All excellent advice.
I'd especially agree with the inventory stuff - if only to give you piece of mind when you're nearing moving out again.
When we bought recently, we were moving out of a place that I'd been renting for ten years. It was in a "only a bloke would rent this" state when I moved in, and we (me and the agent) never managed to get the inventory taken because of the amount of cr@p that was there that we had to ship back to the landlord halfway through the first year. Because of this "no inventory" I'd pretty much written off the deposit. Especially because the some of the wear-and-tear was actually accidents from us. It was a bit of a p1ss-off though.
I actually got a very pleasant surprise from the current folk at the Estate Agent when I handed in notice, though. A) They were very sad to see us go - we were top of the list in the reliable tenants chart, B) Their view was "ten years wear-and-tear, landlord never done any maintenance, no inventory = tuff sh1t on the landlord (and luckily we weren't working here when that was missed!)", and C) The landlord then proceeded to p1ss them off big time over future rent expectations and not wanting the place empty during renovation.
Yes, our deposit was in escrow or whatever it's called, and had been for a couple of years (the Estate Agent started doing this recently). Any disputes were likely to have been decided "fairly". The landlord had x days after we moved out to say "I want...". On receipt of that, we would have had x days to say "but...", and then the 3rd party body would make a binding decision based on the information they've received from us, the agent, and the landlord.
However, none of this came to pass for us. The landlord had p1ssed the agent off so much that, during the check-out, he said to me "well, she's shot herself in the foot trying to decorate before you moved out - as far as I'm concerned I can't charge you for any damage, nor for any cleaning. At the most, you ought to be liable for our time in this visit... I dunno, I'll see what I can do. I'll put in a report to say that everything is exactly as should be - next people you'll hear from should be our accounts department..."
A week later I got a call, and the accounts lady told me that I was getting the whole lot back (even the checkout fee, in the contract, was waived) and what were my bank details so that she could pay it? And then she went on to say how sorry she'd be not to have our account anymore (it appears she's the only person who'd been there all that time and so had dealt with my stuff from the begining) - I was the only tenant she'd never had to chase!
All this might be all very heart-warming to hear about, but I am aware that we had a particularly easy ride. I understand that - as long as it's being done according to the "regulations"(!) - this side of renting is getting smoother. Not sure I believe it, but we did have a good experience. Our Estate Agents turned out to be "good guys" - they weren't always, though. They were pretty naff over the years!
However, what is not included here is all the angst and heart-burn I went through (over the course of several years, at each contract renewal, leading up to us finally leaving). This would have been considerably less if I'd thought I was sat on any evidence that showed what we believed we were responsible for damaging and what we believed we weren't responsible for.
As it turned out, it was wasted angst (we didn't even pay for the stuff I would have coughed up for because I did it!), but a decent inventory and supporting evidence would have made me feel a whole lot more secure.
Anyway, good luck :D - living on your own is BRILLIANT - don't let anyone tell you you'll go crazy, they're the crazy ones and they're all out to get you, it's true, they are! :lol:
