can any1 give me advice. i met the landlord after the estate agents had left, it saves both of us money to cut them out, but. u do hear of a lot of fake landlords, doing a runner with ur deposit and first few months rent, b4 the real owner turns up.

is it unwise to cut-out the landlord?

dont trust the con man. If he is the real landlord, the real estate agent would know is he is a scam or not! It could be the former tenent or thwe friend of the next door neighbor.

Best option depends on knowledge. The more knowledge you have yourself in this field, the less you need the middleman, general statement. In Shanghai, knowledge includes knowing who's the real owner, as many people see absolutely no harm is cheating you, it's up you to be well prepared not to get cheated (reading Fukuyama's 'Trust' helps to signal these patterns). So no harm in taking the real estae agent....as long as you know he's not a scam as well. I cut out the middleman both both for renting an apt. and later for buying one. He was mad at first, but later admitted that for us his added value was close to zero...however told him before that this was going to happen and agreed a pay-off of 1000 RMB

agree with edbreejen, however, plz keep in mind that this is not moral behaviour at all, as you wound not hv known the info the landlord at all.

HeadHonchoHonkie wrote:can any1 give me advice. i met the landlord after the estate agents had left, it saves both of us money to cut them out, but. u do hear of a lot of fake landlords, doing a runner with ur deposit and first few months rent, b4 the real owner turns up.

is it unwise to cut-out the landlord?

we did this for the second apartment we rented and the landlord gave us a reduction in the rent. the agents office was directly outside the compound so at some point we knew they would see us and come knocking, which they duely did. this continued for a few weeks after which we paid them off with a few hundred whilst saving thousands in rent.

to be sure that this landlord is the real deal or not is to ask for the ownership document and ask the owner's ID. You can go to police station to see if this is correctly stated. this is what the agents would do too. Because YOU are signing the contract not the agent with the landlord. Therefore, even if you have an agent and the landlord turns out to be a fake one. You can only blame yourself not the agent!

CUT HIM!!! but, call the 'landlord' and ask him to show u his ID, check if the picture on the ID is the same person, and ask him to show u his original not photocopied 'fang chan zheng'(房地产权证, short form房产证）(house property paper, showin its his flat) that has the same name of his in his ID card. and also check if he is the only person that owns this flat. and also, u should see his 户口（hu kou, residence book of his family, shanghainese all have, so people from outside cant cheat u)
chat with him ask where does he work or live, more u know about him, more u are sure its not fake.
showin u his three proves wont be more troublesome than both parties pay the agent 1000 yuan. actually agent usually take 35% of one month rent and thats all, it should be around 100 for a 3000rmb flat. i was suppose to pay 77 for 2200rmb flat but i canceled signing contract cause the landlord is greedy, he wants 3 months rent plus one month deposit at once in cash, and its not negotiable cause he is too busy to take money once a month from his work.

yes, as palala said, u should check from the local police station 公安局（gong an ju, public security police office).

if u know some chinese check this up:http://www.bjsoufang.com/listnews.asp?id=55

must check if the ID number is the same as in the 户口（hu kou), the name signed on the contract should be same as in ID and 户口.
you should also keep a copy of his ID.