Free tenant, not very "free". Recently, a number of free tenants in Beijing, Shanghai, Wuhan and other places reported that their rent contracts were about to expire, and the rent price for renewal increased by more than 10%, and some even experienced increases of 20% and 30%. Generally speaking, considering the market price fluctuation, inflation, low and peak seasons of the rental market and other environmental factors, it is normal for the annual rent to rise to a certain extent.
By zoushuai
Source / deep burning
A free tenant said that when the rent was renewed in the past two years, the increase in rent was mostly within 3%. Now, when it is inconvenient to move because of the epidemic, the increase is as high as 10%, which is unacceptable. What makes them more confused is that the rent increase is not transparent enough, and there will even be a big gap in the rent increase of different rooms of the same house.
Let's make a simple calculation and see what a 10% increase in rent means to tenants.
If the rent signed in the first year is 3000 yuan / month, an increase of 10%, it means that the rent of the next year is 3300 yuan / month, and 3600 yuan will be paid in one year alone. In addition, freedom will charge the tenant a service fee every month, which is 10% of the rent. When the rent rises, the service fee also rises. Taking into account the increase in service fees, we have to pay an extra 3960 yuan a year. As for the tenants who encounter an increase of more than 20%, this figure will be even higher.
As for the "rent increase storm", the free side responded on June 7 that the overall rent in the second quarter was stable, and the average increase in renewal was less than 3%. As for the increase of more than 10% reflected by the tenants, freely said that the main reason may be that the rent in most of the owners' entrustment agreements increases by a certain extent year by year, resulting in the increase above the average level.
Not only the problem of rent increase, during the epidemic period in Shanghai, libero was unable to perform the cleaning service for CO tenants twice a month, resulting in service fee disputes with tenants. At present, there are still free tenants in Shanghai who claim to be defending their rights.
Ziji was founded in 2011 and was affiliated with linkhome in the early stage. In 2016, it became an independent operating subsidiary of linkhome group. By April 2021, the company has covered 10 major cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Nanjing and Guangzhou. Along the way, he not only gained millions of tenants and hundreds of thousands of owners, but also was favored in the capital market.
Now, the new model, which was once proud of, has gradually exposed its drawbacks. Entering the 11th year, can you keep people freely?
When the house expires, "the renewal will be increased by 24%"
Gu Qi lives in the East Fifth Ring Road of Beijing. In July 2021, she rented a south facing bedroom at the price of 2590 yuan / month. At the end of May this year, she received a free call. The other party reminded her to apply for renewal one month in advance, pay a deposit of 99 yuan to lock in the price, and then make up 50% of the rent one month before the expiration. The rest of the rent in the first quarter needs to be made up before the expiration.
She found that the rent for renewal had risen to 2860 yuan / month when checking the renewal of the contract on the free app. "This is a 10.4% increase." Customer service at ease told Gu Qi that although the rent had risen, the service fee was preferential. "I saw the discount, reduced 411.84 yuan, and reduced 34 yuan a month." She felt that this was an operation of "slapping a sweet date." after the lease was renewed, I had to pay 810 yuan more for the rent each quarter. In addition, I had to pay the service fee in full at one time, 3020 yuan a year. "
Gu Qi was dissatisfied with the opacity of the price increase mechanism.
Gu Qi rented a house with three bedrooms and one living room, two facing south and one facing north. Previously, Gu Qi heard that the general increase in rent was about 3%, which was an acceptable increase of tens of yuan per month. Her roommate in the south facing bedroom next door also confirmed to her that the rent was only increased by 20 yuan last year. This year, after Gu Qi learned that the increase was more than 10%, she communicated with her roommate in BEIXIANG bedroom, who expired at the end of June. The other party told her that her bedroom had increased by nearly 7%. This makes Gu Qi even more unbalanced. "In the same house, the two bedrooms whose expiration time is only half a month away have a difference of 3%."
Shenran learned from the public information of various social platforms that netizens in different cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Wuhan said that the rent increases by more than 10% when the lease is renewed freely. A blogger in xiaohongshu said that her rented bedroom expired in June, and the renewal price rose by 13% year-on-year, paying more than 300 yuan a month. The blogger said that the bedroom was sublet from a friend in January. Her friend lived in the bedroom for two years. The price increased by 40 yuan / month in the first year and 60 yuan / month in the second year. After continuous negotiation with the customer service, the blogger finally took the price increase of 70 yuan / month as the final solution.
It is not an isolated case that prices are raised first and then lowered according to negotiation. According to previous media reports, a tenant told the housekeeper that he wanted to move and choose another brand, and the housekeeper said that he had applied for a "special discount", which changed from a price increase of 300 yuan to a price increase of only 70 yuan. Some tenants believe that this belongs to "children who will make trouble have sugar".
The 10% increase has been difficult for tenants to accept, and even tenants have encountered an increase of more than 20%.
