Landlord faces agent who owes her £20,000.

Channel 5’s ‘Nightmare Tenants, Slum Landlords’ is set to show how one rogue operator gives good letting agents a bad name. Margaret Wilson faces the agent that owes her £20,000 in a perfectly captured showdown on Wednesday 8th July at 9pm.

Margaret Wilson owns two rental properties in Oxfordshire.  Two years ago she handed them over to letting agent Carl Afilaka of Christopher Stanley Lettings Ltd of Bicester, Oxfordshire. Things went well for the first year but then twelve months ago, despite the tenants regularly paying the rent to the agent, Mr Afilaka stopped paying Margaret the rent owed to her. Now Margaret is out of pocket to the tune of £20,000.

A quick view of Christopher Stanley Lettings Ltd on “All Agents” reveals that Mrs Wilson is not the first person to be defrauded by this man, with claims of deposits not registered with a tenancy deposit scheme, not returning deposits, non-payment to contractors and violent behaviour.

At her wits end, Margaret tried everything to get the agent to pay up; she contacted Trading Standards and even called the police, with no success. After months of desperate phone calls and emails to the agent without response, Margaret contacted Landlord Action’s debt recovery department.  With Founder Paul Shamplina at her side ready to serve a letter before action for the outstanding monies, Margaret finally gets to confront Carl Afilaka face to face.

Mr Shamplina of Landlord Action comments: “For a number of years, our debt recovery department has been taking legal action for landlords against rogue agents that withhold rent owed to landlords for their own business and cash flow purposes. It infuriates me that any agent is able to get away with this whilst causing so much distress to a landlord.  It can often discourage them from using a good reputable letting agents in the future.
All landlords should do their research with regards to finding a good agent, making sure they belong to an association such as ARLA or NALS, that they are registered with a mandatory redress scheme and, most importantly, that they have client money protection insurance in place.  Landlords can also look for the SAFEagent logo which will give them a peace of mind. This way, if ever the instructed agent was to go out of business the rent and their tenant’s deposit would be insured.”

Catch tenacious Margaret walking up and down Bicester High Street with a sandwich board warning other landlords of this rogue agent as she prepares to face a cowardly Carl Afilaka on Wednesday 8th July on Channel 5 at 9pm.

Christopher Walkey

Founder of Estate Agent Networking. Internationally invited speaker on how to build online target audiences using Social Media. Writes about UK property prices, housing, politics and affordable homes.

You May Also Enjoy

Breaking News

Newcastle and Edinburgh commuter belts beat London

The latest research from The Property DriveBuy has found that Newcastle and Edinburgh rank as the best commuter belts in Britain, with all surrounding local authorities offering a more affordable average house price than the cities themselves, whilst Liverpool ranks as the worst. The Property DriveBuy analysed current house prices across 12 major British cities,…
Read More
Breaking News

Breaking Property News 16/10/25

Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X. Tlyfe and Eleos Life partnership brings embedded insurance protection to UK Renters In a first for the UK rental sector, Tlyfe (powered by OpenBrix) has partnered with digital insurer Eleos Life by adding embed life and income protection directly into its tenant app. Instead of…
Read More
Breaking News

Sellers of larger homes make £122.5k average capital gains, crushing the gains from flats

Sellers of detached homes made £122,500 in capital gains when selling their home over the last 18 months while flats yielded an average gain of £27,000 Sellers in England and Wales made an average gain of £72,000, a 38 per cent increase in value from when they bought the property The average seller in London…
Read More
Breaking News

London’s second homeowners face £16,446 CGT bill

London’s second homeowners face £16,446 capital gains tax bill, but prime London sellers escaping unscathed The latest research from Enness Global has found that whilst the London property market remains subdued, the city’s second homeowners could still be hit with significant costs when exiting their investments, with the average seller now facing a capital gains…
Read More
Love or Hate Rightmove
Estate Agent Talk

Rightmove launches new webinar to equip agents with market leading insights and business-boosting strategies

Rightmove, the UK’s largest property platform, is launching a new webinar to equip agents with the latest market intelligence and profit-boosting strategies to accelerate sales and improve conversion rates. The webinar titled, ‘From pitch to profit: Competing on more than just fee’, will take place live on Friday 17th October at 1pm, exclusively for Rightmove…
Read More
Estate Agent Talk

60% of homeowners admit to stress & sleepless nights

Managing your mortgage and mental health as 60% of homeowners admit to stress and sleepless nights The latest insight from award-winning mortgage adviser, Alexander Hall, has shown that for the majority of homeowners, their mortgage is their single largest financial worry, with 60% stating that their mortgage worries have impacted their mental health at one…
Read More