Rented Room – Co-Living – Apartment Share

When the first Giz a Room group began in Tenerife, it was a well moderated and highly successful group.

Sadly over time the group and many others that sprang up like it, were hijacked by people whose sole  aim was to charge ‘finders fees’. Often, people on a budget would find out at the last minute that they were expected to pay not only 1 months deposit plus 1 month in advance but also 1 months finders fee (agency fee).

Sometimes it could even be 2 months finders fee, or worse still no-one tells you that they will keep your deposit as their finders fee; you only find out when you ask for your security deposit back and the unsuspecting owner tells you the agent took it as their fee.

This is no longer permitted in Tenerife but many people will look to make the fee elsewhere, such as calling it a contract fee. Another trick is to increase the rent to cover their fee. Whilst people are always going to look for some sort of commission, which is fair enough, the owner should be paying it not the tenant.

Always ask the question and insist on a precise answer. If you don’t hear ‘no fees’ then report the member to admin immediately.

A well moderated group will remove and block these people. However some groups were set up with the intention of circumventing this. Please take care. If admin won’t remove these people then perhaps it’s  a group you don’t want to be part of.

Useful Information

• Bargain Holiday Group (private owners)
• Rent-a-Room Group (budget studios & flats)
• Boat Holidays – For that holiday with a difference

House Share (Co-Living)

• Co-living Etiquette
• Co-living Cleaning Duties
• Co-Living Refunding Deposits

Long term contracts are unlikely to be given with house share arrangements for several very good reasons, but that’s another topic and a thorny one at that. Some owners may choose to provide cleaning services and other other benefits but it’s largely down to ‘you get what you pay for‘.

Here are the principals I adhere to myself when renting a room, considered usual for most decent landlords. You cannot consider them in any way a ‘contract’ unless your landlord specifically states this. It’s simply booking a room for a given period of time (please don’t ask for a year, we cannot do it and it’s unlikely others will!). If you need an empadron check with your landlord before moving in.

On arrival, your booking is subject to a trial period of 2 weeks. If you are unable to get on with other people in the house, you will be asked to find elsewhere. Reasonable time is always allowed for this rare event, provided that the reasons are not extreme, for example theft or aggression.

Deposit

1 months rent is the usual  security deposit. If no damages are found when you leave, the deposit is refunded 1 week after your official leaving date. Invoices confirming your expected leaving date are available when you move in. If you need your deposit refunded on the day of leaving you must arrange to have your room inspected 1 week before leaving and again on the day the deposit is returned.

Official Leaving Date

An example is easiest:

You take the room for 2 months on the 1st Jan so your official leaving date is 1st Mar. Your deposit would be returned 8th Mar, all being well. Remember that unless you discuss this, someone may well arrive to take your room 1st Mar

Deposit Deductions

Please remember that timescales on deposit refunds 99 time out of a 100 can be sorted to suit both parties if discussed well in advance. Problems arise when someone thinks, wrongly, that they are due a certain amount and that’s not the case.

So read before you arrive and you can avoid any pitfalls. Clean, tidy and as it was, with the booking term completed, there will be no worries.

Again, these are my personal methods of ensuring no  misunderstandings and of course, your co-living situation may be different. That said, I hope it’s given you some pitfalls to avoid and ask any questions BEFORE you move in, not on the day you realise you need your deposit back!

Rented Room Accommodation – Shared Housing

There is nothing more frustrating than when something that is obvious to you, appears to be bad manners (or an unfair shirking of house duties) is ignored or misunderstood, leaving you to clean up the mess and solve interpersonal disputes. Being old and sometimes grumpy I often wonder what my mother would think of some tenants manners.

However, times have changed and busy lives encourages us to be thoughtless sometimes.

Make Efforts to be part of the Household

In a shared house  are encouraged to make efforts to connect with each other. Any living arrangements work better when tenants try to interact and help one another. 

Keep your Room clean and tidy

It is the tenant’s responsibility to keep his or her room neat, tidy, and organised. Alternatively, once the weekly household chores are divvied up, one tenant may be paid to clean for another or pay a cleaner from outside to do it.

Communal Space

Do your part in keeping the communal space neat and clean by placing things back to where they belong and in the same condition. A simple gesture such as wiping down the dining table after use is common courtesy. Smoking in co-living premises is not allowed, except for the designated smoking outdoor areas.

Responsible Lifestyle

Leading a sustainable lifestyle is essential and even the smallest of unthinking actions can mount up. Switch off appliances, lights and fans when not in use.

Noise Levels

Common areas are designed for tenants to enjoy and interact with one another. Avoid screaming or blasting music in the common area, especially during the evening and at night.

Refrigerator Space

If you don’t want your food to be eaten by someone else, keep to your allocated space in the fridge. Clear stale food promptly and make sure everything is wrapped.

Laundry Times

Schedule your laundry day. Avoid disturbing people at antisocial times. Remove dried clothes promptly. No one likes to constantly see washing drying!

Communal Expenses

Many any argument started like the old Ben Elton sketch. ‘It was only a bit of shampoo’; ‘Yes but it was MY shampoo’. As soon as possible agree a kitty for  communal expenses and who responsibility it is to fetch them. This is part of the allocation of household duties.

