Sign this petition to ban letting agent fees

Renting in London is tough right now. It seems like every week there’s another story about a particularly shit flat getting advertised for £650pcm.

One thing that rarely gets talked about though, are the unregulated fees that renters are charged when they move in and out of properties. These fees have been banned since 2012 in Scotland, but in the UK we can get charged anything from £80 to £500 for the privilege of moving from one home to another – with little explanation as to what this money is going towards. The impact of these charges is especially high in London where many of us are regularly forced to move flats because of rising rent. 

This is why we’re excited to hear about a new petition, launched today by The Debrief, which is calling for letting agency fees to be banned in the UK. The campaign is hosted on Change.org and calls for the Housing Minister Brandon Lewis to ‘pledge to take action on agency fees’. They write: ‘We are becoming not just a generation, but a nation of renters, and the system is stacked against us. How is it possible that fees can vary so much from agency to agency? It’s a rip off and the agents are getting away with it.'

You can sign the petition here.