Life Stay

Life Stay Free Offer for London Landlords in Zones 1 and 2:

- Up to 20% Above Market Rates
- Up to £6k Free Property Makeover
- Zero Agency Fees

28/05/2026

This is the fee nobody wants to think about, which is exactly why it catches landlords out hardest.

Sometimes, no matter how carefully you screen and manage, you end up needing to remove a tenant. Rent stops. The relationship breaks down. Notice has to be served.

Your agent handles it end to end. Serving the notice. Preparing the paperwork. Sometimes attending court. The documentation alone runs £125 to £300. Court attendance can be upwards of £150 an hour. If the case is contested or adjourned, you are past £1,000 before you have your property back.

And here’s what changed on the first of May 2026. Section 21 is gone. The “no fault” route that let landlords regain possession without giving a reason no longer exists. Every eviction now runs through Section 8, which means proving a specific legal ground, with evidence, in court. Industry figures now put a contested claim as high as £3,000 once you add court fees, solicitor costs, and bailiff enforcement.

The landlords who get hurt most are the ones who managed casually for years. Undocumented payment plans. Verbal agreements. Missing inspection reports. Under Section 21 none of that mattered. Under Section 8 it is the difference between winning and losing.

And that’s the quiet truth across this whole series.
AML checks, void periods, maintenance markups, inventory reports, and now possession. Every one is survivable alone. Stacked together across a year, on a property you manage alone, they are the reason landlords are quietly leaving the market.

That was hidden cost number five, and the end of the series. If you’ve watched all five and you’re doing the maths on your own portfolio, that feeling is the point.

Comment COSTS and we’ll DM you the full hidden fee breakdown from all five videos in one place.
Follow along for more straight talking London property content.

14/05/2026

The management fee on the front of your contract is not the management fee.

Most London full management deals quote 10 to 15% plus VAT. Sounds reasonable.
The number you actually pay across a year almost never matches it.
The maintenance markup is one of the main reasons why.
When your agent coordinates a repair, most contracts let them add a percentage on top of the contractor’s invoice.
Usually 10% plus VAT. Sometimes 15.
It’s there in the small print on page nine.

Here’s how it adds up in real numbers.
A boiler breakdown call out and part replacement in central London sits around £450 to £700.
A roof leak repair often passes £600.
An EICR remedial works job after a failed electrical inspection can easily clear £800.
Each of those is normal.

Each of them is something most Zone 1 and 2 landlords will hit at least once a year.
10% plus VAT on a £700 invoice is £84.
On three to four jobs a year you are quietly handing over another £250 to £350 on top of the management fee you already agreed to.

On a HMO with more bathrooms, more boilers, and more wear, the number is meaningfully higher.
And it’s a fee that goes up when prices go up. Your agent gets a pay rise every time a plumber does.The other thing worth knowing.

The Renters’ Rights Act lands on the first of May 2026 and most high street agents have already announced fee restructures because of it.

The maintenance markup is one of the line items quietly being protected, not removed.

Two questions to ask before you sign anything.
Do you mark up maintenance invoices, and if so by how much?
Can I see contractor invoices directly, or only the marked up version?
If the answer to the second one is no, you are paying a number you cannot audit.

Comment COSTS and we’ll DM you the full hidden fee breakdown from the series.

13/05/2026

The day a tenancy ends is the day the property starts costing you money instead of making it.

Most agents say a “good” London void is two to three weeks. London ran at 28 days between tenancies through 2025, and April 2026 came in around 17. On paper, fine.

The problem is that average hides what’s actually happening.

On a £2,500 a month flat, every empty week is roughly £580 you do not get back.

Add council tax, utility standing charges, service charge, and insurance premiums that quietly tick up the moment the property is unoccupied.

Then the vacant inspections your agent bills for. Then the re-let stack on top, clean, inventory, marketing, referencing, AML.

None of these are scams. They are real things. They just hit you in the same window where you have zero rent coming in.

And here’s the bit nobody is fully pricing in yet. Fixed term tenancies are gone from the first of May 2026.

