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Where to Live when We are Moving to the UK?
How to Find Good and Cheap Rental Properties in the UK?
When someone decide to move to a different country the firsts things that think is “where to live?” or “what type of property should I rent?”. In this post we are going to give you some steps to have a better idea about what area choose to live and how to find properties to rent in the UK.
And in the beginning it can be a little stressful because a lot of question come to our head. But with this post we are going to try to do you a more comfortable way. 🙂
Useful information:
The United Kingdom has a lot of rental properties for you to stay. They range from the more expensive bungalows, town houses, to the lower cost flats which depends on what your preferences are.
Recently there was an article published by a local online news portal that almost 70% of homes in the UK are rental properties. The 30% are owned for self-residential. And the number of homes turning into rental-properties are increasing at a steady rate every year.
With that said, getting to rent a place is easier now than before and hopefully the prices would become cheaper as supply is bigger than the demand.
For those who was planning to buy a house instead, we would suggest you to start off renting in the vicinity of the town or city of your choice. Take your time to decide as every city has its own vibe and atmosphere.
Rental rates in the UK go by weekly or sometimes monthly payment.
But people like us, who come to UK to work or study, want to find something nice but above all the cheapest possible. Because UK is one of the most expensive countries in Rental housing, and not everyone have a lot of saving money to start the first months until you are able to get a job.
So before deciding to rent a place that you could find online is very important you know some steps to take this decision.
For this, we would suggest you to ask yourself the following questions:
What is your budget per month for rent?
In the UK, you would most probably find rental properties in the form as Houses, Flats or Rooms.
Houses:
Would usually be in a housing estate or private land that have ground-floor access.
Some comes fully or partially furnished: car parking garage, driveway, front-yard or backyard, heating system, double/triple glazing windows (to keep the heat inside the building), fencing around the property. And some just come empty without any furniture, means you have to bring your own beds, cupboards, tables, chairs, etc.
The rental rate ranges from £800 to £2,500 per month depending on the location, size, furnishing and design of the property.
On top of the rental rate, you’ll have to factor in your utility bills from water, electric, gas, internet service, council tax and sometimes finder’s fee for the real estate agent.
Council tax varies from one property to another depending on the square footage of the property, which is referred to as tax-bands. Lowest tax band for a house is approximately £1,600 to £2,500 per year depending on the county.
If you’re looking for advertisements online or physically searching for such a rental property, look out for To Let, Let By or For Rent signage.
Flats:
Would usually be in a building that have units on the ground-floor up to the 4th floor, and sometimes the 5th floor.
This means you rent the whole unit with your own private entrance. Most are rented out without any furniture, means you have to bring your own beds, wardrobe, tables, chairs, etc.
The rental rate ranges from £500 to £1,500 per month, depending on the location, size, number of rooms, furnishing, included parking space and condition of the property.
On top of the rental rate, you’ll have to factor in your utility bills from water, electric, gas, internet service, council tax and sometimes finder’s fee for the real estate agent.
Council tax varies from one property to another depending on the square footage of the property, which is referred to as tax-bands. Lowest tax band for a Flat is approximately £1,300 to £1,600 per year depending on the county.
If you’re looking for advertisements online or physically searching for such a rental property, look out for To Let, Let By or For Rent signage. And it would usually indicate the unit number that’s up for rent, eg. Flat 2, Flat 6, etc.
Rooms:
Would usually be in a flat unit in an urban-area that have rooms-for-rent to different tenants ranging from the ground-floor up to the 4th floor, and sometimes the 5th floor.
Sometimes homes also have rooms for rent but mostly in a lower density township that’s further away from the city.
Do note that you would have access to your room via the flat’s main entrance, passing a shared common area, shared living room and to your private room door.
Usually rental rooms comes with a shared living-room, bathroom, toilet, kitchen and most probably an allocated space in the fridge or freezer.
Most rooms are rented out with basic furniture such as, beds with sheets, duvets (blankets), pillows, wardrobe, table, chairs, mirror, and sometimes a television.
The rental rate ranges from £350 to £900 per month depending on the location, room size, furnishing, included utilities (internet service, water bill, electric bill) and condition of the property.
On top of the rental rate, you’ll have to factor in your utility bills (if not already included) from water, electric, gas, internet service.
Council tax is usually paid by the home-owner or registered-tenant of the flat or house. So you should not pay extra for this. No finder’s fees apply to you as usually rooms for rent are self-published by the homeowner.
If you’re looking for advertisements online or physically searching for such a rental property, look out for Room To Let or Let By.
Please be cautious of paying rent to an unauthorised-person living as a tenant in the rental property. There has been cases where the home-owner did not receive the rental money for the rented room for months, ended up having to vacate the room as no money received.
Here’s some snacks Tips:
– In the north of UK normally the rental is cheaper than in the south or London area, where the prices can be really expensive.
– Some websites where you can start searching are: Zoopla, SpareRoom or Gumtree
– In Facebook normally there are groups of people that are already living in a specific area and they publish comment if in a house one the rooms in empty and they need to find a someone soon. Or you can write them and ask if they know about some room to rent.
