Masonknightproperties Reviews 19

I want to advise that while I had initial business with this company I have disassociated myself from them. I have tried to do so by phone and emeil but they are either ignoring my contact or blocking it. I state that I nor my company have anyhing to do with Mason Knight so do not elieve their website details, note some of the properties advertised are not theirs or in their management.

I would advise caution when renting from MasonKnightProperties. I rented a 4-bedroom house with my friends from September 2024 untill June 2025. The major issues started at the end of the tenancy and it was time to receive our deposit. We were persistently ignored and almost all of our deposit withheld, and we had to resort to using the MyDeposit Scheme to resolve this.

We were charged extortionate fees for cleaning, key replacement and garden maintenance. The property was left in a clean condition and there were claims that we had lost almost all the keys given to us when in fact we had only lost one singular key and had communicated this to them before our moving out date. Furthermore, we were charged an expensive gardening fee, despite never being provided a mower or any gardening equipment to do this ourselves. Moreover, in a vague gardening invoice (all of their invoices were vague) it claims that substantial gardening work had been done in November 2024. My friends and I are still yet to have any recollection of this supposed gardening work that took place.

Communication was poor, with long delays on deposit calculations and unclear documentation.

Through the MyDeposit Scheme we managed to claim back £500 more of our deposit.

Previous reviews show that this is a common occurrence: tenants not receiving their deposit and inadequate communication.

Please think heavily of this review before you decide to choose MasonKnight. Please rent elsewhere for peace of mind.

NO DEPOSIT RETURN

After leaving the property in a respectable manner, cleaned to a better standard than we found it and sending all the relevant bill statements our deposit was never returned.

They ignored all our emails, were uncontactable by phone or other means. Worse still we were never provided with a deposit protection number to legally get our deposit back.

Mason knight properties is an unlawful, disgraceful establishment that has stolen £2000+ of deposit form us. From reading reviews we are not alone in this experience

Please never let a property from them.

A plethora of issues with this letting agency.
Firstly, getting in contact with them is almost impossible. No one answers the phone when calling, and you cannot go to the office without an appointment- there’s no one there to talk to anyway.
It often takes two weeks to get a response to an email.
When you do get a response to an email clearly no one is keeping records. I had written confirmation (including singing of paper work) to extend my tenancy by 12 months, then 2 months before the start of the second year they proceeded to inform me they were doing showings of the property and to inform them if I planned on extending the tenancy after these 2 months were over. I had 14 months left of my tenancy according to the previous agreement. (I then had to email back and forth before getting a repeated requested to sign the contract I had already signed). The following year, I was given leaving information stating they were expecting me to move out a month earlier than discussed in previous emails.
Upon leaving the property I was required to provide ‘zero balance statements’ from my energy company - who do not provide such a thing. I eventually sorted this paperwork by providing proof from my energy company this does not exist. I waited over a week to receive confirmation they had received this and was then told to expect a final statement in 3-5 working days (on a Monday). I have waited a further 2 weeks to receive this with no correspondence.

No intention of returning deposit in full - with every attempt made to make deductions. You know it will be bad when they state “no accompanied out inspections” all they want are the keys back to move the next tenants in!
Weeks taken to receive a deposit statement and then complete with unsubstantiated deductions. Eg. Garden was overgrown when moved- no interest by MSP to make improvements but happy to charge for garden clearing on out inspection even though condition was no worse!! Also charging for house cleaning even with evidence to dispute.
Now all communication seems to have stopped - unable to call office for a meaningful conversation despite following their procedure for deposit disputes.

To further highlight their lack of care for tenants, prepared to let student move in with an outstanding electrical issue highlighted by electrician and no plans to rectify plus an out of date gas safety check when moved in. Every issue had to be chased by the tenants. By association, the faceless landlord is just as bad as there is no direct access to discuss this issues.

MKP are just scammers - if possible it’s best to stay clear! Problem is, very few agents for student accommodation in Birmingham. Could really do with some interest shown by local Trading Standards and greater help offered by the deposit scheme to expose such poor trading but it continues year on year going unchecked.

My son’s tenancy itself went smoothly and the property was well appointed.
The problem arose when it came time to have the deposit released. The agent/landlord refused to engage in any meaningful communication by email or phone, and they made no claims for deductions or reasons to withhold the deposit.

