SpareRoom

The site is jam full of time wasters and people who don't read your ads. You can spend hours, even days, arranging views where people don't even show up! Their prices are way too high and the 'service' is non-existent, with messages unresponded to and calls unanswered.

On the other side, I tried finding rooms on there before and it was an absolute nightmare. Most were already taken, or they just ignored the message, or sent a $#*!ty auto-response. In other cases the place was totally unsuitable, and a few were blatant scams. The odd gem is on there but you'd be better off pinning a 'room wanted' ad onto a community noticeboard.

Definitely not recommended.

A lot of fake properties and people in this website. Their system doesn't work properly saving old expired ads. Anyone who even don't have any link with a property can advertise it … any current tenant put anything and were not able to carry on any responsibility for this. How is the current tenant can say – accept DSS?! They refer you to a landlord or estate agency who refuse fairy tales of current tenant and sometimes they are not aware the property is advertised! Just a waste of time with this fake website SCARErooms))

I'm a Landlord looking for a tenant to join our house share I was contacted by a young girl who sent me a message as she wanted to view my room, I replied and never got a reply. I managed to find the girl who's picture was on her advert and got in contact through Facebook to my surprise she said she never made an advert on spare room and was living in India and only dreamed to come to the UK. Her profile stated she was in project management in the UK. Such lies this website makes false profiles and fools people like me who paid for there services. Stay away.

Spare room pretend so hard to tackle 'fake' profiles, insinuating for the most part that these 'fakers' are pretending to have a property to illicit money from a tenant. This is distraction technique. Nobody nowadays needs to be told that they should not hand over bank details or money without checking the accommodation and landlord first. Those scam artists are few and far between. Their advertising revenue comes mainly from Landlords and people looking for a housemate. The scam that THEY are involved in is creating false profiles, many, many of them. This keeps landlords etc, paying for contact. There a number of ways to identify that they are doing this which the ASA is aware of. Just don't use this scam artist of a company.

Sorry but you're getting too much
Sorry but is not right your strictness with Agent & Agencies you're getting too much...

I am an agent who joined recently the industry and due to COVID19 broke indeed, keen to build a transparent business but apparently a tiny hard to understand 4 you... Millionaire company...

You have the right and I am with you on protecting your customers as everyone should but you can't kill new agents or people who's willing to build something but obviously, need time hence may has not all the money you have...

This is completely unfair...

You might be great with a part of your customers but remember that us agent are one of your the CORE of your business... not only Tenants are your customers...

Without us posting you would have none seeking... remember that...

Spare room banned my advertising claiming I was not allowing full access to the kitchen. However, when I myself was looking for rooms, I had found many many instances where landlords did not offer full access to the kitchen. In any case, I did change my ad given that I decided to travel for work for a few days and that I now I could allow full access to the kitchen. However, still they denied my ad. I complained stating that their policies are double standards. I even showed them proof of advertisings that did not even mention kitchen use, and they still do not change their mind. I am looking to complaint outside of spare room. Please do you guys know is the next Ombudsman or Financial Conduct Authority? I honeslty do not think Spareroom is safe. Please stay away!

Have been using this site for quite a while and it is utter rubbish. It is impossible to rent anything via this web, landlords don't reply despite reading messages, listings are inundated with adverts of horrible overpriced con ads or properties already rented. Also lots of people try to scam you and just get your info without offering actual viewing etc.

Made many reports to the site, but they are incompetent enough not to care. They wanted me to play police and submit proofs so that adverts can continue to up as they are ' only advertisement platform' and cannot control what is being posted, according to them. My question is what are the moderators for if they cannot do anything and scammers can do what they want.

Also, most of the adverts that are worth something are not free and want to to pay ridiculous amount to try to contact the landlord that will most likely not reply anyway.

I will soon report it to authorities as they do not realize that responsibility for all the content lies on themselves.

AVOID!

I have used this site for 2 years and found it very well organized, the search is easy and fast and it has a lot of people from all over the world, so your choice is great. It is a little bit expensive but considering I was able to find good roommates within a week, I really can't complain. As i have stayed without because of Covid 19, I'm not sure what I'll find this year (2021) in terms of choices. But yes, you can trust this service.

1. Scammers
It's a decent mix of fake ads and scammers who who don't have ads and reach out directly asking for your contact info

2. Time wasters
You can place your own personal ad detailing who you are and what your looking for. Be prepared for folks to get in touch who don't bother to read your ad. For instance, if you have a small pet, be prepared to be overwhelmed by an array of options that don't allow small pets.

