Tenants, What odd questions have you been asked when trying to rent a property

[im4gine3]

Following on from this thread as i didn't want to hijack it:
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/managing-a-rental-yourself.18937134/

i'm curious as to people who rent a flat/house, have you been asked questions by either the landlord or estate agent which have either crossed the line or borderline illegal to ask?

Whilst there's plenty of material on Google for tenants to ask particular questions before signing the contract, i've found it difficult as to what the other side asks before taking on a tenant. I've never rented before and bought my first flat at 26, so this is more for helping a friend.

Few questions he has been asked by the estate agent.. which as a landlord thought was not appropriate to ask were:

You are a family man with 1 child. You are not allowed to have more children if you want to rent this property.

Please provide your last 12months of payslips.

We expect you to carry out gardening duties if you are renting this property

But i'm not sure if they are actually allowedd to ask these types of questions.

 

[im4gine3]

First one sounds like a badly worded reference to occupancy limits and overcrowding.

The landlord will get done if the council finds out they are allowing their property to be overcrowded. This can come about by having more children during the tenancy.

That's understandable, but for one property which fell through, i believe it was a 4 bed detatched, so theoretically if he wanted another kid would not be an issue.. however the landlord explicitely said along the lines of we don't want you giving birth to more children... which is a bit below the belt

 

[im4gine3]

Then good luck when the tenant vacates and you are presented with something that looks like primal rainforest.

Also true.. having owned a flat, the garden was communal so we had a handman sort that part out and so the service charge covered the costs.. but for renting a house, i guess it makes sense

 

[im4gine3]

another question my friend recently brought up which i thought was ridiculous and discriminatory being chinese myself.. bear in mind he is foreign and moved from the States due to work requirements and is of indian descent.

Is your wife westernized? if not the landlord is not prepared to rent this property to you.

Since when has someone's culture got anythign to do with it

 

[im4gine3]

What was the exact wording of this? Was it a clause in the contract or just something asked informally? If it's the former it's unenforceable, if it's the latter just say yes.

It is a ridiculous question though.

I believe direct question from the landlord to be passed across by the agent

 

[im4gine3]

the second one is understandable.. i guess it depends how anal a landlord can be by calculating a rough estimate of electricity usage per month.

The one about degrees can be taken in different ways.. personally used to judge a person by what subject they are doing to determine whether they are sensible or not.. even if using that method is not accurate

 

[im4gine3]

Twelve months of payslips is a bit excessive, one payslip and a reference from my employer I've been asked for but 12 seems needless.

yes especially when he and his wife both work for billion dollar corporations and been with the firm/s more than 10 years. The agents/landlord didn't seem to care who/how long they worked for and wanted a years worth of payslips