From my experience:
1. Your agent will NOT persue this for you. The odds are so weighted in favour of the defaulting tenant, that from the Agent's perspective they are better off letting you and your tenants business slide off their books than try and persue them for the money owed.
2. The agent's time is more profitably spent persuing new business than chasing up non-paying tenants. (Though they will not tell you this). They will palm you off with inaction, until you eventually tire and sever the contract.
3. Unless you are a wealthy property magnate with multiple properties being managed and let through this agent, they will almost certainly let this one go rather than chase it up.
4. It takes a minimum of three months to evict anyone, and over a year to extract the unpaid rent through the courts. (Provided you have the patience to persue them through the courts).
My advice:
These guys will almost certainly evaporate off the face of the earth as soon as you eventually get them out. So perepare for the worst, and equip yourself with as much pertinent information about them as you can before they disappear. You will need this info to trace them, and eventually bring them to court before you will see any of the money owed.
Even then, it will take at least 12 months to bring them to court, and any money owed will be paid back to you drip by drip, month by month directy from their wages via a court order (Provided they have a job). If they are unemployed, then kiss the money goodbye and move on...
What to do:
1. Forget the agent, they will not persue this for you. They will write it off, and move on. Any court proceedings will need to be initiated by you. The first step to getting your money back through the courts, it to keep tabs on who exactly the individual is who owes you, and where exactly they go to next...
2. Make a landlord's visit in person ASAP. Give them the mandatory notice period for a visit, state a time and a date, and go in there with your own key. During this visit find out as much personal information as you can about your tenant(s) as you can.
Given that they owe you money, they will almost certainly not be in when you arrive. Look at the addresse's names on any mail that is lying around.
Look in particular for
- mobile phone bills,
- utility bills,
- bank statements,
- benefit records,
- payslips (Try and find out where they work, this is especially important)
- anything with a car registration on,
...any documentation with their names on. Not just the named tenanat, but anybody living in the house. Write down and record any account numbers linked to their names. It is a good idea to take a camera, and photograph it all as well (Use the macro function, and do a trial at home before you go, to make sure you can read any info from the photographs you take).
Now, this next bit sounds nuts, and it all depends on how much they owe you, but in my case it was £4k unpaid rent, so I had to do whatever it takes :-
a) Park outside the property in the evening, and look for cars coming and going. Having their car registration is on of the best ways to trace them when they disappear. (The DVLA will release the address of any registered keeper if you need it).
b) If you think they have a job, try following them to work one morning. Finding their employer is key to finally getting your money back. The court will order the money they owe to be payed to you directly from their wages.
Knowing where they work, is also key to finding out where they move to after you have evicted them. When they are finally evicted, they will not leave you a forwarding address, so they will effectively disappear off the map. If this happens, follow them home form work one evening, and you will soon find out their new address.
2. Now cut your losses. Serve them notice ASAP. Get the delivery of the notice witnessed, this is important, as you will need to prove this if you are going to persue them through the courts, and it all hinges on the [u]date[/] that notice was served. (They will claim it was lost in the post / never officially served unless you do this properly). You can pay a baliff to serve the notice properly, or serve it yourself, in person, and take a witness with you (And film the exchange).
3. Now go out and find a new agent... and start all over again.
Hope the above helps! It is important to embrace the fact that you are going to lose money over this, and [u]nobody[/] is going to help you get it back. You need to be pro-active, and find the information necessary for the courts to persue them for what they owe you.
Good luck!
[EDIT] Re-reading, I just realised the above makes me sound like a nut-case! I assure you, I am not, I just have some experience of non-paying tenants, who are a sly species - and invariably know exactly exactly what they are doing. If you need some direct help, email me (in-profile). Ive got a great satellite GPS tracker thingy you can stick under their car....
