It's 10pm, you've just sent another email about the same leaking gutter that's been ignored for six months, and you're wondering if it's actually possible to fire your property factor. The short answer: yes, you can. The longer answer is what this guide is for.
Switching factors in Scotland is genuinely achievable, but it requires understanding some legal basics, getting your neighbours on board, and—crucially—knowing how to pick a better replacement so you don't end up right back where you started.
Your Frustration Is Valid (and You're Not Alone)
First, let's acknowledge what you're probably dealing with. Satisfaction among factored owners reported via the Scottish Social Housing Charter has dropped to around 58%—the lowest in over a decade. Common complaints include fee increases of 10-15% (some exceeding 30%), unanswered repair requests, opaque billing, and the distinct feeling that you're paying for a service you're not actually receiving.
The Housing and Property Chamber—Scotland's tribunal for factoring disputes—received 303 property factor applications in 2023/24, the highest number ever in a single year. In 64% of cases where the tribunal made a substantive decision, it found the factor had failed to comply with the Code of Conduct or their duties. The most common complaint areas? Communication and consultation (62% of applications), repairs and maintenance (58%), and complaints handling (49%).
Real cases paint a familiar picture: in one Glasgow tribunal, a homeowner proved they'd been charged repeatedly for work that was never done, with the sheriff describing the accounts as "illogical." In another, a new flat owner was hit with a £4,000 bill for debts run up by previous residents—debts the factor had simply failed to chase.
If any of this sounds familiar, you're not imagining it. The system has real problems.
The Legal Reality: It's Simpler Than Factors Want You to Think
Here's what factors often don't volunteer: Scottish law gives homeowners significant power to change their property manager. The legal framework has been strengthened considerably in recent years, and the default rules favour owner choice.
The Majority Vote Rule
Under Section 28 of the Title Conditions (Scotland) Act 2003, if your title deeds don't specify how to dismiss a factor, you can do so with a simple majority—more than half of the owners in your building agreeing. This is your baseline right.
Even if your deeds do set out a procedure, Section 64 of the same Act provides a hard cap: two-thirds of owners can always dismiss and appoint a new factor, regardless of what your deeds claim. This override exists precisely because legislators recognised that some old title deeds trap buildings in arrangements that no longer serve them.
The Housing (Scotland) Act 2025 includes provisions intended to make it easier to replace developer-appointed factors—reducing the threshold from two-thirds to a simple majority in certain circumstances. However, different sections of the Act are being commenced at different times, so check whether the relevant provisions are actually in force when you're acting. The direction of travel is clear: the law is moving toward making owner-led changes easier.
What Your Title Deeds Actually Say
Before doing anything else, get hold of your title deeds. Your solicitor should have a copy, or you can request them from the Registers of Scotland for around £3 + VAT per title. Look for three things: whether a specific factor is named, what voting threshold is required to change factors (if any), and whether there are "manager burdens" that restrict your choices.
If your deeds are silent on the question, or if they demand more than two-thirds agreement, the law defaults in your favour—either simple majority rules, or two-thirds becomes the ceiling.
Notice Periods and Getting It Right
The whole process typically takes 2-4 months from initial discussions to complete transfer—longer if you're starting from scratch with neighbour relationships, shorter if you already have an active residents' group.
Your factor's Written Statement of Services (WSS) must specify the notice period required to end the agreement. Industry standard is typically three months, though some factors try to impose longer periods or exit fees. The First-tier Tribunal has consistently taken a dim view of unreasonable notice periods—if yours seems excessive, you may be able to challenge it.
When you do serve notice, do it properly. Send a formal letter by recorded delivery that clearly states the owners' decision to terminate, references the legal basis (your deeds or the relevant Act), is signed by all supporting owners (or enough to constitute a majority), lists all properties covered, and specifies the intended end date. Keep copies of everything.
If you're using the Tenement Management Scheme or deed-based procedures, statutory notice and waiting periods can apply. The TMS requires minimum 48 hours' notice for meetings. If not all owners participated in the decision, waiting periods may apply before the change takes effect—and in some cases, owners with large cost shares who didn't vote can challenge the decision.
