may result in being given notice by a tenant you do not want to lose.

Tailor Made Lettings are happy to provide owners with rental analysis report for your property. To obtain your report simply email us the address of the property, brief description, number bedrooms & postcode to jamie@tailormadelettings.co.uk or phone Poole 01202 673454 to go to our website click on our name Tailor Made Letting Agents

Poole letting agents fresh advice on buy to let property market

Buy to Let Poole Dorset

The last few months has seen the property market booming in Poole Dorset. So what is happening with the the buy to let market. On the face of it the market is very good with a shortage of property and plenty of prospective tenant inquiries. Wind the clock back 5 years to the time when many property owners who invested in property couldn't sell and were then faced with having to rent their property. Turned out quite a good option because of the low interest rates. So here we are 5 years on with a mini boom and a threat of Government having to take more drastic action to slow the market down and Banks finally happy to lend to buyers. The result has been many of those owners taking advantage and cashing in and many who wanted to buy their own homes buying. In the short term this has left a shortage of rental property in the Poole Area and rents have soared. However Agents are finding they are not replenishing their stocks and seeing more move out's than move in's. Great news for those that have decided to remain Landlords or who are looking at buying a property to rent out. Through our agency we can report that our recognized professional property owners, the smart money have been buying renters. They have been making low offers and gaining high rents believing they are yet again on a rising market for the next two maybe 3 years. The shortage of rental property means that over the last few months the average period to find a tenant has reduced from 3 weeks down to 10 days providing minimal void periods for those who invest. Infact in the last 2 months we have seen 3 purchases where we have advised the buyer/landlord to negotiate as part of the deal access to show the property between exchange and completion resulting in a tenant signing up on or within days of the purchase. We have been pleased with the response to our Buy to Let comparable report/analysis and many property investors have looked at a potential property wondering if the figures quoted by the selling agent are accurate. Tailor Made Lettings given a street name and property description anywhere Poole or Bournemouth will be able to produce a written report detailing all rents asked in that street or within quarter of a mile of that location along with a few other useful stats. For instance consider Broadstone in Poole as a potential location to buy a house. The stats we have show that it is a location with fewest rentals yet has the most searches for rental property. Another trend that we are regularly seeing are end user buyers who look to Poole Dorset as a retirement location. Within the last 12 months 4 people have bought houses in and around the Lower Parkstone area with the sole intention of taking advantage of low prices renting for a number of years before re-modelling refurbishing in readiness for retirement. This trend came to my attention some years ago when a London headmaster arrived at our Sandbanks office. The client was 10 years off retirement was conscious he needed to buy now whilst still on a wage and could afford a mortgage, then in 8 years time he will start getting ready to make his move from the City to a beautiful home in a wonderful seaside town 10 minutes walk of Poole Harbour paying off the mortgage using his lump sum from his pension. Poole Dorset surely has to be one of the best places in Britain to live in. The Harbour,the beach,Purbecks, New Forest,Bournemouth town really make this a feel good area to live and to invest in. Why not call us to discuss potential locations for good investment properties 01202 673454

Poole rental agent specialists Tailor Made lettings maintain office dedicated to rental & management

Dedicated only to the rental market Our Poole Town centre office has been a dedicated rental agency from the day it opened in 1992.

Only once did I attempt to bring in a sales department. It was when my wife decided she would like to return to work. The truth was that adding several selling staff into the mix proved counter productive to my Letting business.

My rentals team are proficient and trained to be accurate administrators. Duties include important logging diarising all manner of events,regulations,important anniversaries,rent due,renewals,gas safetychecks,electricity inspections,new tenancies,expiring tenancies, maintenance,rent increases,inspections,checkouts,checkins,inventories and so much more.

Sales staff I soon found had an aversion to admin and seemed to chat most of the day. They discuss their sales,their strategies and bounce ideas around all day long about getting an instruction or promoting a property or controlling a client, they were mainly working loudly together as a team.The sales people jotted the odd notes down and had very good memory for pursuing finite issues that may or maynot caused sales to falter every aspect shouted across the office for all to hear.

All very well but having two teams in one office was causing my lettings team problems.The answer was tricky as after 12 months I had to tell my wife she had to find alternative premises to work from.

Fortunately for Tailor Made we discovered the Sandbanks Peninsula office and opened up a dedicated sales office in 2001 from where staff referred rental inquiries back to Poole Town centre branch.

Since then our interest in sales at Sandbanks has been sold, yet remains in my wifes family.

With new regulations governing every aspect of renting a property, operating a proper management system is key to dealing with larger volume. Lets face it you would not want your property to be the one that slipped through the net for something important such as building insurance,gas safety,electrical testing or tenancy renewal or notice to quit.

For the last 15 years we have used Gemini (started out as protrack) a property management package that covers every aspect of looking after property.The system is wonderful and speeds up all our processes freeing our time to promote and market empty property.

However we have grown with the system and staff are trained to use it. For instance a new member of accounts it takes approximately 6 months of working supervised to become proficient. The entire team pump in their info and record data on a daily basis. The entire history of your property under management is recorded and important events pop up out of the system at the right time and dates.

