Band 6.0 IELTS Writing Task 1 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 6.0 · Barron's Writing · 2026-09-20

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 6.0)

Dear Sir,

I have been living in your apartment since an extremely long time. It is quite an amazing place to live in as the apartment is cozy and comfortable as well as the rent is manageable. I am familar with the building and the people along with the parking space. As you know that i am a full time workingn person so i spend most of my time working so when i come back home there is an issue that had been bothering me since a while. Since a few days, i have been noticing that someone who does not belong to the building parks his car in the parking space and disappears for hours specially at night time. This really bothered me so i went around the building and asked a few acquintances who this car belongs to so we could figure it out together. However, to my surprise, it did not belong to any of us and is of a complete stranger who comes around here to park his car and then disappears. This has caused me wide distress and also seems frightening as the car could be of anyone. I have been facing this issue for quite a while and this has caused major disturbance as i have to park my car two streets away and then walk back. This has caused me severe back problems too as i cannot walk too much daily after working all day. In addition to that, this situation seems unusual and frightening as well. I hope you look into this and provide a solution for this problem as i would be really grateful to you. Thanks and regards

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 6.5

The candidate successfully covers all bullet points required by the prompt. First, the situation is clearly described: an unfamiliar car is being parked in the building's parking lot by a stranger. Second, the impact of this issue is explained, highlighting the distress and severe back pain caused by having to walk from two streets away. Finally, a clear suggestion is made asking the landlord to investigate and provide a solution. The tone is appropriate for a formal letter to a landlord, beginning with 'Dear Sir,' and maintaining a serious and polite register throughout. All parts of the task are well-developed and easy to follow, earning a solid Band 7.0 for addressing all requirements fully.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 6.0

The letter maintains a clear logical organisation, though it suffers from a lack of paragraphing. The entire body of the letter is written as a single dense block of text, which hinders the visual flow and makes cohesion more mechanical than natural. While cohesive devices such as 'However', 'In addition to that', and 'so' are used to connect ideas, the heavy reliance on run-on sentences with 'and' (e.g., '...and the apartment is cozy and comfortable as well as the rent is manageable') weakens the structural progression. Ideas follow a logical sequence from describing the problem to explaining the consequences and offering a solution, but the absence of paragraph breaks prevents the response from achieving a higher score. This sits comfortably at Band 6.0.

Lexical Resource — Band 6.0

The vocabulary used is generally adequate for the task, with some attempts at less common phrasing such as 'full time working person', 'manageable', and 'wide distress'. However, there are notable word choice inaccuracies and spelling errors, such as 'familar' instead of 'familiar', 'workingn' instead of 'working', and 'acquintances' instead of 'acquaintances'. The phrase 'severe back problems too as i cannot walk too much daily' is somewhat repetitive and basic. While the lexical range allows the writer to convey their message clearly, the errors in spelling and occasional awkward collocations prevent the score from rising into the higher bands. It meets the Band 6.0 criteria well.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 6.0

The response features a mix of simple and complex sentence structures, such as 'I have been living in your apartment since an extremely long time' and 'I went around the building and asked a few acquintances who this car belongs to'. However, grammatical accuracy is inconsistent. There are preposition errors (e.g., 'since an extremely long time' instead of 'for an extremely long time'), capitalization errors (e.g., lowercase 'i'), and punctuation issues, notably run-on sentences linked excessively by coordinating conjunctions without proper pausing. While these errors do not impede communication, they occur frequently enough to preclude a Band 7.0, making Band 6.0 a fair and accurate assessment.

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

Browse more IELTS Writing model answers or get your own writing scored by the same AI examiner.