UK Landlord Forum / Life

I live in the south east and have 5 x properties in the north east - in what is now a Selective Licencing Area  .  Because I was working full time I paid and trusted a managing agent to "manage" them for me and have had no chance, until now, to look closely at my accounts. Whilst his fee is 10% he has obviously been making more money from me by falsifying invoices and charges, as well as duplicating charges for maintenance over the past 10 years    and the more I look into it the worse it gets...    I haven't even begun to look closely at the rent side of things... al of the tenants are on HB and the way he presents the monthly statement for the rental income is so vague that auditing that will be "fun".  He gets really hacked off when I ask him for clarification of the maintenance charges he's made (altho when I pointed out that one property didn't need 2 x EPCs because an EPC is valid for 10 years he sent me a cheque for the second EPC immediately) but I'd like to recoup some of the other stolen money from him before I take over managing them myself - I thought I'd get the whole picture recorded in XL and then go the Ombudsman and possibly the VAT office route??  I didn't realise what thieving b'tards they are....      Any other suggestions on how to get my money back and how to seamlessly make the transition from him managing the properties to me managing them myself would be very welcome.

hi 434-10, can you get an accountant to go over books for
property, if what you say is true, his cost can be recovered from
fraud that he finds,. when you have figures confront agent with findings.
if he does not agree to repay money owed,. take figures to police to
investigate for fraud. sure he will pay up when confronted with evidence.
if you have 5 properties. can be difficult to manage if you don't have spare
time.. may be worth hunting around for other agent,.. remember you need
do get all documents back from agent (leases etc)..
                cheers the slug.