Property Management has become more complex and the need now is for specialised staff to perform specific jobs. I have been in the business since 1979 and know that to simply wake up one morning and decide to switch from Estate agency sales to rentals or do both is not conducive to good practice.

When faced with dropping everything and doing a viewing your Estate Agent sales negotiator will be up and gone as this is the reason he took the job to sell and earn large commissions, the fact that he has taken 10 repair calls,a checkout has been delayed, a tenant is locked out of the house and there are nine renewals to be done that afternoon may see the negotiator fade out of sight.

My trained staff attend regular training days and our own in-house training stems from adopted practices and techniques learned from an office with 20 years history as a dedicated rental agency using an expensive software system to make sure things are not missed and all reports are logged. Even for a dripping tap we now click on "choose the property", click choose the contractor, enter an instruction and click to send it to contractor and owner by email.

The job will be shown outstanding until a bill has been received and will disappear off the to-do screen once the bill has been paid. The Tailor Made office in Spain provides Estate Agency sales and although we offer rentals we do so on a Tenant finding service only . No management so essentially Spain is a sales office for the reasons contained above.

Landlords get it right !

To work or to Battle In summer of 1979 my mother pushed a copy of the Bournemouth echo job page under my nose telling me you have had your summer now get a job. Circled on the page an office junior job at a local estate agency. I made the call and was given an interview. On arrival at my new job there was no plush office. A ply wood screen with 10,000 pin holes, patrolled by ants and loaded with faded curling card offering shops offices and rental homes. A herringbone wooden floor and desks from the 1950s. A boss worth millions who owned 20% of property in the area and managed another 20% for old school mates. We serviced Landlords who had handed property to tenants new in the late 1940s & 50s but who had never spent a penny on the homes since. By the late 1970s the original protected tenants on regulated rents were vacating or dying. The properties were grim rotted flooring, nail sick roofs led pipes china sinks and cast iron hot water tanks. As the properties came vacant most were re-let. I organised repairs to nail sick roofs,rotted flooring,rotted windows, new kitchen sinks, gas central heating, and a lick of paint. After spending 5000.00 on a property it still looked naff but we still managed to find tenants. The result was that more often than not the properties were problematic and occupied by agrieved tenants continually complaining. I used to say that every morning I put on my tin hat ready for battle. I was rewarded with hard work, great training and the promise to myself that when I started my own business I did not want to do battle every day. Fourteen years later I was able to put that ethos into practice. No bedsits no student housing and no dilapidated homes would mean that all my energy would be concentrated on looking after nice homes and dealing with mature well mannered customers. I wanted to make work a pleasure not a chore. Find the right property choose the right occupier and if you get it right, managing the property will be smoothe and efficient. Of course many times over the years I arrived at a property that fell far below the standard required to find the type of occupier that I preferred to deal with. I was very aware that to take on a property with a load of issues was detrimental to my business so I would often quote commission rates of 17.5% way above the industry standard simply to lose the instruction. Tenant vetting was equally important and Tailor Made Lettings was the first agency in our area to provide 16 point check/48 hour referencing. Managing property is all about systems and applying risk minimization techniques that are proven to work. Experience is key and managing expectations is very important. Telling a Landlord that if he professionally cleans the carpets Tailor Made will look to ensure the tenant does the same when they vacate, follow up by a simple written pre-warning to the tenant that the owner has used a professional company to clean the carpets at a cost of two hundred pounds ready for your occupation and will expect the same courtesy when you vacate. In this instance you have managed expectations for both sides and the result will be a smoother process at the end of the tenancy with both sides aware of their responsibility. If you are about to rent your property here are some tips that are worth inquiring about before giving instruction 1. Insist on 3 references: bank, work, previous agent /landlord & a credit check. Make sure you see all three and not just the good refs. Some agents may use a referencing agency which include all these checks. Agents desperate for commission may simply want to get deal signed away and provide you with 2 good references but hold back the bad one. I get most agrieved when we turn away a tenant due to bad reference only to find they have gone to the agent down the road and been accepted. Happens all the time particularly in the multi chain agencies 2. Ask the agent to provide some comparable eveidence of rentals achieved in last 6 months for the area. Agents will quote a high rent to get the instruction then pressure you with a low rent offer because its slow to shift. An established agent will have comparable evidence to support the rental valuation and find a tenant quickly at that rent or near to it 3. Make sure you have the final say. Make it clear to the agent not to reserve your property until you have discussed and agreed the tenant is right for your property. 4. Use an agency that can provide 48 hour referencing. Longer can mean the tenant has time to see other property and your deal could fall through. Once referenced and approved by you ask the agent to set a deadline to sign the contract. Normally within 3 days of approval any longer and you need to ask why are we waiting. The worst thing you can do is wait a month until the start date to sign up then the tenant decides they do not want it. After 33 years in the business there are literally hundreds of safeguards that can be used to ensure a smoothe rental we have in place letter templates for all situations and contracts adjusted and written to cover most issues. All this with good working practice makes for happy landlords and just as important happy tenants Francis Payne