Leaders - St Ives Reviews 51

Avoid St Ives branch - have had a terrible experience with the Lettings team. They changed terms after holding deposits have been paid and are moving the goalposts on requirements. They even tried to back up their argument but just used previous emails that showed themselves to be wrong. Laughably bad, would expect better. Avoid where you can!

Abi was extremely helpful and friendly when I called asking for some help regarding tenants that had left last year. She was able to access the document that I needed to solve my problem immediately. Thank you

I want to thank the staff at leaders for dealing with my rental. The girls were very professional and would highly recommend using them 🙌

Cara was really good and kept me updated all the time and realy happy with service to

I made sure to inform the agent that I was in an IVA both on the application form and when I went for viewing. After the viewing, I was asked to pay the holding deposit which I did. I was then told I failed the credit check for referencing even though I mentioned the IVA. Landlord decided not to go forward. It’s been almost 2 weeks and I’ve still not gotten back the deposit. I’ve called three times since then and get told it’s been processed. I’m honestly really frustrated as it’s £340

We had a great experience working with Leila. From the very beginning, she was incredibly helpful, professional, and responsive. She guided us through every step of the letting process with clarity and confidence, making what can often be a stressful time feel smooth and straightforward. Leila genuinely cares for her clients and always made time to answer any questions we had and ensured everything was handled efficiently. I felt well-supported throughout, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend her to anyone looking to rent through Leaders. Thank you, Lelia!

As landlords we were clients with Leaders and their previous owners for nearly 30 years. Everything was absolutely fine for all those years until my husband died 2 years ago. Since then there has been a catalogue of mistakes with wrong payments that have been a nightmare to sort out especially after being bereaved. I am still receiving correspondence for my husband despite him dying 2 years ago, the flat being sold and the account closed months ago. I was promised they would learn from my experience but yet another email was received on Friday for my late husband.

I had an extremely disappointing and stressful experience with Leaders, and I’m sharing this so others are aware of what can happen even after doing everything right as a tenant.

I paid a holding deposit on the 27th of February and completed all referencing by the first week of March. Before I even went for a viewing, Leaders told me the landlord had already seen my application and was happy to proceed if I liked the property. After the viewing, I confirmed I wanted to go ahead and signed my part of the tenancy agreement at the very beginning of the process.

The agreed move-in date was the 19th of April 2024. After nearly two months of waiting and preparing, including setting up council tax, broadband, changing my address, and ordering furniture, I received a call on the 16th of April, just three days before move-in, informing me that the tenancy would not go ahead.

Leaders did not follow up with the landlord to sign her part of the tenancy agreement until three days before the move-in date. At that point, they claimed the landlord had decided not to rent out the property anymore and instead wanted to sell it.

By that time, I had already turned down other rental opportunities, lost money on non-refundable deliveries, and made all the necessary preparations based on the belief that everything was confirmed. I had also redirected my broadband to the new address, only to be disconnected and forced to pay a significant amount for data since then.

The whole process felt very seamless, and I had no reason to expect any issues. I never imagined I would be so badly let down in a twinkle of an eye.

The way this situation was handled was completely unacceptable. It reflected a serious lack of communication, responsibility, and care for the tenant.

I’ve since heard from many others who’ve had similarly negative experiences with Leaders, but many of them haven’t left reviews. I’m sharing my experience here so anyone considering using Leaders can think twice before doing so. They treat their tenants poorly, and no one who’s heard my story has had anything positive to say about the company.

Grace was really helpful

We arrived to a dirty and rundown house, the bins were overflowing with rubbish and MAGGOTS. The garden was overgrown, the gate was broken. There was a Morrisons shopping trolley in the garden, which I supposed would have been ok if it had all four wheels. Conveniently, the check in assessment didn't include photos of the problem areas, or mention them at all.

The fuse box was in the livingroom, at knee level, not ideal when you have a teething puppy. Took about 4months for this to be resolved (they made a crude wooden box for it).

There was rat poison putdown throughout the house, in every room. We had very young pets that could have been poisoned had we not found the pellets first. Our contract stated that we would arrive with pets including a young puppy so they have no excuse.

Our contact at Leaders (Tawnee) was useless. It took the office 4x attempts to get our contact right; basic spelling and formatting are not a pre-requisite to work for Leaders it seems.

In the last few weeks of our term the flat flooded due to a leak which we had reported 6month earlier, making it uninhabitable, we had already moved fortunately.

We moved from Edinburgh and weren't able to view the property beforehand and so it was a risk but I'll never rent a property without viewing first and doing a bit more research. I mean, pretty much every letting agency in the UK are bad, but Leaders are so terrible that it makes the others I have dealt with look reasonable.

We rented in St Ives on Needingworth Road from November 2021 to November 2022.

Grace was extremely helpful through the process and was always available to help at Amy time. It made the process easier and more fluid. She is an asset to the team.

Andreea Tudor from Leaders Cambridge has been a life saver for me, when I rented my house through Leaders St Yves.
She had to correct several mistakes made by one of the St Yves branch staff member (Grace Ames,) who gave me and my tenants, wrong information at numerous occasions, and made my experience with them tedious and very stressful. My tenants complained to me about their own experience with Leaders St Yves too, and told me that they would never rent another house through them.

Total lack of experience, property we rented out for 5 years with mould / rising damp poor property manager called david maleham heating never worked properly from the get go,
Several contractors been out with the advised findings to be done to improve the issues but david and landlord both not interested or what I should say is leaders as a whole not letting the landlord know the full picture,
I'd highly suggest thoroughly inspecting the property properly and just basically avoiding leaders full stop.
Membership fees are a joke and property inspections are a waste of time as they are very in experienced or just acting thick to make there job alot easier tick box sheet and that's it not looking at the bigger picture

Complete lack of communication after reeling you in with good offers and service to begin with. Once you’ve signed you are on your own. The management team are a complete joke and waste of time and money. They never reply to emails, give the incorrect info such as informing us that our tenants were due to checkout 10 days later than what was in the contract, plus the checkout inventory they completely missed a hole in the ceiling! Not to mention they emailed the tenants incorrect details on countless occasions stating they owed money, adding to a long list of issues.

The in-store consultants were very helpful initially getting tenants in last minute, but that was it. Hidden fees, being passed to different people to deal with your problem and a quite frankly abysmal management service team, avoid using this company at all costs.

Tawnee, Eliza and Monique have been a pleasure to deal with. Really helped me and my wife find the perfect property for us. Only needed a 6 month lease but they were so helpful and didn’t mind our many questions. Highly recommend

Had a great experience with Monique at Leaders. Extremely friendly and great customer service

Hello my name is Cheryl. I have had a very positive experience with renting through Leaders. The lady called Monique was wonderful. She understood what I needed and helped me through the transition process. Very appreciated.

Very good experience. Eliza was my contact at Leaders and nothing was ever too much trouble. I would receive regular calls to update me on progress and questions or concerns I raised were resolved quickly and professionally. Eliza’s upbeat and positive energy was infectious and she really was a pleasure to work with.

Eliza from Leaders St Ives was brilliant, always keeping me informed and happy to help at any point throughout the process. Her proactive and positive attitude combined with Leaders' excellent systems and other helpful staff made the whole rental and move process as easy as possible. Highly recommended.

Eliza was always in touch, always keeping us in the loop with progress, clarifying what the next step was. The property was let quickly and efficiently, exactly as was required