RentLocally Reviews 35

I rented an apartment through RentLocally in Dundee, Scotland, and unfortunately my experience was very disappointing. During December and January, I had to live without proper hot water, which made daily living extremely difficult, especially in winter. I reported the issue, but there was little to no response and no effective action taken to resolve it.

The lack of communication and urgency in addressing such a basic necessity was unacceptable. Because of this, I had no choice but to move out after only two months. The only positive point was that I received my full deposit back without issues.

Overall, I would not recommend RentLocally based on my experience, as tenant concerns did not seem to be taken seriously.

We rented a property through RentLocally from 2020 during Covid and had a really positive experience. Ailsa and Clare, our Property Managers, were always quick to respond and extremely helpful whenever we needed anything.

We’ve since moved out to buy our own home in Bonnyrigg, but if we ever needed to rent again, RentLocally would be our first choice. Highly recommended!

I viewed a property managed by this company and I was interested. During the viewing, I asked the property manager if it was okay to move in after 2–3 weeks because of my current notice period. They said it was fine and asked me to proceed as soon as possible.

The next day, I paid the deposit and completed the reference checks. Everything was approved, and the property manager then asked for my moving date. I chose a date that was 15 days later.

After that, the manager said they needed to speak with the landlord. Later, I received an email saying the landlord did not agree to the move-in date, so they would refund my deposit and give the property to someone else because they had many other applicants.

In this situation, what did I do wrong? If the landlord did not agree, they should have told me the latest possible move-in date, instead of simply emailing that they had enough other applicants.

I had already informed my current landlord about my moving date. What am I supposed to do now? This is not the correct way to treat a customer.

If I could give minus stars I would, so angry I rented through these people for the time I did, the property was falling apart and we went months with holes in ceilings and Soddy repair work, but like most happy to have a roof over our head...on being ask to leave because the landlord was selling...we were hit with a deep clean bill and blamed for marks on the walls that would need repaired haha some left by their Soddy plastering jobs etc, looking back at initial moving in pics you can see these marks then and the s*it pardon my French paint jobs prior to us even moving in...no communication, mould found in property on leaving, which has perhaps added to how Ill I've been living there. The communication skills are horrendous but if they want you, be prepared to hounding even when in hospital suffering a devasting loss. Some agencys get a bad rep and don't always deserve it. I think on reading most of these reviews it can be agreed rent locally are definitely very deserving of their bad name.

Zero stars for the whole experience with a flooded property.

Avoid at all costs, absolutely useless. I rented through this company and seen it all, leaks, fire risks, I replaced an old storage heater and lights all at my own expense for the safety of my children. We have now left the property and although they never took an inventory they accused me of removing white goods; I actually left my washing machine there as there one broke and I was asked to get rid of it, which I did. The guy I was dealing with was just rude when I left the property, making accusations with no evidence but when I wanted to speak about our safety issues he was not interested.

One star is one too many! Completely wasted my time and that of my family. Refused to lease a house to me without a ‘guarantors’ signature, despite agreement six months rent in advance would be a suitable alternative.
No sign of the rental agreement until deposit and first (or first six!) months rent paid.
Requests for documents to be signed which hadn’t yet been made available to me! Told amendments to agreement had been made but hadn’t been…
Very personal questions asked.
COMPLETELY AVOID!

My child rented a property via Rent Locally but the landlord has taken over and has come up with a list of things wrong with the property, after it was cleaned and checked by 3 of their parents, photos taken.
On reading some of these reviews, it appears this is not an isolated incident, especially amongst students, where the property is throughly cleaned yet a list appears to stop the deposit being returned in full.

Have been trying to view a flat, No weekend or after 5pm viewings , absolutely ridiculous. Then take time off work to view a flat on a Tuesday afternoon the following week as that’s the only time I’ve been given. They cancelled the viewing 24hrs before and changed the time. Turn up to view the flat with another couple to view at the same time. The agent turned up with keys that didn’t open the door. Was told owner would be half an hour, waited 45 mins and nothing. No wonder this flat hasn’t sold!!! We will avoid using this agent at all costs.

Awful Experience.

Staff are unprofessional, maintenance requests and problems were left ignored for months. This was my worst experience as a renter so far.

Not great at the moment - Need to redeem themselves.

So my landlord has decided to move to rentlocally after many stress free years with the previous agents.

They emailed me at the start of February to introduce themselves and provide bank details and I specifically, and clearly told the person what the payment schedule would be for me because of my wage payment dates, and stating that first payment would be made on 28/02 which was acknowledged. So tell me why I received an unpaid rent notice yesterday (24/02)!
A suitably passive aggressive email was sent back confirming I had explained this to said person, and reiterating what my payment schedule would be going forward.

Come on guys, it can't be that difficult to send an intraoffice email to share information can it?
I'm not convinced at the moment, definitely have a long way to go to convince me you're a great company

**Edit** I have since had a THIRD email from this company about rent. Sort it out!

Extremely poor, unprofessional and vile company, they made us pay money before doing credit checks but now they refusing to give us our money back, i dont want anything to do with this vile company i just want my money back, i wish i could have checked the reviews before dealing with them.