I checked myself and confirmed the deposit was lodged with mydeposits.com insured scheme (meaning the landlord, not the scheme, physically holds the money). Despite this, the agent shows no interest in initiating the release—presumably because leaving deposits “in limbo” benefits them on paper and accrues interest on very large sums.

They repeatedly ignore my son’s calls, but when I phoned from a different number they answered—until I mentioned the word “deposit.” At that point, they launched into an extremely scripted response and offered no details, not even asking which property I was calling about, which makes me suspect this happens frequently.

Fortunately, I am a landlord myself and have a legal background, so I will pursue this formally if necessary. Students and first-time renters, however, might easily give up and never see their money returned. In my view, this practice should be highlighted so others are aware.

As a student at University of Birmingham and I needed to find a place to live. MasonKnight were very helpful and they found me a great property that was safe and secure. The agent I worked with was really patient and they took the time to explain everything to me. I would definitely recommend them to other students.

We rented through Mason Knights for two years and at the end of our tenancy we received an email from them expressing how happy they were that we looked after the property so well but they would still be withholding our deposit. When we questioned why, they proceeded to ask for proof that we paid all our bills whilst living in the property - we provided them with two years worth of every bill we paid and they still refused to refund our £900 deposit. We had to raise this with the government deposit scheme through court action to force them to refund our deposit that we had rightfully secured. Within the day we reported we got our deposit plus interest back. They target students and vulnerable individuals for their properties to steal their deposits from them. They forged our gas certificate and they do NOT look after the properties or provide any maintenance. If you are a landlord or renter AVOID at all costs.

Terrible, dishonest and not respecting the law of UK. MasonKnight Properties is registered as MKP Management Ltd. and is run by CHINESE (verify details of owner Yuting Liu from UK Government website). The ex-BRITISH owner Mr. Adrian L Mason is no more involved and ceased to be part of it. Your deposit is not secure so be ready to lose atleast half or more of your deposit after your tenancy ends. They are neither a member of NRLA nor MLAS (Landlord association). Your deposits are not protected as they use unethical tactics to release deposits by getting acknowledgment from tenants. They make you sign one contract with all tenants and then deduct uneven charges after your tenancy ends. We kept property clean and tidy despite of that they charged us 584£. MKP plays these dishonest tactics with everyone of their tenants to cover fixed costs of properties when they are mostly empty in July/August. Worst experience. Now a research scholar and happy to answer questions.

Awful experience. I used these guys while I was in my second year of Univeristy. We all signed separate tenancy’s for each room. 3 people then decided Univeristy wasn’t for them and dropped out. After this they tried to bill me for the full amount of the house leaving me with nowhere to live 3 days before I was supposed to move in. They then continued to hound my parents and myself for weeks. We told them they could keep my deposit if they stopped contacting us. Crooks

Definitely a ZERO-star agent!!!
Need to avoid this agent at all costs!
They harassed the tenants and caused me so much troubles.
Rude and unprofessional staff is a headache.

Disgusting! Unprofessional, never in the office no communication, rude staff

Avoid at all costs. They are very quick to slap a huge bill on at the end of the tenancy for inflated and fictional costs. They see students as an easy target and when you question them or provide evidence to the contrary they ignore you, refuse to speak directly and threaten with solicitors. Incredibly unprofessional and make money out of unsuspecting students when they leave!

I have been waiting for months for my deposit back. I've emailed 'James' repeatedly and have still not received any reply other than please don't call in the office. When calling into the office they just direct me to email James. This is ridiculous. Would not recommend this company to any other students or anyone looking to rent. Treatment from this company is horrendous. Would give 0 stars if I could.

My d daughter rented a house with masonknights along with 2 other students last year. The process was OK but the customer service needs improvement. My main disappointment came when the direct debit of 1 month rent payment came out of my account on August 1, 2022 in error. The contract was until July 30th. I have been chasing them through email to James and Admin since August 1, 2022.. I Sent all the proof of information they needed and was told refund takes up to 7 days. Still waiting and efforts to ask when exactly I can get my money back have not been responded to. This is not the way to treat your customers.

