Tenancy review for 33 Seiriol Road in Hirael, Bangor rented from Hywel Davies rented via Dafydd Hardy

Landlord rating: 2

Seems okay at first, until something goes wrong. VERY rude, and super uncaring to say he has student-age children himself, who he probably wouldn't want to be in the same situation.

Agency rating: 1

Dafydd Hardy. Absolutely awful experience.
Extremely patronising to students (e.g. suddenly asking for payment for services which had never been mentioned or warned about previously, and then acting as if you are stupid when you question why you are paying these amounts).
Staff act as though they don't want to be working in the student housing department.
Did not make charges clear at all so you end up paying for services you didn't know existed. Very dangerous if you live loan too loan.
Staff super unhelpful when there were issues.
Showed some even worse houses than the one we ended up having to settle for.
General avoid.

Property rating: 1

2 double rooms, 2 single rooms. All single beds.
- Single glazed windows with largely rotten frames make for very cold winters, and expensive bills as the heating goes straight out the windows. FREEZING. When living there everyone ended up buying personal space heaters because it was cheaper to keep a couple of rooms warm that trying to heat the entire house.
- Various areas of the house with precarious fixes e.g. plank of wood holding up waste pipe in downstairs toilet.
- Boiler fitted in 1999, parts hard to get hold of when it plays up.British gas man said new boiler needed really as most showers were lukewarm/cold but landlord refused as he'd "just fixed the roof".
- Kitchen roof leak began early September. Water running through the light fitting into the kitchen sink. Classed as an emergency repair, so requires fix within a week. Actual repairs occurred in November after lots of shopping round for the cheapest deal, the work was never even fully completed.
- Mould on kitchen walls painted over rather than removed.
- Rear entry door rotten at base, allowed an ant infestation as they could easily get in and out.
- Large patch of damp and mould in upstairs bedroom clearly caused by exterior sources. No fix.
- Rear upstairs bedroom has no window which opens.
- Generally very dingy interior e.g. peeling wallpaper. House was absolutely filthy when we arrived (vacuum full after small patch of carpet filthy).
- No microwave provided (second method of cooking should be provided by law?) and vacuum is available only on request.
Probably more issues, but that's it off the top of my head.
To be clear, landlord and agency were made aware of all of these issues at the earliest possible chance.

To add some positives, the house is very cheap which does make up for the shortcomings. Good storage space. Upstairs bathroom is nice. The larger 2 of the rooms are a nice size. Adequate furniture in bedrooms although very dates and some parts falling apart but not bad overall. Not a bad house if you need somewhere cheap and you're pretty much just going to sleep and store things there, however definitely not a nice place to come home to if you spend a lot of time there, unfortunately.

Area rating: 5

Immediate neighbours friendly enough, however other neighbours petty about parking and not so friendly etc. Usually able to find parking. Lots of noise from playing fields early until late, lots of litter too. Generally a pretty quiet street which is okay to live on though. Average for Bangor, not really a student street.