*** Page under construction – lots more to  say 🙂 ***

Sunday Lunch in Tenerife

Not listed for Sunday Lunch? Contact us to see your bsr or restaurant advertised here for Sunday Lunch. All your local restaurant needs; find them here on Tenerife Pages.

Plumbers in Tenerife

How CCTV Surveys can save time and money when unblocking drains

There’s nothing more annoying than a blocked drain. Let’s face it, when you’re trying to have a shower and the water just won’t go down the drain it creates a really unpleasant experience, and in many cases it can leave you trying a whole host of different options before you find the right way to clear it and move on with what you were doing.

When I was younger I used to live with a girl who had long dark black hair – the same as mine – and we found that after every few weeks our shower drains would clog up with hair sending water straight back into our shower environment – not great. After using a mirage of supermarket products we would finally manage to clear it and by doing this every three weeks we would help to keep the drains clear.

Problem solved?

Perhaps – but what if this was to happen on a larger scale?

During winter it rains in the UK, that’s a given, and as the harsh rain pelts down our drains are forced to deal with large amounts of water rushing down them quite frequently. With leaves, pollution and various other elements being carried along it’s not hard to see how they can become blocked, spewing water back out onto the road which causes flooding and general havoc for motorists.

When a drain is blocked on a main road and flooding occurs then it’s crucial to get it fixed straight away, but with an extensive drainage network and no real idea of where the blockage might be, it can be hard to know where to start.

Introducing the CCTV survey

This small device is designed to work in the drainage system, identifying potential blockages and sending back information to a main receiver. CCTV surveys allow the user to utilise a GPS function to identify the exact area of the blockage and also to take any pictures that are needed to identify what the potential problem could be. In turn this enables workers to identify efficient methods of unblocking drains.

Another major benefit of a CCTV survey is that your ability to pinpoint the problem means that you can deal directly with that area. So rather than closing off an entire road or road area, you can in turn just close off an area which helps to keep traffic moving and prevent delays.

CCTV surveys are a great way to save time – by pinpointing the exact area of the problem you can deal with it directly rather than causing other unnecessary damage – and money as they enable you to work specifically at one point which saves additional drilling work, staff wages and various other costs. Overall if you are looking to get your drain unblocked quickly then they can be a great service to use to unblock your drainage system with minimal intervention required.

Planning Your Kitchen

The kitchen is  probably the most used room in the house. It is where the day starts and ends  and is generally a hive of activity when the family is at home.

It is therefore  very important that this room is well organised and the use of space is  carefully planned. This post is all about planning to make the room safe,  pleasant and relaxing to work in. It will also help to ensure that you have a  kitchen to be proud of and which will add value to your home. 

There are  three simple stages in kitchen planning.

The first is to carefully measure  your room and draw a plan of it, to scale, on the graph paper provided at the  back of this leaflet. Do wall plans as well as a floor plan.

The second is to  list the fitments you want and plan their positioning in the available space –  follow these simple guidelines to ensure that the kitchen you create is  practical and safe, as well as beautiful.

And the third is to visit your local  kitchen suppliers to choose the kitchen style you prefer, and enlist the aid of a Design  Consultant to answer any questions you may have about the planning, and to  process your order.

The work is never completed through plans or members of the corporate body. There is a need for a constant level of maintenance and updates to keep the building in proper working order. This means that the organization will be forced to hire electricians regularly, and from the point of view of safety and performance, it is essential to hire the right electricians to do the job.

It is equally important to participate regularly in construction inspections to ensure that all work done is high level. Here is a checklist that blueprints or corporate body members can use when they interact with electricians, to ensure that all required work is done correctly:

1. IS THE ELECTRICIAN PROPERLY AUTHORIZED?
Laws vary by Autonomous Community in Spain, so make sure you know what the local laws in your area are. In general, it is illegal for a person to be carrying out more than € 5,000 in labor and materials without the correct license. So, if you are looking for an electrician for a large project, make sure they can show that they are licensed first.

Beyond the law, it makes sense to make sure that you are working with a legitimate and qualified business, however, research shows that only 1 in 10 building owners and administrators will consult Social Security to verify if a merchant has a license. correspondent.

2. ALSO, DOES THIS LICENSE HAVE INSURANCE?
Not all contractor licenses are insured. The public registry may list a licensed contractor, but with the condition “only for contracts that do not require insurance.” This stipulation means that the person could not provide evidence to maintain insurance eligibility when applying for the contractor’s license.

It is best to always hire duly insured and eligible contractors, but certainly for any job over € 20,000, it must be essential that there is adequate insurance for all who complete the job.

3. WILL THE ELECTRICIAN WORK WITH REASONABLE TERMS?
It goes without saying that the electrician must produce and guarantee good quality work, but beyond that, he must ensure that they can work with a minimum of terms. These terms must be:

Efficiency: with an option to charge for the project instead of by the hour.
Offer a 24-hour service when necessary, as a project in progress may experience an emergency.
Good communication: you will want an electrician who behaves professionally and can work as part of a larger project and with many other contractors if necessary.
The professional electricians will not tolerate wiring or substandard facilities, so you should look at your team as an electrician has occurred in the past and use it to measure the approach taken in this project.