Property Concept (Estate Agents in general)

Member Name: Michael

Product:	Estate Agents in general
Date:	12/09/09 (8 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Nice Range of Properties

Disadvantages: Expensive, Terrible Communication, Rude, Arrogant

Property Concept are by far the worst organisation I have ever dealt with when letting a property. The company demand relatively high fees in relation to their competitors therefore it would be fair to assume a higher standard of service reflected these prices. In my experience I found completely the opposite. Their communication is, at best, appalling. I must point out this is not in terms of lack of it, but to the effect of receiving so much of it that it left me wishing for an end to the ordeal after days. I was inundated with questions asking the same information on a continual basis, mostly with "call us urgently" this even after personally going into the office to clarify the terms, I began wishing I had never started the process.

To further complicate matters I received a call telling me that property concept had in fact conveyed a 12 month lease to the landlord for me even though I'd asked for a 6 month and this was the offer that had been accepted. I told them that this was not the offer I had authorised them to make, the one I had put my agency fee down to agree, and that I wished to withdraw from proceedings. I was promptly told that if I did this I would not receive any of my £320 agency fee back.

Now I want to emphasize here, that despite me affirming several times the terms of my offer, over the phone and in person still made the wrong offer and then informed me effectively this was my problem so would lose my fee if I withdrew.

decided I didn't want to lose the money I had put down, or go through the hassle that would surely come with fighting them, so asked what we could do to resolve the issue. Incredibly the agency gave me the landlord's number, I believe something they are explicitly not supposed to do. In my phone call to the landlord, I found out that the contract length had apparently changed several times and they had been told the tenant (myself) had been responsible for this. This interestedly me greatly as to my memory I hadn't changed it once.

Days later we arranged for a viewing to inspect work done on the property before we moved in. Shortly before this meeting I received a phone call telling me that we couldn't view the property because the flat had already been taken.

Seeing as I had my agency fee paid this surprised me. Turns out that the person who had taken the property was myself. So the estate agent was, in fact, ringing to cancel my viewing of the property because I had taken it.

Summary: Worst property ogansiation I have ever come across