Privacy & Cookie Policy.

Who we are

Browns Residential is the trading name of Browns Sales and Lettings Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales (company number 13729338). Our registered office is at Prohal Chartered Certified Accountants, Unit 2 Leavesden Lodge, 1a Leavesden Road, Watford, Hertfordshire, WD24 5FR, and we work from Unit 18 WOW Workspaces, Sandown Road, Watford, Hertfordshire, WD24 7UY.

We are the controller of the personal information described here, which means we decide how it is used and are responsible for looking after it. This policy explains what we collect, why, who we share it with and the rights you have, in line with the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018.

If you have a question about any of it, write to us at the office address above or email contact@brownsresidential.com.

The information we hold

We only collect what we need for the work we are doing with you. Depending on how you deal with us, that may include:

• your name, address, email address and telephone number;
• details of the property you are selling, letting, buying or renting, and your requirements as a buyer or tenant;
• proof of identity and address, and the information needed to confirm the source of funds, which the law requires of us before we can act;
• for tenants and guarantors, the information needed for referencing and Right to Rent checks;
• bank details, where we collect or pay rent, deposits or other money on your behalf;
• records of our correspondence with you, including emails, messages and notes of calls and viewings;
• information about how you use our website, collected through cookies, as set out below.

How we use it, and on what basis

The law asks us to name the basis on which we use personal information. Ours are:

• To act for you. Marketing and selling or letting your property, arranging viewings, negotiating offers, managing a tenancy and handling client money are all part of the agreement between us, and we use your information to carry them out.
• To meet our legal obligations. Anti-money laundering regulations require us to verify the identity of the people we act for and, in some cases, the people they deal with. Lettings law requires Right to Rent checks, the protection of tenancy deposits and the keeping of certain records.
• In our legitimate interests. We keep sensible records of our work, follow up valuations and enquiries, improve our website and protect our business, always weighed against your own interests and rights.
• With your consent. We send marketing emails and use non-essential cookies only where you have agreed. You can withdraw that consent at any time, and every marketing email carries a way to unsubscribe.

Who we share it with

We do not sell personal information. We share it only where the work requires it, and only with people who are bound to look after it, such as:

• the other parties to a sale or tenancy, and their solicitors, conveyancers and agents;
• property portals including Rightmove and Zoopla, which carry our listings and pass enquiries to us;
• the systems we use to run our business, including our viewing and client management platform, our email provider and our website host;
• identity verification, referencing and credit reference agencies;
• the Tenancy Deposit Scheme, where we protect a deposit;
• contractors who carry out work at a property we manage, given only the details they need to do it;
• our accountants and professional advisers, our redress scheme, The Property Ombudsman, and regulators, the police or other authorities where the law requires it.

Some of these providers store information outside the United Kingdom. Where they do, we rely on the safeguards the law provides, such as UK adequacy regulations or approved contract terms.

How long we keep it

We keep personal information for as long as we need it for the reason we collected it, and then for as long as the law requires. Anti-money laundering records are kept for five years after our relationship with you ends. Most other records of a sale or tenancy are kept for up to six years after it completes or ends, so that we can answer any question or claim that arises. After that, we delete them securely.

Your rights

You have the right to ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you, to have anything inaccurate corrected, and in some circumstances to have it deleted, to restrict or object to how we use it, or to receive it in a form you can take elsewhere. You can withdraw consent at any time where that is our basis for using it.

To make a request, email contact@brownsresidential.com or write to us at the office. We will reply within one month, and there is normally no charge.

If you are unhappy

Please tell us first, and we will do our best to put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK regulator for data protection, at ico.org.uk.

Cookies

Cookies are small text files saved to your computer or phone when you visit a website, which let the site remember you and your choices from one page or visit to the next.

They fall into the same groups as our cookie settings:

• Necessary cookies, which the website needs in order to work, including the one that remembers your cookie choices. These are always on.
• Functional cookies, which remember preferences so that you do not have to set them again.
• Performance cookies, which help us understand how quickly the site loads and responds, so that we can keep it fast.
• Analytics cookies, which tell us, anonymously and in aggregate, how people find and use the site, so that we can improve it.
• Advertising cookies, which help us measure and tailor our advertising.
• Other cookies, which have not yet been placed in a group. They are treated in the same way as the non-essential cookies above.

Only necessary cookies are set without your agreement. Everything else is used only if you allow it, and some of these cookies are set by third parties, such as Google, for their own purposes as well as ours.

You can change your choices at any time through the Change your cookie settings link in this section. You can also block or delete cookies through your browser’s settings; if you block necessary cookies, parts of the site may not work properly. Your choices apply to the browser and device you make them on, so you may need to set them again elsewhere.