Tomlinsonestates Reviews 18

Based on my experience as a tenant, I would not recommend Tomlinson Estates.
The property was handed over in poor condition, with damaged furniture, worn carpets and sagging mattresses. Communication throughout the tenancy was slow and inconsistent and several issues we raised took months to address.

There were also several occasions where contractors were given access to the property without our permission and without proper notice. They entered using keys without knocking or waiting for a response, which made us feel unsafe. Viewings were arranged for months with only the minimum notice, even during exam and deadline periods, causing constant disruption.

Repairs were delayed or left incomplete, and at times things we said were repeated back inaccurately, which made resolving problems even harder. Despite leaving the flat much cleaner than we found it, we were charged over £200 for cleaning at the end of the tenancy.

This reflects my honest experience and I hope it helps future tenants make an informed decision.

As a parent of a student in a Tomlinson rental I would advise everyone to avoid Tomlinson. You will not get your deposit back no matter how much you clean the property. You can provide photos to prove its cleanliness, to prove the state it was in when you moved in etc but they will continue to put every obstruction possible in your way so that you will give up and give in to their unfair and unprofessional practice.

If I could give this company 0 stars I would. My daughter moved into her student accommodation to find walls damaged which would have been deducted I’m sure from the previous tenants. However she meticulously did the inventory and upon leaving the accommodation was left to a high standard and was cleaner than what it was let in. She’s now battling with Tomlinson over a cleaning charge which is now no longer a cleaning charge but now a charge for damages. They take forever to respond. Absolutely useless. Avoid at all costs. They’re scammers and out to deliberately rip students off so beware. A Gold Winner at the Property Awards? Clearly the awards people don’t read these reviews or check out actual students feedback. I will now be contacting arla about their behaviour.

I have a disability and am a student. Tomlinson were as difficult as possible with ramps and other adaptations we are legally entitled to, to the point we put them up and risked fines.

At one point I was bedbound and in and out of A and E needing constant care following seizures, and I got endless harassment about arranging viewings. I just needed to 'go out for the day'.

Just general admin wise they made everything as convoluted as possible.

I would not recommend if you value your sanity.

Awful.

We have been living here for a month now. Upon arrival we were given four keys for our six person house. Countless emails have been sent and nothing has been done about it. As a result we have had to resort to leaving the house unlocked which is a massive safety issue. This has led members of the house to suffer with anxiety.

Our house smells of sulphur constantly. We were told a plumber would be come by, however nothing came of this.

One of the downstairs bedrooms stinks of heavy cigarette smoke - this was not made aware to us before moving in.

My son started a tenancy with a group of other students at a shared property let via Tomlison Estates. On first entry we noted and reported that his room had a faulty / damaged window, that the extraction fan in the bathroom was not working and the Freezer compartment of a fridge-freezer was leaking as it was rammed with ice, the door was not closing and needed fixing. My son stayed in the house and his room no more than a week (or less) and moved out to another loaction. We got no help from Tomlinsons to relet the room (basically it was our problem and just pay the rent, they did not seem to care a jot) and hence the room stayed empty for the duration of the tenancy. As far as we know the faulty window and extractor fan have not been fixed (we have reported it to the landlord was the usual response). With the tenancy ending 31-July-24 I expected the deposit monies to be returned promptly in full, particularly that of my son, as he had not been living there for 95% or more of the tenancy period whilst we paid the full rent for 2 accommodations! Now in October they have returned the deposit with a large deduction for end of tenancy cleaning. Totally unacceptable.

I have to agree with all the other bad reviews about Tomlinson, they were very slow to deal with any issues that we had during the year, including when one of our two toilets broke and was completely unusable, and one of my housemates was sleeping on a broken bed for a couple weeks when we moved in. Also, they withheld an extortionately (in my opinion) large amount of money from our deposit for cleaning and refurbishment, even though in my opinion the property was definitely in the same (if not better) condition than how we received it. We are now in dispute with them to try to recover our deposit. Another thing to note is that, like another review i just read, they did not carry out an in-person inventory with us, which is standard procedure for any landlord/agent in order to make an agreement between the tenant and landlord/agent on what condition the property is in when the tenant first moves in. Because of Tomlinson's failure to do this with us, it means now we have moved out there is a debate over whether aspects of the house's poor condition were caused by us. Probably best to avoid using these guys if you can.

