College & County

Reviews

• one of the worst experiences I've ever had

  I rented a newly converted basement flat with College and County, who misled me into thinking it was a separate unit when the electricity was shared with the upstairs property. The water board and council had not been notified that the house had been split. Cowboy builders had not put in any ventilation in the closet toilet nor made any provision for soundproofing - so I could follow the conversations of the students staying upstairs. The noise from their stereo caused light fittings to come loose from the ceiling and smash, and door slamming caved in the window above the front door. In breach of the Data Protection Act they also disclosed my telephone number to the students who had infuriated me for months. My letters (by registered post) to the agent stating that (not unreasonably) I wanted to leave were ignored until I stopped the direct debit - at which point I was smugly told that if I wanted to leave before my contract ended I should contact a lawyer. Not wanting to spend the money on this I did some reading of various housing acts and a call to the Council revealed that Building Regulations had not been sought, so the property was visited by a couple of inspectors. Now the house will have to be either converted back into one property, or the building work done to conform with regulations - which I see as a small moral victory. I don't know of anyone else letting with College and County so it is possible that others have fared better, but an Environmental Health Officer knew well the name of one of the partners at the agency, which suggests that he regularly has to inspect properties managed by this company.

  10

  Howard W.
  Review Date: 01/12/2009 Report review