Every tenancy is now periodic.
Your tenant can serve two months’ notice at any point in the year, for any reason.
Lining up a new tenant for the first of the month gets a lot harder when the leaving date is whenever the current tenant decides.

A 17 day average sounds reassuring until you realise some properties re-let in four days and others sit for two months.

Yours is one of those, not the average.

Comment COSTS and we’ll DM you the full hidden fee breakdown from the series.

10/05/2026

Anti money laundering checks are now a legal requirement on every tenant who moves into your property.

Fair enough. Nobody wants dirty money flowing through London rentals.

The part most landlords don’t know is who actually ends up paying for the check.

It’s £10 to £25 plus VAT per person. On a single let it looks small. On a four bed HMO it’s four checks. Two move outs and two move ins in a year means eight.

Multiply that across a portfolio and a “small” admin fee turns into a line item you never agreed to.

Your agent has to run the check. That bit isn’t optional. Whether the cost sits with them or quietly lands on your statement is a completely separate question. And in most contracts, it lands on you.

Ask your agent two things before you sign anything. Who pays for AML checks. And how often they get re-run.

Comment COSTS and we’ll DM you the full hidden fee breakdown from the series.

07/05/2026

The 15% on your management contract is the tip of the iceberg.
Most London landlords don’t realise how many costs sit underneath that headline number.
These aren’t fake or scammy fees. They’re real things that need doing. The problem is most landlords only find out about them invoice by invoice, after they’ve already signed.
Over the next five videos we’re breaking each one down. What it is, what it typically costs, and the questions to ask before you commit to anything.
If you manage your own property or you’re already with a high street agent, follow along so you don’t miss the rest.

Comment LIST and we’ll DM you the rundown of the 5 costs that quietly drain landlord profits the most.

06/05/2026

We took this Zone 1 property on the week before the Renters’ Rights Act came into force.

Outdated blinds. Tired furniture. A living room that wasn’t earning its keep. The kind of property a lot of London landlords are quietly walking away from this year.

Here’s what’s actually happening to it.
The living room becomes a fifth income generating bedroom. All four existing bedrooms get refurnished and redecorated. Kitchen cabinets repaired, small appliances added. Bathrooms refreshed. Entrance and hallway visually upgraded so it actually feels like somewhere people want to live.

The landlord pays nothing for any of this.

We sign an agreement, pay guaranteed rent every month regardless of voids or arrears, and run the property as a fully managed HMO under the new rules. When the agreement ends, the property goes back in better condition than we found it.

Whether you have one house or flat in Zone 1 or a portfolio of five plus across London,
comment CONSULT and we’ll send you the breakdown of how the model works on your specific property.

If you’re not the right fit, we will tell you straight.

📍 .london

Most London landlords have no idea how much their letting agent actually costs them.It is not just the management fee. I...
29/04/2026

Most London landlords have no idea how much their letting agent actually costs them.
It is not just the management fee. It is the renewal charge every 12 months, the maintenance markup on every contractor, the inventory fee, the checkout fee. None of it shows up in the headline percentage.
Swipe through and add it all up. The number at the end surprises most people.
Save this if you are coming up to a renewal. It is worth knowing before you sign anything.

23/04/2026

May 1st will tweak the landlord rulebook.

And most London landlords self managing a property in Zone 1 or 2 are already making five mistakes that could cost them thousands. Not in a year. Not when something goes wrong. Right now.

One is hiding in the paperwork most landlords never actually read. Another is already live, already mandatory, and quietly catching people out every week. The rest? Expensive, avoidable, and the kind of thing you only find out about when it’s too late to fix.

If you own a rental in London Zone 1-3, watch this one twice. Then save it and send it to the landlord in your life who still thinks the old rules apply.

Want someone to handle all of this for you? Comment RULE and we’ll send the details.

E14Landlords

21/04/2026

£7,200 on a flat. Landlord pays nothing.

Most people assume there’s a catch. There isn’t, and the reason is probably the opposite of what you’d guess.

The short version: tired flats rent for less, attract the wrong tenant, and sit empty longer between lets. A refurbished flat doesn’t. That’s the whole logic.

Save this for later. If you want the numbers on your own property, DM the word CONSULT.

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