HOMETRUST - EXETER, DE

If you are a student who has the option to not rent with Hometrust, then don’t. Below is a list of reasons why:
- Increasing the rent by 20% over 2 years (admittedly in line with other estate agents, but nonetheless contributing to the steep rise of student accommodation prices in Exeter).
- In 2 years’ rental periods, I never received the full deposit back, despite leaving the property in a very clean condition both times. There is a mandatory carpet cleaning fee, and both times we were charged for ludicrous cleaning items (“not cleaning the tops of kitchen cupboards” when the cupboards literally reached the ceiling, “dusty light fittings” and “grubby power sockets”).
- We had a rat issue in our house which continued almost for the entire duration of the second term of our tenancy. To be fair, Hometrust (especially Aly) were very understanding and persisted in getting the landlady and pest control involved, but they were slow to respond initially and we had to put up with the issue for most of the academic year.
- Poor communication (frequently having to chase up enquiries by calling or sending multiple emails; receiving no reply only to be told that the email addresses we had been sending it to had been defunct for months (which we were not notified of); we would ask multiple questions in emails and only receive replies to part of them; receiving multiple replies to the same email from different staff members).
- General incompetence (putting the wrong tenant’s name on the housing contract; mistaking us (the prospective tenants) for the current tenants and texting us about the landlady attending before we had moved in; on one occasion a staff member explained to us at length about how to open and close the windows)
We were unhappy with many aspects of our rental term – the accommodation itself was fine (excepting the rat problem!) but dealing with Hometrust added a lot of unnecessary stress to 2 of my 3 years at university. I would not recommend renting with them.