Reviews
They cancelled my viewing without calling me to let me know, and after rearranging, they showed us a completely different flat and refused to show the one that was advertised! Complete waste of time and effort. Avoid.
I began renting a flat in the southside of glasgow through a private letting agency, after about 1 year (and a couple of landlords) in the property I was notified that Lowther homes were taking over the property.
To begin with this meant I had to go to the GHA office on trongate to sign new documents, which was an inconvience to me as it meant a day off work. It also meant my rent day changed and had to have a lean month whilst they sorted out the rent payments and refunded me the overpayment due to change of dates, again an inconvenience but I dealt with it. During the document signing I was asked to fill in the direct debit mandate form, which I don't normally do, preferring to set up my own standing order, but being the nice guy I went along with it as I'm in the GHA building how bad could this letting agency be!
Well how wrong was I; about 2 months later I get texts telling me I'm in rent arrears! Unfortunately the Lowther homes rep had not bothered to set up the direct debit, so I had to then pay 2 months rent and set up a standing order to ensure this didn't happen again. That's when the problems really started; as after my complaint over being pushed to fill in the direct debit mandate, them not actually doing anything with it and me setting up a standing order. Lowther homes then decided to set up the direct debit, so I was then paying double rent for 2 months. Eventually got that sorted and everything began to go well; mainly as I never really had to deal with them outside of the usual annual maintenance required.
This past few months however the fun restarted. They booked me in for replacing the smoke detectors in the flat which is fine, I'm an electrician to trade so know how little work is normally required to do this. However when the person showed up to do it(I'm not sure I can call him an electrician) there was apparently an entirely new system needed installed which entailed a considerable amount of plaster work in the ceiling given the construction on the flat and relative locations. As I was expecting a 5min job and this was turning out to be at least a whole day and I wasn't able to stay for the duration the work wasn't carried out. This was apparently due to new legislation however no follow up has been made from Lowther homes.
More recently I'm due my gas boiler service, which I'm now on my 3rd booking after their contractor failed to show twice and then tried to blame me for not letting them in the flat; had threatening letters off Lowther homes about their duty of maintaining legislation in their properties and I must allow access; even after I have made a formal complaint regarding the no shows for the contractors.
Notice the difference in attitudes between legislation compliance when it costs them money.
Thankfully I'm now about to move out of the property and will see the back of Lowther homes.
Let's just hope the pay my deposit back in good time...a
Total waste of my time and money. The flat I went to see looked NOTHING like the photos. Even the layout was different, finishings were awful, kitchen was dirty and totally falling apart, no dishwasher (as said in the add), bathroom was mouldy. In fact, you could smell the mould from the outside of the flat. Be aware, total scam!
They use photography of a demo flat on Benalder St (G11) to advertise a flat of different layout and quality. A waste of people's time and money. Beware of this scam!
Good customer service and friendly staff, always willing to help answer any queries. The properties me and my flatmate have looked around have always been finished to a very high standard.
Got through first time and had a very helpful lady organise an electrician and shower technician to come out to my property. Much improved from previous experiences.