Stonehouse Lettings Reviews 156

AVOID THIS AGENCY if you want to keep your nerves and deposit

I have dealt with a few letting agencies, however Stonehouse were the worst, a nightmare.

During the tenancy they "lost" my emails, ignored my questions, showed up after less than 24 hour notice (breach of the contract). A few times they also advised an inspection, but cancelled the very last minute or they did not even show up (they did not pick up when I tried phoning just before 4pm to see if anyone will be stopping by and they replied to my email a few days later - I took a day off and it ended up being wasted). They change the property managers frequently, so you never know who to contact and when I asked once who is my new property manager, I received a very rude reply. They also asked me to overpay, but when I asked for my money to be returned, they wanted to charge me a transaction fee.

However, the absolute worst was leaving them.
The checkout report was done without my presence (due to COVID, I do understand that). The report itself was disgraceful, completed well after I already left the property, it completely disregarded the check-in report and listed things that were beyond my control. They attempted to charge me the most unreasonable things.
The whole thing went to adjudication process and during it this greedy and incompetent agency came up with ridiculous excuses and prolonged the process as long as they could.

ADVICE: AVOID them at all costs, however, if you are already stuck with them - TAKE PHOTOS AND VIDEOS and make sure they are dated!

This is a disgraceful agency and they should not be allowed to operate.

They provided us the inventory checkout report after almost two months when we left the property and they made deduction from our deposit for the things that happened during these two months period (just created in the property during this period) and these things were beyond our control. They even didn’t listen to justifications and just blame the tenant to pay for those things which were the responsibility of stonehouse.

Except for the above their overall services during the tenancy were rubbish.

I wouldn’t recommend stonehouse. Please stay away.

We rented our property using Stonehouse Lettings and received abysmal service throughout. Issues we encountered:

1. Staff were Incompetent and did not demonstrate any care for the fact that they were looking after a big and financial asset on your behalf. The staff had no idea of the rules or regulations surrounding landlord and tenancy and almost certainly were put into jobs with little to no training for the job.

2. We were continually handed exorbitant quotes and invoices for work on the property with no prior advice from Stonehouse, or approval from ourselves that the work should be even be performed. When we challenged these quotes and invoices we frequently were surprised to discover that the tenant requests were just be acted upon without first being validated as genuine, or for the genuine issues was even the best course of action in the interest of both tennents and landlord i.e. they allowed their trades people to simply 'decide.'

3. Inventory management was beyond disgraceful. On returning to our property we discovered that the check out reports, done by a third party, were of a substandard quality resulting in us having to pay a huge outlay for items that should have been included in the report and covered within the remit of the tennents deposit.. This included the tennent having done poor quality DIY on our property that was never approved, damaged doors, a carpet lifted and irreparable damaged, and fixtures and fittings clearly stolen. When we made an official complaint, Stonehouse blanked our emails with illogical and nonsensical responses from a variety of different people all of whom clearly just wanted us to go away.

In summary, I would stay well clear of this organisation and I personally will never use them again. The customer service is dreadful, management ineffectual, and returned our property to us in a terrible condition never before experienced with a letting agency.

They switched my electric from a company I was happy with for years to sparks who have made my life utter hell and no idea when or if I will ever get away from them. I own the flat and took it back. they didnt tell me they had switched electric when the tenant had moved out, they just did it I imagine for a bung from sparks. they say this is policy so be v aware.

I would not touch they guys again
I didnt get my keys on the day stated because they had been late giving me yet another form to fill in which i had to chase up
Travelled to aberdeen with packed car and 2 dogs
was still waiting at 3pm to get the keys by 3.30 i told them that i no longer wanted the property
They didn't seem to worried about it ,at no point did they put themself out to try and put there mistake right all the onous was on me .
I had broadband box being delivered to what i though was my new address when i asked if someone could go and collect it for me i was told that they would not be making any special trip it would be collected next time they had a viewing
remember im not in because of there incompetence
Very very bad exoerience
Of course the landlord wont know any of this

Oh my god. Do not go near these scammers. Tried to take our full deposit and had the cheek to ask us for more money on top of it. Luckily we appealed and got our money back. Please be careful, what Stonehouse do should be totally illegal. It scares me to think how many tenants just accept that there deposit is gone and don't fight it.

STAY AWAY Absolutely unprofessional. Weeks before moving in I listed several major issues that they said would all be addressed before move in. They blatantly lied and had no intention of having anything fixed and ready. Upon move-in the dishwasher and clothes dryer were still broken along with countless lights and beeping fire alarms. Shower without hot water etc... etc... After several weeks of constant reminders there is still numerous items not fixed. How quick they are to charge you if your rent is a day late but how slow they are to prepare and fix items. Abysmal.

Stay away unless you have your deposit to spare! The check in report listed many but not all pre-existing damages. It doesn't keep them from charging them fully in the check out report. Plus exorbitant cleaning cost for light dust, which most likely settled in the few days between move out and check out inventory taking.

Worst ever agent. Don't ever please!

Absolutely terrible. The check-in inventory report missed half of the issues, which then got reported as tenant's fault in the check-out inventory report. And even though I have noted some the additional issues when moved in and let the agency know, they just ignored that and still deceitfully charged me for pre-existing issues when moving out.

Avoid at all costs, otherwise make sure to take photos of any tiniest speck of dust and any other issues no matter how small or you will be blamed and charged ridiculous amounts. These sharks will try to take every last penny from you.

Awful people who were rude and took every liberty throughout our tenancy.
Tried to bill us for changes to the property during our stay there as if they were repairs, I spent a considerable amount of time getting them to waive the fees because the faults in the property were present when we signed for it and not caused by us.

Turns out they didn’t waive the fees: instead they’ve just decided not to give us our deposit back and billed us nearly £400 for “cleaning” a house that we left spotless, having spent 24hrs ourselves giving it a thorough clean having kept it tidy all year.

Going to have to dispute this now at an additional demand on my time. Avoid this company at all cost!