Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Barron's Writing · 2026-09-16

IELTS Writing Task 1 question

You live in a small apartment building with a parking lot in back, and you often cannot find an empty parking space when you get home from work.

Write a letter to your landlord. In your letter
• describe the situation.
• explain why it bothers you.
• suggest something the landlord could do to solve the problem.

You do NOT need to write any addresses.

Begin your letter as follows:

Dear ____

Student answer (Band 5.5)

dear marc,

Today, i am writing this letter to you with concern about my car parking. many times, i unable to find a single car parking in lot that leads my wastage of time. Therefore, i have to park my vehicle on the road-side.

Last week, iwhen i was returning to my home, there was not even single empty parking as well as i was fined about $250 of this month,that is deal for me to pay. i could not find any vehicle reservation at that time.

It is a humnle request to you whether to reserve one paid parking on road side or pay to local building to give me authorization to park my car only at one spot.

I will be appericiate to you if you provide me a considerable solution in revert back.

Regards,

Bharat Banger

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.0

The response covers all three bullet points required in the task instructions: you described the parking situation, explained why it bothers you by mentioning a fine and wasted time, and suggested potential solutions such as reserving a paid parking spot. However, the task requires a minimum of 150 words, and your response contains only 139 words. Because this length requirement was not met, it negatively impacts the overall task achievement score. Furthermore, some ideas like the specific parking arrangements could be extended and developed more fully to reach a higher band level. Consequently, a score of 5.0 is awarded for this criterion due to the under-length nature of the letter and the somewhat limited development of your ideas.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The letter maintains a reasonably coherent overall arrangement and a clear purpose. You open appropriately with a standard salutation and conclude with a sign-off, adopting an informal yet communicative tone suitable for a letter to a landlord. However, paragraphing is somewhat rudimentary, and cohesive devices are occasionally forced or slightly unnatural, such as the use of 'Therefore' and 'that is deal for me to pay'. Referencing is sometimes unclear, making the flow of ideas slightly disjointed in places. While the progression of ideas is generally understandable, the mechanical use of cohesive elements and limited paragraph structure place this response firmly in the Band 6 category.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.0

Your vocabulary range is adequate for the task, allowing you to successfully convey your core message about parking difficulties and fines. You attempt some less common expressions such as 'authorization' and 'considerable solution', though these are accompanied by lexical inaccuracies and word-choice errors like 'humnle', 'appericiate', and 'in revert back'. Spelling errors also occur, such as the lowercase 'i' used throughout the text. While these slips do not completely impede communication, they demonstrate a lack of precision and control over less common lexical items, fitting the descriptive criteria for Band 5.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0

The response displays a mix of simple and attempted complex sentence structures. However, there are frequent grammatical and punctuation errors throughout the text. Examples include missing subject-verb agreement or missing auxiliary verbs ('i unable to find', 'there was not even single empty parking'), incorrect preposition usage ('fine about $250 of this month'), and punctuation issues such as comma splices ('this month,that is deal'). Furthermore, capitalization is ignored at the beginning of sentences and for the personal pronoun 'i'. These frequent errors can occasionally cause some difficulty for the reader, aligning the grammar score with Band 5.

See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.

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