This Privacy Policy and Terms of Use (“Policy”) explaine how The Independent Landlord will use and protect any information you give me when you use my website. Any information that you supply via this blog will only be used in accordance with this Policy.
At a glance
General
Theindependentlandlord.com is a personal blog, owned and operated by me, Suzanne Smith, and all opinions featured are my own.
Terms of use
In my blog, I talk about being a landlord and share tips and insights based on my own experiences and my own research. Although I practised as a solicitor from 1994-2019, and make general comments on legal, tax and financial matters, I am not providing legal, tax and financial advice on this website.
You need to take your own advice for your specific circumstances, and cannot rely on general tips and comments made on blogs. I exclude all liability arising from any losses arising directly or indirectly from actions you take or do not take after reading my blog.
By using this site, you are indicating your agreement to the terms of this Policy. If you disagree with any of the terms, please do not use my site.
Newsletter subscription
When you sign up for my newsletter, you provide your email address and sometimes your name.
This information is maintained in two places:
- On the blog by WordPress. I access this information via the WordPress dashboard only. I do not process your email further, do not download it and do not share it with any third party.
- On the mailing list host MailerLite. I have full access to all data stored there and can delete a subscriber’s data should they so wish.
I will use your email address to email you The Independent Landlord newsletter, which may contain direct or indirect marketing material such as blog posts where I have partnered or collaborated with companies in exchange for a fee or commission.
When you subscribe to receive my newsletter, you consent to receiving this marketing information which forms part of my blog or newsletter. If you do not wish to receive such marketing information, you should not subscribe to the newsletter or you can unsubscribe at any time via the link in the newsletter, or by contacting me. You can continue to use my website freely, without subscribing to the newsletter.
Comments on the website
When visitors leave comments on my website, we collect the data shown in the comments form. We also collect the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.
An anonymised string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.
Cookies
A cookie is a text-only string of information that your computer stores for a time via your web browser. This is done so that the website can remember who you are. Cookies cannot be used by themselves to identify you personally. A cookie will typically contain the name of the domain from which the cookie has come, the ‘lifetime’ of the cookie, and a value, usually a randomly generated unique number.
If you leave a comment on our site yo, may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.
If you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.
When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. The login cookies will be removed if you log out of your account.
If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day.
Embedded content from other websites
Articles on this site include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.) and links. Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.
These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content. This includes tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website. I don’t have control over these websites, so do check their privacy policies before sharing your personal data with them.
Affiliate links
All of the content on The Independent Landlord is free. I sometimes add affiliate links to content, where I believe they are helpful and relevant for property investors. This means that if you click on a website linked by me (such as Amazon, the NRLA, OpenRent and Viewber), and make a purchase on that website, I may gain a small percentage or a fixed amount of any sale revenue.
The data that you enter on the website where you make a purchase (such as a delivery address or telephone number) is not passed back to me. When you use other websites, any personal information you give them will be dealt with in line with their privacy policies, not mine. Please do check their privacy policies before using the site or providing any personal data about yourself to them.
You can find more about my affiliate policy here.
Quotesearcher Insurance
The Independent Landlord’s insurance comparison service is provided by QuoteSearcher Limited (Quotesearcher), who are authorised and regulated by The Financial Conduct Authority, their registration number is 504796 and their permitted business is insurance mediation. This can be checked by clicking clicking here.
By using the QuoteSearcher service, you are agreeing to their privacy policy and terms which can be checked by clicking here. QuoteSearcher is a limited company, registration number 05387593, with their registered office address at 8 Waldegrave Road, Teddington, Middlesex, TW11 8GT.
How long we retain your data
If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognise and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.
For any users that register on our website, we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.
What rights you have over your data
If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.
Where your data is sent
Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.
Last updated: 12 March 2023
