[och]

I guess I am paranoid form having read all the scary stories on Gumtree.
Suppose I found a flat that I like a lot. It's an average vacant unfurnished flat in a not the best, but OK neighborhood in the city. The price is average for this kind of a flat, from what I gather based on the ads for the same neighborhood.

The advert was a private advert on gumtree and the landlord is a private guy in his 30s who isnt the professional landlord, it's just his flat where he lived and they moved with his wife somewhere else now. Seems like a nice guy. A creative type. Knows all the neighbors. (all of these are my impressions from the viewing).

Is there anything I am supposed to ask for to actually make sure it is, for instance, his flat? back where I come from when I rent out my house I show a copy of a property title in my name. It is considered a norm. is there anything I should expect to be shown here in London? Is it rude to ask? am I paranoid?

[Bluey]

You can download ownership details from the land registry for about £4 and can courteously ask the landlord to show you photo ID to check they match or ask the landlord to show you documents that will satisfy you, such as consent to let or mortgage doc. It's becoming more common for tenants to check but I don't believe its a particularly common practice so the landlord may not expect this.

Face to face scamming is rare but does happen.

The only other thing to be wary of is whether your landlord has permission from his lender to let the property as if he used to live there, it would be a residential, not buy to let mortgage and he would then have to apply for permission to have tenants.

From memory, I believe that tenants who live in properties where the landlord doesn't have permission to let from their lender can be much easily evicted should the lender repossess the property versus tenants in property where the lender has given permission for it to be let. The Shelter website has a section on how repossession affects tenants so you can verify there if I've remembered correctly.

[och]

thanks! and if it is an ex-council flat on a council block, would details be on the registry? and how do I find it (the registry)