h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

First up "What's the area like?"

You may not know. If you live local then you're likely to know whether it's okay to move there or not. If you're not local, then you won't. Ask people. One thing that you really want to find out is how safe or dodgy the place is. Ask neighbours about previous tenants. If possible ask to look around the property while the present tenants are still there. Do they look like they will have looked after the place?
We found out about a month after we moved in here that not the previous tenants didn't even own a vacum cleaner and it seems that the never cleaned the cooker either, and the people before them were evicted for drug dealing from the house.

When looking around the property...

Check the locks on the doors. Do they look like they've been kicked in and replaced? Look at the door frames themselves. Are they sound?
Look at the window frames. Are they sound? Do they let a draft in? Get somebody to go outside and talk to you through the window, do they let in much noise? Do they actually open?
The front door here has been kicked in, twice. Thankfully though the landlord got a good repair made on it. The windows sash ones, and these are notorious for letting in drafts. Oh, and one of the ones in the living room is sealed shut, that was forced to let the baliffs in as we found out later.

Next check the carpet, is it new? If not, what condition is it in? Carpet isn't cheap, so can you live with one that has lots of tears or a really horrid pattern?

Does the floor actually meet the skirting board?

What condition are the walls in? Run your hand along the wall and feel if it's sound or not. Look for flaking, stained or peeling paint. Most landlords have the whole place repainted just before they let them, and then it's hard to tell if there is any damp around. But if a wall is cold while the rest of the house is warm, then ask the landlord outright is there ever has been any damp in the place, and if so, what has been done to fix it. They aren't allowed to lie. They can forget to tell you something, but they can't lie. If damp turns up at a later date, then you can get in contact with the previous residents and see if there was indeed a problem with damp.

Ask how much DIY/decorating you are allowed to do. Our landlord at this current house asks for us to contact him before we do anything, including putting up picture hooks. In the previous house, they couldn't care.

Check to make sure that there are fittings and space for things like the washing machine and fridge/freezer. If there isn't, will the landlord fit one?

What sort of heating does the place have? Storage heaters or central radiators? Make sure that all the heating works. If yuo can, try it while you are looking around the place. Often this isn't practical as the gas/electricity has been turned off. But make sure that the lanlord knows that if they don't work it's his responsibility to fix them. We were in this house for a month before we got the gas boiler to work.

Which companies supply the gas/electric/water? It took us just under a month to get the water company sorted for this house, just over a month to sort out which gas company would be sending us the bills, and we still haven't been able to figure out who is supposed to be charging us for our electricity, and we've been here two months.

Are the ammenities paid by bill or card? If it's a token/card meter, where is the nearest place to recharge the card or buy tokens? And do they open 24 hours and are within a distance that you are prepared to walk to on a freezing cold night when you're having a party and have just run out of electricity.

Make sure that you can afford the house. Remember, it's not just the rent that you have to pay, there's the council tax, the water, the gas, the electricity. All these change as you move around the country.

Can most importantly...
Can you get broadband internet in that area? I had to give up my cable modem connection when we moved here and go back to 56.6k. Hmmph.