We had the same experience as Ellie.
Unresponsive all year- responding to landlord issues of mould, ants and no heating systems in either bedroom (illegal) with "we have never had this issue reported before". When we asked to relay the matter to the landlord we were advised this would be done and then heard nothing further.
Property was left cleaner than it was when we moved in but we have been charged 473 from our deposit. I am disputing this.
DO NOT USE THESE AGENTS FOR LETTINGS/LANDLORDS. Ensure you have landlords contact and details.
Really disheartening, stressful and unpleasant experience that was unfair, disproportionate and condescending.

AVOID!!!
They ignored us all year with problems then tried to call us a liar when we said we had contacted them. plus they to off an excessive amount (£750) of our deposit for cleaning when we had cleaned the property it sees to return it in the same state as we got it which was dirty and not cleaned yet when I say this they again called me a liar. Worst landlords rude and negligent. They also charged me to remove a mattress which they had left.

This company should be banned. They fail to provide a decent standard of housing, don't even check the property before letting, ignore any issues, then withhold deposits at the end of tenancy. They are out to fleece students. Lazy, rude and unprofessional staff. Do Not Use!

AWFUL. MOULD AND RATS.
In my 3 years in student housing I have never come across a company so negligent and lazy. When moving into tomlinson estates property it was evident the house had not been cleaned or checked. We found toenails on the floor and sharp objects in the carpet which cut our feet open. We had to clean the kitchen before being able to put anything in the fridge or cupboards because it was that disgusting. Upon arriving we noted that the dining table chairs were broken, the sofa was broken, the wifi didn’t work, the TV was broken, loads of light bulbs didn’t work, the mattresses were so old and thin you would have been more comfortable sleeping on the floor. Tomlinsons response to these issues was poor. We were told we had to fit new light bulbs our self as this was ‘our job’ even though the lights were fitted into the ceiling, we are not electricians who know how to remove light fixtures. The chairs never got replaced, the sofa got replaced with the cheapest, tackiest sofa they could find. They replaced the TV and never collected the old one as promised. Don’t even get me started on the wifi. This dispute went on for MONTHS, as you can imagine being in third year of uni with no wifi was really difficult for us. I was told to move the wifi around the house which I couldn’t do because of the wires. I was told to move it out of the way of objects? I was told to turn it on and off. I was told to do a speed test and send it to them as proof. This dispute must have gone on for about 4 months until they sent a wifi booster. They clearly thought because we were students they could fob us off and we would get bored of arguing.
This is the worst part, we had MOULD and RATS and tomlinson estate decided to blame this on us. The mould was a result of the building which had water leaking through every time it rained, I explained this to them and they just sent me a patronising explanation as to how mould occurs and told me that I’m not putting my washing away correctly. They also suggested that my wardrobe was ‘too full’ which is hilarious considering it was empty. It is stated by the government that landlords must take mould seriously and tomlinson estate could not have cared less. My roommate also had awful mould all over her bed and tomlinson estate took about 2 months to come deal with it (we kept cleaning it but it kept coming back). We reported rats early on in our tenancy, so it was evident the rats were there before we moved in, we are clean students who do not leave the kitchen a mess. When sending the landlords a picture of a rat IN OUR BIN, they sent a patronising email back telling us it must be because we leave food out or on the floor. We had rats our entire tenancy because of tomlinson estates negligence. They left the rat they killed in our bin for 2 weeks and I had to call to ask if they were coming to dispose of it after they said they would have 2 days after killing it.
We were required to pay rent in July even though we had all moved out by May which is fine. But Tomlinson estate called me 3 times in 3 weeks asking when I was giving my keys back. I told them every single time that if I have paid rent on a property then I am keeping the keys.
Trying to get our deposit back from tomlinson estate was more difficult than my entire degree. They didn’t feel the need to keep us updated about the entire process. We didn’t know when they had conducted the inspection, if there were any deductions or an approximate time frame of getting it back. I called about 5 times only to be fobbed off with ‘we will tell them you’re chasing it up’ and ‘you will know soon’. We asked for the deposit holding company and their number which tomlinson estate refused to give to me and told me they would email me the details and never did. So we found the number ourself and started a dispute. Tomlinson finally got back and deducted a £145 cleaning fee from our deposit which is insane considering I spent a week cleaning the house, it was spotless. The tenancy agreement states we must leave the house as we found it when moving in, which ironically would have meant leaving the house filthy and broken.
They are an absolute joke of a company and made our final year at uni extremely difficult.

