FlatsOnRent: Landlords can focus on corporate renters

I’m not sure why renting your flat to a corporate professional should mean it stands less chance of being smashed up during a wild bonus-celebrating party but it obviously gives some landlords more peace of mind to have men in suits moving in.

This website is strictly about matching those very people with available properties to rent and even goes as far as excluding any property hunter without a corporate email address. It goes without saying then that all correspondence is routed through the email system at a potential tenant’s place of work so if the company blocks such transmissions the homeless numbers could go up!

Seriously though the system cuts out the need to deal with property agents or brokers and landlords can register and add a profile of a particular property along with photographs and specifications. Those looking for somewhere to live need to register as well and all subsequent dealings are carried out on a direct basis between them and the landlord.

Landlords that register can specify "target tenants" so I can only assume this means they can block the likes of lawyers whilst accepting the clean living bankers of the world. As soon as the property details are loaded they are emailed to all registered property hunters meeting the target criteria.

Similarly those looking for a flat will immediately be emailed details of properties matching their requirements and also have access to the existing database. It is then a simple process of hitting the contact button and negotiating with the landlord.

As for costs it’s pretty clear that searching for a flat is free of charge however the site must make money somewhere apart from the advertising that appears on some sections. I guess that landlords will be charged a success fee when a flat is occupied as a result of flatsonrent.cominvolvement but I could find no mention of it on the site.

Conclusion

I’d love to think that there’s a little guy who stokes the boiler in the basement at somewhere like Goldman Sachs who has a company email address just to enable him to order coal. Imagine the fun he could have turning up to view a "corporate" property looking like a miner!