Attempting to rent somewhere to live in London

[Hedgeyourbets]

I thought I'd ask here because a lot of assembler members are much more experienced and wiser than I
Ok so I'm desperately trying to find somewhere to live in London for my uni, I've been loooking on gumtree for flatshares and the like.
Sent off loads of emails and things and only got a single reply from someone claiming to be a woman who lives in a flat and has two spare rooms. Fair enough seemed ok.
Then she sends me some form to complete to see if I was elligible for one of the rooms whioch looked like it had been written by a five year old but i filled it out nonetheless.
This morning she emailed me saying that the council had approved my form, which is odd considering i only emailed it to her at about 11pm last night.
She is now asking to send her the deposit via western union, the address for the western union transfer is in brighton and like I've never seen this palce aside from the pictues I've been sent, £780 is a lot of money to trust soemone with when I've never even seen the place even if it is like really cheap for a deposit. So basically does it all sound a bit too good to be true and incredibly dodgy because frankly something isn't right here. If so what on earth should I do?

[Bad_Ad84]

100% scam.

[Hedgeyourbets]

Thought so, just needed confirmation before I tell her to go to hell
Is there someone I should be reporting this too?

Typical though, anytime I try to get soemthing important done it always goes wrong :(.
If only everyone in the world were like ASSEMbler members

[LeGIt]

Brighton to London isn't a big journey - it is possible she could have a property in London but live in Brighton. Either way a) I wouldn't pay for a property I've never seen and b) £780? No thanks. Is there any good reason why you can't stay on the University campus? When I went to Bath the rooms were awesome.

[Bad_Ad84]

Western union means you have no way at all to get your money back. All scams start with western union.

If the form was looked like it was written by a 5 year old, it wasn't anything official and again, scam. Council doesn't do anything that fast, it was done fast to get your money before you have time to realise it's a scam.

They are preying on students being desperate.

[Hedgeyourbets]

Yeah it all seemed bit fishy from the start to be honest when I think about it

Brighton to London isn't a big journey - it is possible she could have a property in London but live in Brighton. Either way a) I wouldn't pay for a property I've never seen and b) £780? No thanks. Is there any good reason why you can't stay on the University campus? When I went to Bath the rooms were awesome.

She claimed the property was in central london and even gave me an address, she also claimed that she lives there permenantly. £780 was the deposit plus first 2 weeks rent or so she claimed so it was actually pretty good for living in london, too good to be true actually. I wasn't actually planning to pay for anything I hadn't seen, her email had just taken me by surprise as I had just woken up. Also it is like an hour and a half from brighton to london victoria. I actually live halfway between brighton and london so living in brighton would be a bit counter-productive:P
The reason I couldn't live in the uni halls was because I was actually attmepting to transfer unis during the summer because I didn't like it massively the first year. Trouble was the uni I was trying to apply to, after spending £20 on the ucas fee and stuff told me that my tutor hadn't bothered to send off the reference (despite telling me she had) and the deadline had been compeltely missedm, they only bothered to let me know this on the 19th of august... which is far too late for uni halls. I had soemthing int he running for a while but then that fell through three days ago. My first lecture is on tuesday and I'm stressed out of my mind, my mother doesn't really want me to be living at home and it's a bit miserable living so far away from uni and all my uni friends, my social life is pretty much non-existant as it is.


Wow sorry for the essay there, clearly this is all affecting me worse than I thought

[Segafreak_NL]

Definitely a scam, see if you can report this somewhere.

[Cooleo]

Why don't you try somewhere in West Sussex? Like Oxted? It's only 45 minutes away from central london.

[mooseblaster]

Sounds a bit suspicious to me too.

First year? If so, I'd recommend trying to aim for halls (if there's spaces left) or UNITE buildings, else you'll have a pretty damn lonely and expensive time.

http://www.unite-students.com/London

Also, your university will usually provide approved letting agents to go through, so have a look on their website (or the student union's website) for more information.

[Hedgeyourbets]

I'm second year, had to go with unite last year it was horrible and wayy too expensive, the people I lived with were nice but the whole unite company are obsessed only with making money, despite repeated complaints they only fixed my bathroom floor which was seeping stagnant water after I moved out and they left us without a kettle or a toaster for 4 months, despite again, repeated complaints in addition to this the force you to sign a 12 month contract in order to live with them, my student loan + grant is £8500, the cheapest unite place I could get ended up being £8600 for the twelve months, leaving me to beg my mother for money for things like food and the £80 or so i spent on the tube every month. Like commuting from home won't be a massive problem, I'm only about 30-40 minutes away from london victoria as it is, I jsut think my mother would prefer to be rid of me and to be honest, after living away from home last year, be nice to carry on doing so. But if I'm moving out, It's to central London as anywhere else I'm paying loads for transport alongside rent. It's possible to find places in my budget which frankly is a fair bit bigger than most other students I've seen looking for somewhere in london, just, it would appear, quite difficult.

[Borman]

I think Unite handled stuff when I was there, and I could see them being shady people. We had all sorts of issues that were never taken care of.

[mooseblaster]

Hedgeyourbets: ah, fair enough - back when I was at uni, Unite weren't quite as bad as that, but I guess it's mostly dependent on how old the building is. I agree though: if you've 'been there, done that' then it doesn't surprise me you want to get out!

Seeing as I have never been based in London, it's very difficult for me to suggest exact places to go, but I can offer more general advice.

When I was looking at places to live at uni in my 3rd & 4th years I combined booking about 20 or so viewings via FindAProperty.com across a weekend and doing little bit of footwork around the letting agents in the areas I wanted to live. Believe me: whilst the flats always look good in the pictures, it's the bits they don't show that are really important. Also, it gives you a better idea about distances away from important things like tube stations and corner shops - but you'll often have to compromise between distance and price.

Good luck!