Do you have the initial rental deposit?
If you decide to rent a place, either a house, flat or a room, do consider factoring your rental deposit.
Usually comes as 1 + 1. This means 1 month rental and 1 month deposit. Eg. £500/month rental means you’ll have to pay £500 x 2 to get the key to the place. Some would come with 1 + 1 + Utility Deposit, which refer to the electric, water and gas deposit.
How much space do you need for yourself or your travel partner?
When coming to the UK, you’ll most probably travel light, 1-2 luggage at most and a rucksack. Double that amount for you and your partner, you’ll probably not fit in a small room you’re planning to rent.
Also plan ahead if you’re staying for an extended period in this area, you might be tempted to buy a bicycle or piece of furniture to set in your room or have a friend visit to stay the night before leaving in the morning, you’ll need a little more space to fit an air-bed.
How far would you like to stay from the township or amenities?
Since you would be new in this area, it is always a better idea to stay near to the township, supermarket, shops and amenities such as the beach or an area you’d probably find a part-time job.
The last thing you want to do is living too far away that you’ll have to take 2-3 hours of commute by public transportation to get some things done.
Rental can be cheap but the transportation cost and time would cost you even more. Does it make sense?
If you are an adventurous outdoorsy person, you can also consider using a bicycle as mode of transportation as in the UK. Most major cities do support the use of bicycles that you can even bring your bicycle on the trains. Check for this information on regional or council area specific website.
Do you have your own transport or do you travel by bus/train?
The UK have a good transportation system as I’d say a big number of people today do not own a private vehicle, eg. car or motorcycle.
Instead most people are still relying on public transportation from buses, trains to tram services.
If the rental place is far away from the township, you can still use public transportation to go places.
Please do note that there are some ‘blackout’ areas that are out of reach for public transportation.
We would suggest you to check on locations using Google Maps and Google Street View to confirm your walking route to your rental property.
Back in the days, both of us have learnt the hard way of not doing our ‘research’ before heading out on foot to some places.
If you have a car, that’s good for you, but check if the place you’re renting have parking spaces at walking distance that would fit your requirements.
Some streets allow you to park for only 1-hour and not to return for 2-hours to the same spot, active from 8am to 6pm. That means you can park from 6pm till 8am the next day, with allowance of 1-hour each period.
Parking long past the allowed times might get you fined with a Parking-Charge-Notice usually around £90.00.
But, what if we don’t have much money to rent a place?
Don’t worry, we’ve got your back this time. If you’re saving up your money or don’t have much to spare for rent, you have a few options:
Hostels
Hostels are usually cheaper than rooms in private homes. In the hostels you will not have to pay the initial rental deposit. Some of them also have private rooms but usually they are more expensive.
The rooms in hostels usually have 4, 6, 8 or more beds. So you will have to share the room with more people. The space will also be smaller. Of course, you will share common areas such as living room, kitchen and bathroom with the rest of the people.
To begin in the UK, it’s not a bad option. Harris and I lived in a hostel when we arrived in England, and it’s also a good way to meet with other people like us. In the hostels there are always more foreigners living and will help you if you need it.
Share a Rented House or Flat
What you could do is, gather a group of friends from your circle to travel together. Rent a flat or a house that fits your group and split the rent or utilities equally.
Elect a leader (or you could be the leader) to take on the responsibility to deal with the real estate agent or homeowner.
As long as your group is under control and not bothering the neighbours, stay as long as your group sticks together.
HelpX – Exchange Program
Okay, we’d suggest this idea as the last resort as not everyone likes this concept.
Or if you want to be adventurous like Consuelo and myself, go for it! Visit www.helpx.net and register yourself as a member (helper).
You’d have to pay €20.00 (accurate at the time of this post and valid for a 2 years period) to HelpX.net as a premier member which allows you to contact any hosts (home-owners or business-owners) worldwide if you’re interested in a role at their place.
The concept of this help exchange program is you’ll be ‘helping’ the host between roughly 18-20 hours a week in exchange of free lodging.
HelpX Hosts usually requires Helpers to stay for at least 2-3months (usually), unless if you could negotiate via messaging with the Host itself.
Some hosts would give your tours, breakfast, pick-up/drop-off and even join their family gathering.
It varies from one host to another, so refer to their write-up and don’t forget to send a message to the host confirming what you’re expecting versus what they are expecting you to contribute as a helper -make things crystal clear.
Honestly speaking, we both think that HelpX was a brilliant portal enabling people from all ages (especially youth) to travel ‘without boundaries’ worldwide as we believe that the biggest cost (boundary) of all in our travel trips are spent on lodging.
→ If you are interested in this kind of jobs, you can read our special post about “How to Travel with almost Free Accommodation“.
⇒ If you need extra explanation or guidance to using HelpX service or rental in general , send us a message and we’ll take it from there.
⇒ If you are moving to the UK, you may also be interested in other posts about “Which are the best UK phone companies & how to get a free sim card” and “Open a UK Bank Account“