Wang Xiao, who lives in Beijing Shuangjing, is one of them. She rented a bedroom last July at a price of 3230 yuan / month (excluding service fee). You can check the renewal price two months before the expiration. Wang Xiao pinched the time and opened the app on the night when you can check the price. He found that the renewal price reached more than 3700 yuan. She checked the price the next day and found that it was 3990 yuan / month. "I calculated that this was a 24% increase. It was so shocking that one bedroom with three bedrooms could rise so much." After negotiation, complaint and rights protection, Wang Xiao finally got the free treatment that the renewal price was changed to 3790 yuan / month. "I can't accept the symbolic reduction of 200 yuan."
On June 7, freestyle responded that the data showed that in the second quarter of this year, freestyle's national rent level remained generally stable, with month on month fluctuations within ± 2%. At present, the renewal price of customers increased by an average of 2.5%-3% year-on-year, which was significantly lower than the increase of general rental price in first tier cities in the past year.
As for the increase of more than 10% reflected by the tenants, freely said, "the main reasons may be that the rent in most of the owners' entrustment agreements increases by a certain extent year by year, and that some houses may indeed increase by more than the average level due to factors such as the owners're signing the contract, the tenants' participation in preferential activities in the early stage, and the surrounding rents' significant increase due to market supply and demand, which makes the tenants feel more strongly about the increase."
Wang Xiao did not recognize the free response, "there is a suspicion of confusing cause and effect and starting prices."
Why does freedom provoke public anger behind the rent increase
The one price increase factor mentioned in the response of Zhili is that "the surrounding rents have increased significantly due to market supply and demand", but the actual feeling of some tenants is not so.
Take the houses near Wang Xiao's home for example. A year ago, Wang Xiao rented a house at a price of about 3200 yuan, which was the average price of similar houses nearby at that time. After learning that the renewal price was 3990 yuan, Wang Xiao compared the prices of houses in her community. She found that most of the free houses with the same conditions as her own rooms were about 3300 yuan, and even the special price rooms were less than 3000 yuan.
In other words, under the influence of market changes, inflation and other environment, the rent of other free houses in wangxiaotong community is still the same level as that of the same period last year, but the rent of Wang Xiaotong's house has to rise by 24%.
On the left is the signing price of Wang Xiao, in the middle is the renewal price, and on the right is the price source of similar free houses nearby / photo provided by the interviewees
It is worth noting that the rent increase in Beijing, Shanghai and other places coincided with the special management of many residential areas due to epidemic prevention and control. Some free renters in Shanghai said that when Shanghai was still under sealed control, they could not move when the free price increased by 10%. Even if they did not agree to the price increase, they could not change their rent, so they had to accept the increase.
"We do not allow outsiders to enter our community in early May. There are closed communities nearby, so we can't see the house at that time. Under such circumstances, we feel we have to accept the free price increase." Wang Xiao said.
In May this year, the Beijing Municipal Regulations on housing lease was passed and will come into force on September 1, 2022. It stipulates that the annual increase of urban housing rent shall not exceed 5%. At present, the regulation has not been implemented yet. However, before that, the Ministry of housing and urban rural development issued the notice on preventing large-scale demolition and construction in the implementation of urban renewal, which has made it clear that the annual increase of urban housing rent will not exceed 5%.
Wang Xiao believes that it is understandable to increase the rent every year according to market fluctuations. It is incomprehensible that under the premise that it is inconvenient to move and change the rent due to the epidemic and the rent around has not increased significantly, the rent of the old tenant who renewed the lease has increased by more than 20%, which makes her feel that she has been "killed".
During the epidemic period, in addition to the rent increase, the service fee was also criticized. Since the end of March, the Shanghai community has been closed and controlled continuously. For free tenants, the closing and controlling period means that the on-site cleaning service in April can not be performed. Even some tenants began to close and control in March, and the cleaning in March has not been completed. If you encounter problems such as home appliance failure, you can't enjoy free on-site maintenance services. Many Shanghai tenants asked to freely refund a part of the service fee, but the initial negotiation result was that freely offered a solution of making up for cleaning or offering dozens of yuan of bedroom cleaning vouchers.
At the beginning of May, freestyle said in the "second letter to Shanghai freestyle customer" that users who choose to refund the fee will receive 40% of the paid monthly service fee as the refund of the affected cleaning service in this round of epidemic, and the other option is still to do additional cleaning.
For such a solution, some Shanghai tenants said that they did not enjoy any services, but only refunded 40% of the monthly fee, which was unreasonable. Moreover, it is unrealistic to make up for cleaning, and frequent cleaning is not necessary.
Source / xiaohongshu, a free tenant in Shanghai
In addition to the tenants' roast, the landlords also have complaints.