Check the specific rules that apply to your building; Under One Roof and Shelter Scotland provide detailed guidance on these mechanics.
The Hard Part: Getting Your Neighbours to Care
Here's where legal theory meets messy reality. You can have every right in the world to switch factors, but if you can't get enough owners to agree with you, nothing happens.
The challenge is structural. Absentee landlords don't open their post. Some owners have simply stopped paying attention to their factoring bills. Others worry that switching will be more hassle than the current problems. This apathy is, frankly, your factor's greatest protection.
Building Your Case
Start by documenting specific problems. Not "they're useless" but "here are six repair requests from the last year with dates, reference numbers, and no resolution." Screenshot correspondence. Save emails. If other owners have complained, ask them to share their experience.
Then make contact. If your building has a residents' group or WhatsApp chat, start there. If not, you may need to identify owners through the Land Register (Registers of Scotland allows title searches for around £3 + VAT per property) and write to them individually.
When you reach out, be specific about what's wrong and realistic about what switching involves. Some neighbours will be persuaded by financial arguments—comparing your current fees against market rates. Others care more about service quality: response times, whether repairs actually get done, whether anyone answers the phone.
The Formal Meeting
You'll need a formal decision, either through a meeting or a written voting process. If you go the meeting route, check what quorum your deeds require (often 25% of owners present). If that seems unreachable, use proxy forms—written authorisation for you to vote on behalf of owners who can't attend. Proxies are the single most effective tool for overcoming low turnout.
Document everything: who attended, who submitted proxies, what was proposed, what was agreed. This paperwork matters because factors sometimes challenge whether a dismissal was validly made.
Common Obstruction Tactics (and How to Handle Them)
Not every factor accepts defeat gracefully. Here's what you might encounter.
Some factors demand extensive proof that a genuine majority voted to remove them. This is actually reasonable—they need confidence the decision is legitimate. Counter it by being meticulous: have your decision letter signed by all supporting owners, keep minutes from any meeting, and be ready to provide a list of properties and which owners agreed.
Others escalate debt collection, suddenly chasing arrears aggressively or spreading the cost of non-paying owners across everyone else's bills. If you're hit with unexpected charges, request an itemised breakdown before paying anything. The Code of Conduct prohibits "unreasonable or excessive" charges, and you can take disputes to the tribunal.
The classic tactic is claiming your deeds don't permit a change, or that you need a higher voting threshold than you've achieved. Know your legal position: if your deeds demand more than two-thirds, Section 64 overrides them. If they're silent, Section 28's simple majority applies. If a factor persists with spurious legal claims, citing the specific legislation usually ends the conversation.
Finally, some factors delay handing over information to your new manager, blaming "administrative processes" or GDPR. The Code of Conduct requires cooperation on handover—data protection isn't a blanket excuse; it affects how they share info, not whether they can cooperate. Set a firm deadline (four weeks is reasonable) and make clear you'll escalate to Scottish Ministers if necessary. Most factors back down at this point.
The Critical Step: Choosing Your Replacement
Escaping a bad factor is pointless if you jump straight to another one. This is where most switching attempts fail—not at the dismissal stage, but at selection.
This is the most sobering lesson from homeowners who've been through this. One forum user described leaving their factor after 10 years for what seemed like a better option, only to find them "terrible, much worse" with work not done and repairs taking months. Another reported that their property manager literally followed them between companies—transferring to the new factor and being reassigned to their building. The grass isn't automatically greener.
The market has consolidated significantly in recent years, with smaller independents being absorbed into larger corporate groups. That's created economies of scale but sometimes depersonalised service. When a local firm gets bought out, you often lose your direct contact and end up dealing with a centralised call centre.
What about self-factoring? For smaller tenements (4-8 units), managing things yourselves can seem appealing—zero management fees, total control. But forum threads are littered with cautionary tales of initially successful residents' associations that collapsed when "people started getting selfish and tried to avoid paying, leading to confrontations and hassles." Most conclude that paid factoring, despite its frustrations, beats the alternative. If you do go this route, organisations like Under One Roof provide digital tools to make it more professional.