Quite frankly, I ordinarily don't agree with most reviews of companies as you never truly know if they are true, But given that I am unemployed due to health issues that limit what work I could/can do and I am discriminated by numerous companies some less than others granted with rent but given that this one had the audacity to word it that the landlords insurances can be void and not allow benefits. Which is complete lie as that is discrimination and is against the law. They just outright want to make it that it is someone elses problem or fault and not theres. It is ridiculous and quite frankly these companies deserve too all be in court on the same day for the difficulties and homeless THEY CAUSE no one else its not the government its no one but these companies making it impossible to rent. Most want your annual income to be 30x the rent. Bare in mind an entry level job with NHS or council won't cover the cost that would be within many areas. Certainly not Edinburgh where these clowns own far too many / rent far too many of the properties. It's about time these people get disbanded as they are truly the cause of the crisis. DJ Alexander another one asking for ridiculous amounts of money using the 30x which given that unless your a couple you can't rent anywhere unless you have a gurantor who earns 34x sometimes they want 38x there income who on earth given what people earn now a days can do this? It is damn near impossible / definitely impossible. It's about time these scam artist companies are held accountable and taken too court.

As landlords, having been happily with a small agency (Edinburgh Letting) for a number of years we were passed on to Rent Locally when the owner of EdLet sold up. Despite assurances of a continued personal approach this failed to materialise, being on the end of automatically generated emails from unknown (to us) RentLocally staff. (We never met any of the staff despite a promise to meetup).

The main issue, however, was the low bar for property inspections; a less than adequate few words in an email with no supporting photographs and, as we discovered, the inspections very much did not reflect the reality of the state of the property. The last report declared “The property is being well looked after by the tenant, he appears to be cleaning regularly”. What we found a week later, bizarrely, was long term ingrained dirt in all areas of the property, particularly the bathroom and kitchen, which was the result of continued neglect. The same level of quality control was applied to the checkout when again a level of dirt and broken inventory item was accepted by RentLocally without the tenant being challenged until we raised a flag.

On the positive side they found a tenant and collected the rent for us.

RentLocally is contributing to the utter exploitation of university students that is rampant in Edinburgh.

After being good tenants for 3 years, we cleaned our flat before moving out. Then, RentLocally told us they would be deducting £510 from our deposit for professional cleaning. They did not share the supposed quote they received from the cleaning company with us, or give us any explanation as to why the cost was so exorbitant.

We left the flat in far better condition than we found it. When we moved in, there was rat faeces everywhere, yet RentLocally claimed it had been "professionally cleaned".

(I saw another reviewer who had the exact same experience - seems like this is what they do!)

Then, they tried to pay us back a deposit which was less than the deposit we had paid (even without the cleaning deduction). They had logged an incorrect, lower, amount in their deposit scheme. This was not necessarily intentional or nefarious, and may have been a clerical error. However, that makes it no more acceptable. If we had not noticed, we would have been cheated out of an additional £520.

We successfully reinstated the correct amount, and negotiated the deduction down significantly, but not without a great deal of effort and wasted time on our part. Fortunately we had photo proof of the clean state we had left the flat in.

Throughout the negotiation process, RentLocally was totally incompetent and unprofessional. Why they are so intent on unfairly squeezing every last £ out of university students is beyond me.

I attempted to rent a property in new Cumnock.
I earn £20k a month and the house was £700.
We were told due to how rural it was no one else had viewed in months.
Upon arriving we met a nice estate agent.
Upon ringing the office I spoke to someone who seemed to be very slow in guessing elderly.
She heard my age (24) and that we are self employed (6 years worth of books over a million in networth) and that because we were living with family could only supply a guarantor or financial reference, she just pulled out the card that “3 other parties were interested”
So I offered £50pcm more, the property had been reduced and she accused that of “pressuring the landlord”.
Immediately I knew this old lady had a discrimination issue.
I got my tech team to do some digging.
The night we first viewed the property (we spent £800 on a rental car and £400 on a luxury spa hotel as we were 100% certain we would get it. We even had the money laying about to pay 3-6month upfront) & wanted to experience the lovely viral local hotel we would regularly be dining at.
That very night after speaking to us they reposted the property to 4 new websites…
No other parties were interested as 6-8 weeks on the house is still available & we are going to the papers.
Blocked my huge social media’s as well.
Estate agents like this are causing the death of the UK housing market.
They are lucky we don’t sue and get compensation, probably cripple the company because by the looks of the reviews this isn’t the first issue like this.

I would happily recommend Rent Locally Edinburgh as I have found them to be professional helpful and friendly there will always be minor issues that arise with letting out a flat and I found that they were quickly resolved.

Extremely poor service and best to avoid.
I've stayed in the flat since 2020. During this time, I put up with a water boiler that was from the 70's and extremely uneconomical, I put up with them leaving me for two weeks with no hot water due to a broken boost switch, I put up with windows, some of which were only single glazed. The property was freezing and every winter, I vowed I'd move out. In November 2023, I raised a query to have the ancient heaters (from the 80s) updated. Well, it is now January, and nothing has been done. Huge amounts of poor, miscommunication, cutting corners at all angles. Their online system for repairs is a logistical nightmare, and it's highly unlikely that you'll get a repair or maintenance within 2 months. Avoid. I know I will.

The flat I rented was of a high quality and the application process was seemless. The flat was also in very good condition, a condition in which I kept it. Repairs were also done promptly.

However upon moving out, I was charged £110 from my deposit for cleaning costs, yet the flat had been professionally cleaned. 'Dirty' items included, crumbs on the floor, washing machine glass not wiped (?), and not having hoovered the wardrobe!

Very pernickity and a let down from an otherwise brilliant rental company. I left the flat in better condition than I received it ie I had many repairs completed which should have been done before my tenancy, such as fitting bath taps, fixing lights, the fridge and also having to live with a cracked bedside table. These things I did not mind, but it is quite ironic that these were acceptable but they ridiculously charged me for leaving behind a 'dirty' flat.

One of the most unprofessional, discriminate and asking you personal question that are irrelevant. I ll say the lady on the phone she was purely racist. I called them for a property inquiry on Drygate Street Larkhall and she discriminate me. Not recommended. Don't trust them see the reviews. They will also rip your money off from you.