Some agencies may ask for a flat-rate fee to show you a list of announcements within their portfolio. Even if not outright illegal, this often turns into a money loss. The transaction usually entails access to a list of phone numbers. Many of them will not be answering or will tell you the apartment is already gone. There could be different degrees of how bad this plays out: there may never be an advertisement ‘fitting’ your needs; there may be some that are sub-standard or over-costly; even if there’s a fitting ad, you don’t necessarily have priority over other customers. The best practice is to pay the agencies for their services only after they successfully brokered a rental agreement between you and the landlord.

Another common practice is asking you to pay a fee upfront to prevent others from seeing the apartment. The reasons for asking for a downpayment can differ: maybe there’s high demand, the landlord is very busy and can’t show you the apartment or doesn’t live nearby, or even to prove that you are ‘really interested’, and so on. It’s important to never pay anything without a receipt or without signing a legitimate contract. The first rent and the deposit should be paid after signing the contract. Some landlords/agencies may ask for a downpayment before signing the rental contract: this is legitimate, but the transaction should happen under a specific contractual agreement, and in no cases should be paid without having seen the apartment and verified the vendor’s trustworthiness. The downpayment is handed back when the rental contract is signed (it may be commuted, if parties agree so and if properly stated in the lease agreement, in the deposit or in the corresponding months of rent).

This concerns mostly ads found on social media. Many are openly fake, and usually, you are asked to pay a fee to ‘stop’ the apartment. This is a variant of the ‘pay to stop’ scam, which also involves a non-existent apartment. To this kind of scam are particularly vulnerable those who need to rent before arriving in town. Asking some friends to go and take a look at the apartment before wiring any money, or asking for a virtual tour are best practices that could help prevent incurring in scams and losing money. It’s important to avoid giving personal or financial data if you aren’t sure about the vendor’s reliability. Another way scams can extort you money is to ask you for an address to receive a delivery with something of utmost importance (for example the keys of the apartment or the contract): when the delivery person arrives they’ll ask you to pay for the ‘insurance’ of the delivered package. Then the accomplice goes away and your money never comes back. When chatting online with potential landlords/agents, pay attention to the language used in messages: often they are sketchy, just like spam emails from Princes or Widows.

This one concerns the memento of leaving the apartment. The landlord can inspect to see if everything is in order, and left as it was when the tenant began living there. If they find that something is damaged, they could use all or part of the deposit to cover these costs, However, tenants may be asked to pay for non-existing damages, or damages that aren’t their fault. Often they are also asked to pay for cleaning services or whitening. It’s important not to be charged with unjustified expenses. The tenant has the right to ask for a full inventory of the house at the beginning of their contract. This is especially important if nobody was living in the apartment before. A good practice could also be to take photos of the room and/or the general state of the apartment, both when checking in and when checking out. Whitening should be charged to the tenant only if the deterioration of the walls is the direct result of their negligence.