During August and September Pimlico Flats have a number of Flats and Studios becoming available. They will be listed on our Available Page (see Menu Left) and of course advertised in the Property Portals through our account with Upad (see advert left) in a couple of weeks. Meantime I’m on holiday, so the vacancies are being notified via this Blog (see Advertising Panel Right) .

We have several of each type of property – a 2 Bedroom Garden Flat, pet friendly. A 1 bedroom Ground Floor Flat, and 2 Studios (photos below). Prices vary depending upon the property, the Studios £1000pcm and£1250 pcm, the Flats from £1300 pcm and £2000 pcm. If a tenant has said that they wish to rent a flat and has left a holding deposit, we mark the listings as “Under Offer” pending taking references, and preparing the rental agreement. Once this process is complete the listing will be marked “Let” and left for a period.

Walk In Shower

These photos are for one of our new Studios – 75 Flat 12 which is available to rent for £1250 pcm from 1st August 2010.

Studio Kitchen

Studio Kitchen

Fitted Washer Drier

Fitted Fridge

Bathroom & Storage

Twin Headed Flood Shower

CCTV in Pimlico

After a regular series of newsletters I have to confess that we are taking stock, and recovering our breath. Our building contractor has left site and now we are on our own fixing and developing as is necessary. One area which has been causing some recent complaints is the availability of the Internet.

The first point that I continually emphasise is that whilst we provide all flats with either Wireless or Wired Internet Access it is only suitable for casual and social use. If you use wireless access the quality of your connection will depend upon the quality of your computer’s aerial as well as your distance from our transmitter. Even if you have a wired connection we do not support our service beyond a goodwill basis – if you rely on your internet connection to run a business, or require support and reliable service we ask you to arrange for your own service. Ours is provided free of charge without a commercial support on our part.

Having said that we have made moves to improve the reliability of our network. We have installed new cables out to 71 & 79 where we will be installing new wireless routers to expand the reach of our wireless network. We now have IT experts managing the network, and are exploring the idea of providing further services – specifically Network Printing, Network Attached Storage, and perhaps most excitingly VoIP telephone services. Perhaps the most important point that I would like you to take on board is that we are spending substantial amounts of money to provide you with free services. The sorts of services that we are considering are readily available from upmarket business hotels on a Pay As You Go Basis, we are aiming to give you a 5 Star business quality service for no premium to the rent that you pay.

One of the new developments is the new CCTV System which monitors the entrances to the houses. The original proposal was a community system which would protect the whole of the street, but Westminster Council turned down the idea, so we are left with a system which monitors the fronts of our houses only. This can be viewed by anyone on the internet, but if you are a resident you can get a much better view by just using our network.

All users wanting to see the CCTV pictures need to use Internet Explorer with Active X  controls enabled. For instructions on how to be sure that your web browser will show our CCTV pictures go to our Pimlico Flats Fun website . Any Internet User can view our CCTV cameras at http://pimlico.thruhere.net/ use the username “User” and the password “User”. If you are a tenant you will get a faster better view by connecting directly over our network by using your browser to connect to the IP Address 192.168.0.8 (just type it in).

Finally to leave on some very sad news for those of us involved in the development in Winchester St. – Zygmunt Giszczak – known to us as Ziggy passed away on Monday 31st May. Ziggy was 47 with a wife in Poland and 2 children, his son is 22 and living in London, working as an assitant manager in a pub in Clapham, his younger daughter is in Lublin University studying.  Ziggy came to London in 2005 to make a better life for himself and his family, he was a very calm and well like man who made a big impression in Pimlico, he took his work very seriously and always want to achieve the best for everyone.  He had established himself as a talented electrician and a great man to have on site – no issue was beyond his ability to resolve. Personally I will always remember him for his humour and smile, and the fact that everyone who met him loved him. Ziggy – you were a great man sorely missed.

Map of Pimlico

Hi – I am sorry for being so slow in issuing this Newsletter. The big change this month has been the introduction of the reception and management area in house 75. The idea from now on is that George will be available at 09:00 every morning if you have any problems that you require attention during the day. We will be exploring how to make this most effective over the coming weeks, and in particular that the reception is only easily available to tenants with access to 75.

Please feel free to let me know how you would like to communicate problems that you wish to have attended to. Currently the ways available to you are to speak to George, to leave a note at 75, to phone or text 07947 777575, or to e-mail maintenance@pimlico-flats.co.uk.

Our original plans submitted to Westminster City Council included individually mail boxes for all tenants and full street security monitoring. Both these plans were rejected however we intend to try to work around Council regulations and we have installed door monitoring CCTV. This is available over the network and via the internet, and if you enquire to maintenance@pimlico-flats.co.uk we will provide instructions for how you can monitor your entrances.

Wow – what a busy year we have and are having! It always was going to be a busy time as we introduced 11 new properties to market over the year, but our churn seems never ending as flats become vacant as fast as they fill. We seem to be averaging several new tenancies a month and I have to put my hands in the air and confess that I haven’t been able to recode the website fast enough to keep up with the changes. This sometimes leads to complaints which can have a funny side:

annoyed tenant wrote:

Thank you for the info, but I do not realy believe in that “I’m sorry but the flats immediately available have now been let.” These stories every eastat agent do the same. I am not interesting in studio fom much higer price! so when you have for the same price similer as it is advertise.

My Reply

Jxxxxxx – in this case it is true, besides if you had read our mail you would have noticed that the flats now available are actually CHEAPER than the ones which you enquired about and have been let.

I can understand that you are fed up with chasing after flats which are bargains only to find that they have been let and that those still available are more expensive. Had you considered that maybe it’s simply that the bargains get let quicker than the others?

We are regularly introducing new flats to the market, and they then rent extremely quickly because they are superb quality at an excellent rent. If the flat that you have enquired about is no longer available it is not a sign that we are trying to get people to enquire after fictitious flats, but rather that our flats are cheap

So without further beating about the bush, what do we have available in the near future?

Currently – no vacancies

Early April: Brand new Double Studio £1000 pcm see one of our other new studios for an indication of the build quality.

Late April: Large Double Studio with own Balcony £1100 pcm.

2nd May: Brand new Double Studio £1100 pcm with own Roof Terrace – see one of our other new studios for an indication of the build quality.

1st June: Small Bedsit with Balcony £420 pcm.

21st June: Double Studio £900 pcm.

Please keep visiting, or subscribe via the RSS/eMail – as I said we are currently averaging two new vacancies each month.