This company is what makes Estate Agents the object of such disgust - they work on a basis of ignoring, creating confusion, bullying and intimidation - specifically with students in and around Selly Oak.
Had to deal with aftermath of students having rented a (poor quality) house from them. On checking out, the faceless agents create items of damage that don't exist and then slap extortionate charges on for the fictious damage. For example - charging £35 to change a lightbulb, or detailing that there are cobwebs in a room when they rented the house out with smashed kitchen cupboard doors.
Of course, getting to actually TALK to anyone is imposiible. They refuse to answer the phone and require everything to be dealt with via email. What's the problem there? They use pseudonyms, so there is a faceless "Peter@" or "Steve@" which basically gives them a cover to have fictious employees, who should anything goes wrong, can be easy deleted from the system.
Going back to this specific case - said students detailed a comprehensive disagreement with their "agent" over the closing report, What do Mason Knight do? They go silent, don't respond to emails then send out the odd email of "Thanks for your email. We have replied to your representative on..." without any content, detail or context. When this is challenged, they simply resort to sending solicitor letters to the students guarantors.
Now that isn't necessarily an issue, except that they decide to create hugely inflated charges with no substantiation, no reference and then decide to send the total charge for ALL students to EACH guarantor - so immediately inflating their charges by 500-600%. When details are requested, they direct people to their solicitor, who has no context, said solicitor sends them back to Mason Knight who again refuse to answer the phone or respond to emails.
This company will try and make money off creating damage, creating fear and bullying people. Interestingly, if you look on Companies House, you will find that there is NO Mason Knight Properties, so even the trading name is a front and they are hiding behind smoke screens.
What does that say about Mason Knight? Not a registered name with Companies House, emails contain only one name, they won't answer the phone or talk to anyone? Does that sound like a fully open, upfront estate agent?
Use them if you want to learn more about The Property Ombudsman, Trading Standards and how to take someone to the small claims court. If you'd rather have a quiet life - use a reputable estate agent!

Good customer service, lovely staff to deal with

Jade, Maite and K Maps were tenants in one of our property, rent was never paid on time, sometimes 4 months late, when we phoned them up, they will use excuses such as draw is not stable, but when we offer to go in and fix the problem, they refused the access for our workman. During their tenancy, Police has been called few times due to their behavior towards our member of staff. Now Maite has left the property with unpaid utility bills around 2000 pounds, and also have completely trashed the property with multiple damages such as smashed room doors, doors of fridge freezer that has been ripped off, the property was in such a state that our cleaners team of 5 had to spend 12 hours in there.The cleaning and repair bills have amounted around to £3000.00. And also we have lots bailiffs knocking on the door looking for them. County court summons has been issued against them, not because of the review, but to recover the damages and unpaid bills they have left. Quite frankly, they were the worst tenants we have had in 20 years. We want to warn any prospective landlords about these tenants and we will be contacting tenant referencing agency about them as well. And also now they are using reviews as leverage to try and get out what they want. Which we are not prepared to do, not when the tenants trashed the landlord's property and walked away with thousands of pounds of debt.
If you look at our google reviews. We have plenty of customers who are happy with our service.
We have to reply in this way as those review site such as Trustpilot is such a con, they asked small business to sign up for whooping £75.00 per month, for nothing different from what Google does. And they don't give option to business to remove themselves.

I wish I could rate this company no stars.

THE WORST STUDENT LETTING AGENCY IN SELLY OAK. Adrian and Louise Lui are soooo difficult to deal with. They are very unprofessional, immature, rude, dishonest, insulting. It's no wonder they're not part of the MLAS. If you're a person of colour please stay away they do not know how to treat all customers fairly. Very very dishonest constantly feeding us different kind of lies throughout the whole year. They did not respond to any of our concerns or issues regarding the property effectively or efficiently often ignoring our emails. Often responded to negative feedback in a very juvenile and petty way rather than attempting to resolve issues, which is highly unprofessional.

Left a negative review on Google. This agency have sent me emails threatening to take me to court for costs for cleaning and repair if I do not take down my google review. Shows just the type of dishonest and unprofessional company they are trying to cover up the truth. I have evidence of this if anyone wants to message me about this company, I am very happy to share.

Also I have evidence of them sending me a breakdown of the costs of repair which has amounted to £555. They have my deposit so have no reason to pursue costs for cleaning and repair in court. Happy to show his to anyone also.

Please stay away from them. What kind of company threatens people over google reviews? Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

The funny thing about this is that they have responded to our reviews quicker than they have ever responded to any comment or issue regarding the house which is absurd.