We are waiting for our holding deposit to be refunded as they didn't take it put of the market and we decided not to take the property, giving two months notice. No application completed yet. They charged another tenant a holding deposit and it was rented out shortly afterwards, yet months later they still refuse to give us a penny back. How mamy holding deposits do they keep! Very unprofessional and not prepared to make business decisions. Prefer to continue getting bad reviews notice they don't comment on these trustpilot reviews and there are no good ones either

Unbelievably bad. Do absolutely nothing to resolve problems. Don't care about the students in their properties - like the landlords only interested in squeezing as much money out of them as possible for poor accommodation.
Leaks left unfixed, substandard repairs so they just leak again. Properties rented out dirty and in poor condition and with doors that aren't secure. Endless battle to get even basic repairs. Use someone else.

The absolute worst agency in the uk. Never trust what they say and firstly never rent a house from them. They are negligent and dishonest. Our deposits aren’t completely protected which they lie about and when confronted they disappear or change topic. Secondly their approach to any circumstance is aggressive and legal which will only cost you and they refuse to take any accountability for their negligence. PLS AVOID THEM. Trying to fight them since months now and nothing has been settled or taken accountability for. There are much better agencies in Nottingham like Student cribs or even Purple frogs for crying out loud.

Good lord, where do I begin. Avoid these people at all costs. It started back in April, when the two of us visited a few houses and ultimately settled on the last one we were shown. We asked a few questions about what would be included with the house when we moved in, and were explicitly told that items such as the quality garden furniture and some tablecloths were included. This later turned out to be false when we moved in and all of these were missing.

There were some minor issues during the contract signing process when some of the scans I sent over were simply ignored and I was told they weren’t ever sent.

Fast-forward to the start of August, and we move into the house. It’s immediately clear that no inspection or cleaning of the house took place. We were given an online inventory form to fill out, and exactly all of the features (probably over 50) were noted as “good” condition or cleanliness, without fail. This resulted in us having to spend several hours documenting all of the cobwebs, marks, scratches and dirt that was present but not accounted for in the report. We also found a large quantity of the previous tenant’s hair stuck to the wall in several places.

We contacted them on the second day of the tenancy to ask about this, and were told that a temp worker had apparently conducted an inspection of the property and that it had been professionally cleaned two days before we moved in. Both of these were clearly not true, as the inspection stated that objects not present in the house were in good condition and the two elapsed days would not have been enough for the amount of cobwebs, dust and hair that were present to accumulate. When this was brought to their attention, no offer was made to have the property actually inspected or cleaned.

On a less related note to the property, their website for tenants appears to store passwords in plain text, a practice that is highly insecure and universally condemned by cybersecurity experts. In general, communication has been slow and you would be better served by practically any of the other estate agents in the area.

Rented years ago and only just thought about this. My deposit was not DPS protected. I was a new international student and did not know better. But to take advantage of people like me is absolutely disgusting. They basically ripped me and my housemate off and we got £65 back from our deposit each. Charged me for removal of a random wooden crate lying outside that wasn't even mine. Moral of story: do not rent with them full stop

I wish I could give a rating of 0 stars. This estate agents are absolutely pathetic for tenants - they will provide you with an absolutely disgusting house and claim they have 'deep-cleaned it', will give you old, dirty and damaged furniture, not to mention items of furniture that can cause a safety hazard. The won't replace this furniture though as they would believe it is adequate. Too tight to have some money spent eh? They blame the landlords, who also don't seem to care about issues. They will take their time responding to your emails, and hardly do anything about it. This agency should be shut down, absolutely pathetic. I would not recommend anyone to use Tomlinson.