Jacksons Estate Agents
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Avoid Renting with Jacksons Estate Agents Streatham: Dishonest, Unprofessional, and Neglectful
I would strongly advise avoiding Jacksons Estate Agents Streatham - my experience with them over the past two years was a complete nightmare. There are so many examples of their unprofessional and unlawful practice, but I’ve covered a few below. I was left with severe black mould for over nine months, despite calling and emailing Jacksons almost daily to try to get it sorted. The mould affected the walls, bedding, and furniture, and I had to throw away many of my clothes because of this issue. I have asthma and had highlighted that my health was at risk, but they left me living with severe mould for 9 months, only taking action when my dad had to step in. My asthma is now considerably worse because of their neglect. On another occasion, the fire alarm malfunctioned and was going off constantly, but Jacksons claimed this wasn’t an urgent issue and said they would send someone round in 3 days… how is a fire alarm malfunctioning and going off continually not deemed urgent?! The tenants weren’t able to sleep at the property during this time, as Jacksons left us with the continuous fire alarm noise, as well as in a dangerous environment without proper fire safety. During our viewing and offer process, Jacksons made a series of promises that were never kept. For example, they told us the landlord would be replacing all the carpets before we moved in. Two years later, not only had the carpets had not been replaced, but I overheard an estate agent making the same promise to new, prospective tenants at their viewings. They also assured the new tenants at the viewing that there had never been any mould at the property, which was a lie given the months of black mould exposure we suffered. This level of dishonesty is absolutely appalling. As well, our property was advertised as furnished but, after moving it, we found out the house was lacking a lot of basic furniture, including having only 1 dining chair for 3 tenants (it transpired that most of the furniture I had seen at the viewing had belonged to the previous tenants). Due to the issues in the property, such as the mould and a flea infestation (at the start of our tenancy due to the previous tenants having a cat), I had to move out temporarily on multiple occasions. These issues were never treated with any urgency - Jacksons often took weeks to even acknowledge the issue or start repairs. Their complete disregard for our comfort and safety was astonishing. Of course, I don’t know how much this delay was due to Jacksons, and how much was due to the landlord not communicating with the estate agent. However, even if it was the landlord who was slow at responding, as an estate agent, it is your job to ensure tenants have a safe, habitable accommodation and you should be ensuring timely responses from the landlord. Jacksons took over a month to communicate with us about our deposit at the end of the tenancy and, when they finally did, their proposals were outrageous (and illegal). They accidentally sent us the check-in report for the new tenants, which included an invoice detailing that the landlord had paid £240 for a professional clean, despite having proposed to deduct £385 for this clean from our deposit. As well, the items the landlord had proposed to charge us to remove (charging £70 for this) were all listed in the check-in report - the landlord had kept all of these items but proposed to charge us for their removal. The check-in report we were sent by mistake made it clear that Jacksons and the landlord were attempting to retain as much of our deposit as possible by inflating and adding charges. Jacksons broke the law on multiple occasions, for example leaving us to live in mould-infested conditions for 9 months, the outrageous handling of our deposit, and sending people to the house with less than 24 hours' notice on multiple occasions, even after I repeatedly asked them to stop doing this. They demonstrated a complete lack of care, professionalism, and responsibility throughout our entire tenancy. They left us living in dangerous, unhealthy, and often uninhabitable conditions, and only responded to issues when I took extreme measures, like threatening legal action. Their dishonesty, broken promises, and disregard for tenant welfare are disgraceful. Please do not rent through Jacksons Streatham – my experience was truly horrific, and no one should have to go through what we did. UPDATE: Jacksons replied to this review saying they'd been in touch. They have, of course, not been in touch.