Undoubtedly Stow Brothers are slick marketers and certainly pull in the punters. (Pre-Covid, viewings were uncomfortably packed). But as a buyer there’s little sense anyone’s taking a particular interest in you. Jumping straight to ‘best and final’ offers isn’t a great policy, nor is failing to contact you when a house you failed to get is back on the market, because they’ve decided they know what level of offer you’d put in the second time round and dismiss you! My experience once I was successful with an offer was poor. The sales progressors provided no help with the difficulties of being in a chain. At one point mine seemed close to collapse – but If I found anything out it was only through being contacted by my vendors. Direct communication with them became vital. I got no updates even when there was a frustrating delay for a whole week before exchange. If I was a seller I’d be concerned I could lose a sale because of poor liaison with my buyer; as it is I’m pleased I wasn’t the one paying Stow.

I'm a local landlord (and resident). I hate to knock a local business but we were hugely disappointed by the experience we had from Stow Brothers in managing our block of flats. It was bad enough at the time, including failing to make us aware of the new licensing regulations that were coming in, despite knowing we wanted everything done by the book. However it was only when we needed to regain possession to carry out extensive renovations did it become clear quite how inept they'd been, including signing one tenant up with the FORMER agent listed as the landlord, hugely delaying the eviction process and leaving empty properties as we couldn't upgrade them until the entire building was empty, as we wanted brand new wiring and plumbing etc throughout. Their terms exclude liability for their negligence, and when challenged they wouldn't remove this. With hindsight that should have rung alarm bells. Maybe our experience was a one off but it really wasn't good.

I was given written confirmation of a viewing, turned up 15 minutes early, only to find no one there. I called the office to be told that my viewing was 30 minutes before what I had been sent in writing. I then got a call from the agent who was meant to meet me who insisted he had been there the whole time. I then viewed another property with this agency thinking that the last time had been bad luck only for it to turn into a bidding war with very terrible communication from their part. This agency knows how difficult the market is and are not doing anything to make managing it any easier for tenants.

Update: unfortunately, in retrospect I would have to say Stow Brothers have the best pre-sales team, and the worst after-sales support. 12 months on from my review below, we have decided not to renew our agreement with Stow. The main reason is that they simply provide terrible service to landlords: information takes weeks to get to tenants sometimes, and Stow guard the communication with tenants jealously. In addition, every single piece of work needed to the property in the part year, if done through Stow Brothers, ended up being quoted as over £250. Even something as simple as kitchen cupboard hinges becoming loose, or a bathroom door starting to stick: "It's all knackered, you need to replace it all." The final insult has been the way our tenants' checkout has been handled - I have personally had to supervise the entire affair, pointing out to Stow where the tenants haven't fulfilled their part of the tenancy agreement, and organising remedial works. If I wanted to manage the property myself, I wouldn't have hired Stow to do it! Terrible. Avoid, avoid, avoid! -- We've let our house out through Stow Brothers for 6 months now, and they have been professional and thorough in their service. Our contacts have been Catherine and Geida in the Residential Lettings team, and while it sometimes takes a bit of time to get things organised, they have managed to handle every thing that has come up. Thank you, Catherine and Geida!

Shocked!! …. Called the Walthamstow office to make an enquiry and I was appalled at the level of rudeness I received. I believe the agents name was Rhea. I felt the phone call was very rushed like she had better things to do. This is not how I or anyone should be spoken to. WILL NOT BE CALLING STOW BROTHERS AGAIN!!

Trying to arrange a viewing for a house that's been on the market for 7 months. Each time we call get told they've just had an offer and not taking further viewings. They've reduced the price of the house a few times but haven't even given us the opportunity to view. We are serious cash buyers. They appear to be playing games with the vendor. I would avoid if you plan to sell a house through them

We were looking for flats and we came to agreement on one day with this agency to view a flat. As we live Central we had to travel there for about 40min plus the cost of the tube. We arrived 30 minutes before viewing to make sure we are on time, then 15 minutes before viewing we got call from the agency saying that they don't have the keys from the property and we can't do the viewing. Anyway, we were very close to the agency and we walked in to ask if there is any way we can check the property today as we had seen few and we wanted to give our final decision by tomorrow. The guy said that we can’t and he asked us to come again tomorrow (when we already spent monay for the transportation and 40min travel). We replied that we want to take our decision today and this was our last property to view. This was his response: That's fine! We have lots people lining up and looking for flats! Is this a professional response? I'm not sure if he was confused as this is not a game that someone loses and someone doesn't! Anyway, if he believes that having people lining up for and he can do whatever he wants that a very bad attitude and disrespectful to see it from a human being. We got another flat at the end and we won't be coming back again to this agency as I can't imagine how they will treat you if you already rent with them.

I have been renting with the Stow Brothers for nearly four months and have had to deal with an unfortunate number of incidents which has lead me to this point of frustration in having to post about it publicly on Google. Sadly these issues were not handled in a timely or professional manner by my property manager, Catherine. I feel as if there has not been an open line of communication and as a tenant I have had to constantly chase Catherine for updates as she does not provide these in an efficient manner, and sometimes not at all by the deadlines she promises. In addition, she has scheduled several contractors over the weekends who have not shown up and has taken no accountability for it. It took her over two months to help resolve a slug infestation in my apartment after several failed attempts and miss-scheduling of contractors who were no-shows or were not approved to do the job. It also took Catherine over a month to arrange for and fix a hot water problem in my shower during the chilly winter months, with no sense of urgency evident. I would really like to rate the Stow Brothers higher, but the level of service I have received and the premium I pay to live in an apartment that is managed by an independent leasing agent just do not match up to my expectations.

They know why, that's all that matters. 🤫 …