Foxtons has come under fire after a couple found their estate agent had signed them up to lease the wrong property
Naomi Trent and her husband Anthony Regan thought their budget of £1,400 a month would only stretch to a one-bed flat in Brixton, south London.
Imagine their excitement then when a Foxtons estate agent showed them a two-bed Victorian conversion in Brixton Hill and told them they could afford it.
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Speaking to The Sunday Times, Anthony said the flat looked the part when he viewed it and showed it to Naomi over video call, who was equally pleased. Eager to move in, they quickly signed a 12-month lease and paid £3,500 to secure the property, but when moving day came they found the keys to the flat didn’t work.
A nasty surprise
When the couple queried the problem with Foxtons they were told that a mistake had been made and they had signed for a smaller one-bed flat in the building instead.
With boxes full of belongings and nowhere else to go, the couple had to move into the small flat in late March and have been trying to find somewhere else to live ever since.
Naomi said: “The downstairs flat was not what we were looking for at all and it wasn’t a good deal at £1,400 a month. Estate agents in London are notoriously poor and this just reaffirms that.”
'Human error'
There has been speculation over whether Foxtons employed the dreaded bait-and-switch tactic, in which a tenant is shown an attractive property only to be told it's been snapped up and offered a less attractive or smaller property in its place. However, the estate agency strenuously denies this accusation and says the mix-up was a result of human error.
Foxtons has returned its £500 agency fees to the couple and compensated them to the tune of £1,500, while the landlord has waived all utility bills while they look for a new home.
Foxtons said: “We would like to take this opportunity to again apologise to Ms Trent and Mr Regan. They were shown around a flat by a new member of staff.
“The cost, tenancy agreement and paperwork for the one-bed property the couple initially inquired about were all correct. But, as a result of human error on our part, the [viewing] was mistakenly for the wrong property.”
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