(I suppose they think that you throw your small pet in the trash?)

3. Functional issues
There are certain features that aren't, like the aforementioned, mentioned. These features don't work on the app yet work on the website.

(It's a go figure it out for yourself bonus)

4. Breach of contract
In the event that you share your dissatisfaction, in the event your experience is quite negative, eventually a "manager" of customer service comes along and insinuates a ploy of brutal British condescension. Without requesting anything whatsoever, SpareRoom will take it upon themselves to cancel the service you paid for no longer providing "early bird" access to ads.

Businesses have an opportunity to grow as a result of direct and honest feedback. This particular business doesn't inhabit or share that particular value.

I'm quite confident they hope I just go away. I'll be glad to. I'm equally confident that SpareRoom's nefarious business practices won't

Finding a room shouldn't be this difficult, they needs to start banning non responsive landlords from the site as they just waste everyones time. Landlord wants to know more about you? Cool I'll spend 20 minutes writing something that conveys that only to get ''read''. At least allow us to put a BIO section so we don't need to waste time introducing ourselves what we do etc, absolute waste of time, this site sucks so bad I'm starting to use gumtree instead.

Read the ad very carefully before the landlord responds to your ad. You be ready to ask questions about whose going to be living in the home. You are the one that's going to be spending your hard earned money. Remember your in control and the landlord is counting on you to help pay down their mortgage. If you need to sign a lease, you aren't happy with your house, you aren't obligated to stay another day if it causes you any problems.

I've used spareroom for a few years and still they don't seem to take the diversity of renters seriously. There is no function to be able to set preferences of who you want to share with.

The dangerous this is that the majority of landlords are white and discriminating against ethnic room seekers. Spareroom monitors ads for racist or discriminatory language, bit needs to fully verify ad posters and do checks.

I had an experience with a landlord that kept my deposit and had mould issues and behaviour issues. The landlord had painted over the mould and the mould grew back. I alerted spareroom multiple times, with photo and video evidence, as the mould affected my property in the room and my health. Yet the landlord had posted the room again without fixing the issue before i left. Without fixing the issue before I moved in and refuses to address it properly.

I received email responses from spareroom saying they are a platform and don't get involved and will bite my report, so in the future if anyone else reports the landlord it will be on file.
I understand that spareroom is a platform and I needed to report it to the local council environment department. However, if I have alerted spareroom why was the landlord allowed to repost?

I think spareroom needs regulation and a body that they report into to make sure anyone posting an ad is verified. There are social media platforms that are held responsible, so why not a platform for renters/landlords.

They charge excessive fees to list a property
There is no guarantee of any return on investment, despite this being the "number 1" place to rent a room
The LL has to do all the chasing, wrong imo as i've got a room for rent, but am not the one who needs a room.
The site admin team are down right rude and disrespectful
Never again - use roomgo, idealflatmate and other sites now, awful company never recommended by me

As above be really careful getting a tenant from this site you will end up being owed money, being messed around by dishonest people.

And I decided to post an ad, for a roommate. MUCH better than CraigsList, even though a small fee is involved (you can use the free version, but then you have to wait 7 days before someone can contact you). The phone didn't answer and I don't like how they don't make the policies very clear up front, which is why they only get 3 starts. Do it right, SpareRoom, and even if people have to pay a little bit, you'll quickly win over the CrapList, I mean CraigsList crowd. That service is free with no waiting, but HORRIBLE now.

Normally l do not write reviews, but please be aware of those properties that are rented out by beaconproperty on sparerooms or any other plateform. These people will not return your deposit and will try everything to make sure that they do not return your deposit. To their defence I did stay extra one week which I forgot to pay the rent until remainded, but was the time I was moving out.

Upon leaving and despite leaving everything in really good state, infact left the room better than it was given, they now claim that I was late on the rent and had to pay £195 pounds when the rent that was agreed was £125.
Long story short, try your level best to avoid this company as you are sure to be bullied and ripped off.

I cut my losses, because they wanted me to pay the £195 then they would return the deposit :)) ), inanycase this is for others out there, who maybe are health care professionals or who have been employed by the hospital.
All I'm saying is to be very careful, Guys and Girls.
P.S zero stars

Regards
The Doctor

Horrible App. Nobody replies and full of fake adverts. No matter how much you complain, no action is ever taken.