What to Gather Before Approaching New Factors
Before contacting potential replacements, assemble your documentation:
- Title deeds/deed of conditions showing voting requirements and cost apportionment (from Registers of Scotland)
- Current Written Statement of Services detailing what your factor should provide
- Recent factoring invoices showing current costs for comparison
- Float payment records proving what you've contributed
- Correspondence with current factor, especially complaints
- Buildings insurance details including policy number and renewal date
- Outstanding repair records documenting known issues
- Contact details for all owners for coordination
Having this ready means you can give prospective factors an accurate picture of your building and get like-for-like quotes.
Before appointing anyone, verify they're on the Scottish Property Factor Register—operating without registration is a criminal offence.
What to Ask Before Appointing Anyone
Request Written Statements of Services from at least three or four factors. The WSS is legally required and must cover everything from fees to repair response times to complaints procedures. Don't just compare headline prices—read the detail.
Pay particular attention to response times (how quickly will they act on routine repairs? emergencies?), inspection frequency (how often will someone physically check your building?), insurance arrangements (is it transparently priced or buried in commission structures?), fee increase policies (tied to inflation or at the factor's discretion?), and debt recovery procedures (will they chase non-payers or spread the shortfall across everyone else?).
Ask direct questions about insurance commissions. Following Financial Conduct Authority reforms, factors must demonstrate "fair value" in insurance arrangements. If a factor can't explain clearly how they handle insurance or becomes evasive about commissions, that's a red flag.
Red Flags When Comparing Factors
Based on tribunal complaint patterns and Code of Conduct requirements, watch out for:
- Vague or missing Written Statement of Services — if they can't provide clear terms, that's a warning sign
- Unclear end-of-contract terms — excessive notice periods or exit fees buried in the small print
- Poor communication responsiveness — if they're slow to respond during the sales process, expect worse after
- Evasiveness about competitive tendering — good factors can explain how they get quotes for works
- High staff turnover or no named contact — you want someone accountable, not a call centre
- Reluctance to provide references from comparable properties
Doing the Comparison Work
This is where the selection process gets time-consuming. You're comparing multiple documents, trying to decode different fee structures, and making judgments about service quality from written statements alone.
Resources like Compare Factors exist precisely for this reason—to let you see factors side by side, compare fees and services, and review track records before making a decision. Rather than manually pulling apart four different WSS documents, a comparison platform can surface the meaningful differences quickly.
Whatever approach you take, treat factor selection as procurement, not just escape. You're not just getting rid of someone bad; you're choosing someone who'll manage your home for years to come. The new factor knows you switched once—that's leverage. Use it to negotiate response times, clarify insurance, and establish clear communication channels from day one.
What Happens If Things Go Wrong
If your current factor breaches the Code of Conduct, or if they refuse to accept a valid dismissal decision, you have recourse through the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland (Housing and Property Chamber). It's free to access, relatively informal, and designed for homeowners rather than lawyers.
You'll need to go through the factor's internal complaints process first, but the tribunal is there if that fails. And factors know this—the threat of tribunal action and potential deregistration is usually enough to ensure cooperation.
As noted above, 64% of substantive tribunal decisions in 2023/24 found the factor had failed to comply with the Code or their duties—so the system does work. The most common complaint areas are communication failures, repairs issues, and poor complaints handling. If you're considering tribunal action, focus on clear-cut failures where you have documentation: duties not performed, funds not returned, handover information withheld, or Code of Conduct breaches you can demonstrate with correspondence.
The Bigger Picture
Switching factors takes effort. There's no getting around that. But the legal landscape has shifted meaningfully in homeowners' favour, and the regulatory system now has teeth it previously lacked.
The era of the permanent, unchallengeable factor is over. What's replaced it is a market where factors compete for your business—and where you have genuine power to walk away from providers who don't serve you well.
Your frustration at 10pm is valid. But it doesn't have to be permanent. Understand your legal position, build consensus among your neighbours, execute the switch cleanly, and—most importantly—choose your replacement carefully.
That last part is what actually changes your life.
Ready to compare your options?
See Scottish property factors side by side—fees, services, tribunal records—so you can make an informed choice about who manages your home.
Browse All Factors