Castle Estates: Customer Reviews
Number of customer reviews: 7
- 2 would use the agent again
- 5 would not use the agent again
Reviewed by greenockletting on 28th November 2008
Services: Lettings (as a Landlord)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? NO
Castle Estates Greenock > What can I say but unprofessional, unprofessional, unprofessional!!
Luckily I never signed a contact so I did not end up in a bad position, However, I do feel sorry for the prospective tenants. I received the contract the day before they tenants were meant to move in. When I queried the fact that I did not want full management, the bill doubled. Phoned to resolve issue but manager hung up and refused to deal with me as it appears "I was annoying him", by refusing to pay this inflated fee. I could go on and on about the lack of a contract, amended terms etc, but my best advice is do not use. I would advise this for landlords and tenants alike, as the tenants in my case were severely compromised, I wonder what web was spun to them
To sum up unprofessional, unprofessional, unprofessional!!
Reviewed by CC on 19th November 2008
Services: Lettings (as a Tenant)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? NO
Completely uselss! (Stony Branch). Terrible communications on move out - property in disrepair on move in. Moving out tomorrow (fingers crossed we wont be charged obscene amounts of money). One employee in particular (a lettings negotiator) was extremely useless!
They accused me of lying - we asked about the underwriting scheme to take over the tenency after a "company let" had it all verbally aggreed by negotiator named above. A day before the tenency was to be signed over, they decided against the underwriting scheme, and told us we needed to pay them nearly £1000 for deposit and reference checks for a small 2 bedroom house.
Since then, I have been sent emails to an account they know I have limited access to, telling me about viewings happening that day. Instead of letting me "allowing" them access they tell me when they are coming, and do not prepare for the house to be "unavailable" for them on certain days.
They are now dictating to me that they must show a couple around when we are in the middle of moving out! How stupid can they be!
DO NOT USE CASTLE ESTATES!
Reviewed by Cov1 on 25th April 2008
Services: Lettings (as a Landlord)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? NO
My list of complaints about Pettifer (Castle Estates Coventry) is endless....They constantly made mistakes, LOST the rent on 2 occasions, accused my tenant of not paying and made her pay twice when THEY had lost the money. Forgetting to pay me, paying me in Euros (!!!!), not notifying me when they spend large amounts of money on repairs. In 2 years, there has rarely been a month when I haven't had a problem. Not only do they constantly make mistakes but they never even pick up on them until we point them out. I feel I have been paying them a lot of money to do absolutely nothing. They seem to have forgotten that they have to provide both myself and my tenant with a service rather than just raking in their share of the profit and sitting back.
They have just had the nerve to say that we bother them too much with problems - I had to point out that I am also sick to death of bothering them about the problems, which are in themselves indicative of the non-existent service they are providing. I have actually paid to get out of the contract with them now, and am using another agent.
Would NEVER consider dealing with them again. If you want to pay for the priviledge of being stressed out by a company who are clearly more concerned by their profit margin than with providing you with any of the services that they supposedly offer, then Pettifers are for you!
Reviewed by sooze on 2nd January 2008
Services: Lettings (as a Landlord)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? YES
Absolutely brilliant, best letting agent I have every used. They know what they are talking about, don't overcharge landlords and just as important don't overcharge tenants.
Reviewed by lizziehug on 2nd January 2008
Services: Lettings (as a Landlord)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? YES
I used Castle Estates in Exeter and would recommend them to anyone. They took on a lot of additional work in getting rid of a very troublesome tenant and didn't charge me a single extra penny! Long may they reign.
Reviewed by Ravi on 16th November 2007
Services: Lettings (as a Tenant)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? NO
Lived for 6 months in a Nottingham Flat. Horrible service. Did not have basic services when I moved in fully furnished flat like vaccum cleaner, duvets pillows although was supposed to be there according to iternary.
I was blackmailed to pay more rent when I moved in than previously agreed as I signed papers on the day of moving. Broken furnitures were not replaced for 5 months despite reporting.
They even charged me from deposit to clean carpets, kitchen, etc when I left the flat in a near normal state. Please please never deal with Castle Estates.
Ravi T P
Reviewed by Rob Hall on 28th August 2007
Services: Lettings (as a Landlord)
Property: Residential
Experience: Would you use Castle Estates again? NO
I rented out my bungalow through Castle Estates' Salisbury branch for 6 years of which the agent received a very good commission, but gradually towards the end he let the bungalow go into decline. The crux of the matter is that at the end of the contract, he has refused to pay me the money owed, ie rent damages and costs incurred amounting to over 1 thousand pounds. He refuses to contact me and has absolutely closed the door on us even though he had two solicitors letters which he also ignored. This is over 18 months ago and we are still waiting. We complained to head office and they passed us over to another agent in Southampton, who was most unhelpful. He threatened us to take no further action.
There is a lot more to this tale, whether you are interested remains to be seen. As far as I am concerned Joe O Neill is a liar and a fraudster.
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