Terrible, exploitative, dishonest company. Avoid.
Myself and three other housemates rented a flat in Bristol from 2C during the academic year 2023-2024. The rent was an astronomical £8,400 per quarter excluding bills, despite the flat's inconvenient location at the other end of Gloucester Road with poor transport links to the university.
The building is old and clearly run down with peeling walls and a “garden” that is exposed to the road, overgrown and basically scrub land. Moreover, 2C provided us with the bare minimum of old, stained and peeling furniture, with no desks or even lampshades provided, and only installed locks on half of the bedroom doors, refusing to even allow us to install locks ourselves. The geriatric 17-year old boiler broke down several times during our tenancy and has still not been replaced.
No wonder 2C couldn’t care less about the upkeep of the property – according to Bristol City Council they had recently applied to demolish the building, only to have planning refused.
For the duration of our tenancy, 2C, which is owned and entirely run by the Toussimanesh family, was completely useless, unhelpful and rude each time we brought up the several issues we had. Interestingly, 2C always stated that they would pass our comments onto the “Landlord”, which according to the tenancy agreement was “Elizabeth Blackwell Properties Ltd.”, a company owned by… the CEO’s sister.
When we complained about the damp and mould in the property (which was so bad that the mould started growing on my clothes), 2C replied that the Landlord was “unaware” of any structural damp problem, despite the fact that they had to completely replaster and insulate a bedroom prior to the start of our tenancy due to mould.
This also caused us to rack up a large heating bill during a cost-of-living crisis as we struggled at all times to bring down the humidity levels in the flat, while the windows had to remain open constantly during the cold winter months. As someone with asthma and a skin allergy to mould, this living situation actively damaged my health, yet 2C could not care less.
When we complained multiple times about the extremely unpleasant woodlice infestation that was present from the beginning of the tenancy, having sent them video and photo evidence of hundreds of woodlice crawling up our walls and hiding in our clothes, bedsheets and carpets, 2C said that insect ingress was “normal” in any household and refused to lift a finger to help, forcing us to foot the bill for managing the infestation with insecticide, humidity meters and dehumidifiers.
2C was also an incredibly intrusive presence throughout our tenancy. They carried out no less than four flat inspections during the year and we were expected to carry out a “deep clean” before each inspection. No reason was given as to why they required this excessive amount of inspections. In addition to this, 2C entered our flat to carry out viewings on at least three occasions.
Finally, 2C attempted to take a whopping £623 worth of spurious charges off our deposit, which amounted to £2800 in total. When we pointed out that many of the “damages” they were charging us for had been caused by previous tenants, such as the sofa cushions being completely covered in paint, the landlord generously reduced the charges to an outrageous £495 “out of goodwill”, with the added threat that if we refused to accept it, they reserved the right to charge the full amount.
The rest of these charges either constituted fair wear and tear, were not our responsibility or just outright lies (such as charging us for “blue-tack marks” when none of us used blue tack - we are all well into our twenties and do not decorate our rooms with posters anymore.)
We had taken good care of the flat, not just because we are respectful tenants in our final year of university, but because 2C's attempt to charge us for every speck of dust we left behind came as little to no surprise to us, having experienced their unscrupulous behaviour throughout the tenancy. Considering the shocking state of the property when we moved in, one has to wonder where all that money is going.
Throughout my time living in Bristol, I have never experienced such dishonest behaviour by any landlord or lettings agency. 2C could not care less about their tenants’ wellbeing and will scam you out of every penny they can, knowing that as inexperienced students we are unlikely to push back. AVOID.