6^th February 2020

Unprotected deposits at an all-time high

Alarmingly, a leading deposit replacement provider, Hamilton Fraser, has claimed that as much as £1.2 billion in tenant deposits could be sitting with landlords or letting agents in the UK without any form of protection. The 2019 English Housing Survey report indicated that there were around 4.6 million tenancies in the UK, of which only around 3.5 million had deposits held in protection schemes. If the average deposit is taken to be in the region of £1,130, then the value of the approximately 1.1 million tenancies with unprotected deposits would total around £1.2 billion. Another source, the Centre for Economics and Business Research, estimates that 14.5% of deposits taken by landlords and letting agents are not protected, without doubt resulting in in excess of £500 million being at risk.

As Andrew Ward, owner of Award Property Management, confirms, it’s vital that all landlords and letting agents take steps to protect the deposits they hold for tenants. ‘As letting agents in Cambridge, at Award we go to great lengths to ensure that our landlords tick all the boxes in terms of compliance,’ comments Andrew. ‘Fundamental to that is that they comply in guaranteeing that all deposit money is protected. We work with all our landlord clients to make sure that protection is in place because it is one of the cornerstones of building a really trusting relationship between tenant and landlord. Not only that, many tenants and landlords may not be aware that any tenancy that has been renewed since June 2019 should have included a reduction of their deposit to the newly capped level, which is the equivalent of five weeks’ rent in most cases.’

Award Property Management are letting agents in Cambridge, so if you’re looking for help and advice with protecting your tenants’ deposits, why not get in touch? We’d love to hear from you.