In 2020, freely was exposed to terminate contracts with owners in large quantities. According to the report at that time, in June, 2020, a free owner received several calls from free asking the owner to reduce the rent, on the grounds that the epidemic had led to a high vacancy rate. A few months later, in the case of unsuccessful negotiation between the two parties, the owner's rent was automatically terminated. Afterwards, the owner will also compensate more than 4000 yuan. At that time, many owners who were forced to terminate the contract were the same, and they needed to pay a high amount of decoration fees and home appliance compensation fees.
After 11 years of freedom, can the model stand the test
High rent increase and unclear service fee performance are the two major problems that are most reflected by free tenants at present. Can you stand the test freely under the epidemic situation?
Take the service fee for example. Some tenants believe that the free service fee does not specify the cost details of cleaning, which will lead to changes in the refund rules. The service fee includes room selection service, cleaning service, maintenance service, broadband service, customer service and housekeeper service. According to the free tenant, among the six items, the only ones that are commonly used and can be realized are cleaning twice a month in the public area, broadband handling and maintenance.
Moreover, freely collects service fees from the tenants of each room. Taking Gu Qi's three bedrooms as an example, the three families have to pay a service fee of nearly 700 yuan each month. Only the above services are really used.
Free service fee includes project source / free app
Gao Xin, who once rented free houses in Haidian District of Beijing, told shenran that the three services that can be appraised, i.e. cleaning, broadband and maintenance, are not worth the money. "Things in the house don't go bad every day. During the period when I rented it, the light in the bathroom was broken only once. It's easy for the cleaning staff to clean every time. If the public area is small, it can be cleaned quickly." As for broadband, the cost of self handling is not high, let alone several people can share.
At the same time, some tenants reported that the free service was also suspected of "shrinking". Jiangxiaochun has rented a comfortable house in Beijing for three years. She said, "in the past, there was a housekeeper when looking at the house. After signing the contract, the housekeeper and the tenant have a group. If there is anything in the group, the Housekeeper will handle it. Now it is cancelled. If there is anything to do, go to the app to find the cloud housekeeper." The communication interface of cloud housekeeper is actually customer service. "I pay more than 400 service fees a month. I don't think it's worth it."
The free service fee also includes a "complaint handling". In this regard, Wang Xiao also encountered a bad experience. After learning that the rent was increased by 24%, she complained on the free app for many times, but basically she did not receive the phone call from the free Commissioner, and the complaint page showed "completed".
Jiangxiaochun told shenran that what he had chosen to do freely was to be worry free, clean and good service. However, after several years of changes, the rent has risen, and the service can no longer enjoy the previous level. "Now there is only beautiful decoration left."
As the head company of long-term rental apartments, freeform has indeed made innovations in the long-term rental model. Just as jiangxiaochun said, decoration is a major advantage of Zifang in that year, that is, after signing a contract with the owner, the house will be uniformly decorated, furniture with the same style will be purchased, and each room will be uniformly installed with a password lock, and then leased to the tenant. Compared with traditional intermediary companies, the innovation of freedom also lies in that no intermediary fee is charged. The service fee charged is also a "service" that advertises continuous performance during the lease term, rather than a "intermediary" that cannot be found after one payment.
The short-term rent model, the free deposit for graduates, and the introduction of the new model "gain rent" entrusted by owners' assets have come from undeniable status and value in the Internet real estate industry for 11 years. However, along the way, freedom has also faced many disputes. Events such as formaldehyde exceeding the standard, secretly photographing cameras, and drinking reclaimed water to tenants for nearly a year have caused a lot of public opinion. It has been exposed that the sharp rent increase is not a new situation in 2022.
It seems that the tenant and the landlord make money, but it is still difficult to be comfortable. According to media reports, from 2015 to 2017, the company suffered a cumulative loss of nearly 1.3 billion yuan. Tianyancha shows that after 2018, it has freely raised funds for many times, with an amount of more than 10 billion yuan. In june2019, freely completed the round B financing of US $500million, and in March 2020, it received another US $1billion from Softbank vision fund. However, according to the disclosed data, from 2019 to 2021, the free income was 309million yuan, 128million yuan and 158million yuan respectively, and the operating status has not yet recovered to the pre epidemic level.
In recent years, there have been many problems with long-term apartments. Eggshells and young customers exploded, the enterprise capital chain was broken, and the landlord could not get the money, so he drove the tenant away. The tenant had no place to live after paying the money. In addition to the prevailing "rent loan" at that time, many people could not live in a house but had to continue to repay the loan. In november2020, the use of long-term apartments will be suspended by installment and easy payment. Without this "fatal defect", the trust crisis left by long-term apartments still exists.
Jiangxiaochun said that when the house expires this year, he will no longer choose freely. At the same time, Wang Xiao is still communicating with the regulatory authorities, reflecting the situation and trying to solve the problem. "I can only move away if I can't solve it." In the midst of the loss of tenants, perhaps we should start to face up to the trust problem of long-term apartments.
*The picture is from pexels. At the request of the interviewee, Gu Qi, Wang Xiao, Gao Xin and jiangxiaochun assumed pseudonyms.