Landlord licencing scheme boundaries released by Newham Council

NORMAN WEYMOUTH says:

GIVE ME MY PIPE BACK OR ELSE BUGGER THE £30 I WILL PUT IT UP TO £500. OH I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT WE WILL WASTE THIS MONEY ON

Paul Barber says:

looks like this council is just trying to justify raising additional revenue to fill their funding gap.

I also read an article last week that a council were going to charge council tax on each room for a HMO property instead of one charge on the whole property. They are all trying different methods of generation income. Landlords are helping them fill the shortfall in their own stock and yet now they are biting the hand that’s assisting them reducing their costs by not having to house people in expensive bread and breakfast accommodation. Just does not sound fair to me.

http://www.discountmortgagesuk.com

Worried Wifie says:

Outrageous fees. Will have to be passed on to tenants or will have to sell properties affected. Totally counterproductive

Nik says:

We have had selective licensing in Manchester for almost 5
years, it end on 4.8.2012. The good landlords like me registered, the bad ones
did not and continued to let unsafe houses. There are several exemptions from
having to license, like the landlord shares a kitchen or bathroom with the landlord
or the tenancy is over 21 years.

Watch out for the small print of the conditions. In
Manchester I was the only one to object to the rule that a landlord is
responsible for not only the tenants but the tenants visitors behaviour, even thought
that is country to the “Northern Ireland Judgement” a judicial reviews
undertake by the Landlords Association of Northern Ireland with the Help of
Other Landlords Associations like the NWLA North West Landlord Association

andrew says:

who would trust a Scot called Wales?

andrew says:

the prince of wales gives 4 fingers to his newham surfs.

Mark Alexander says:

Good idea Roger. I’ve invited Darren Bowen from Leathes Prior Solicitors to take a look at this thread. I doubt that London Solicitors would want to take on Newham Council without a huge fee to compensate their reputational risk. Leathes Prior have a pedigree in taking on and winning against Councils, Darren is a Landlord and Tenant specialist and he is Norfolk based, hence Norfolk prices and no fear of Newham Council. It will be interesting to see what Darren has to say.

Martin Power says:

first gas certs(fair enough) then electric certs/appliances,,then deposit schemes,then energy certs every ten years,now a copy to each new tenant,then if a tenent wants something on the report improved it has to be done.Now a licence/tax.Saw the writing on the wall a few years ago and should of got out.Had an email today from local landlords association about how local council encouraged landlord to take on mentally unstable woman.After a couple of weeks they stopped all the support she was having,several assaults later the owner contacted the council to evict the tenant and was basically told that would be against the law.
I myself let a flat to two young lads the council wanted housed.Long story short,they refused to pay me £1200 they owed,they accused my letting agent of forging their signatures,the police were called and new who was in the wrong and the council finally paid up.Do not be under any illusion of trust in the authorities of any type.

Mary Latham says:

By the way the Licensing fee in Birmingham began at £500 five years ago and has now increase to £1,150! £850 for a simple renewal!

Paul Barrett says:

So if LL exit the market and properties are converted to normal dwellings; if they are allowed to be taking into account Article 4 etc like flats ; where will all the tenants who can only rent single rooms go!?
UC claimants would have to be accommodated somewhere!
Where will this be and where will they stay.
Especially as UC is reduced for under 35′s.
TA will be the only solution.
B & B is far more expensive than other normal accommodation.
Plus if there are no affordable or insufficient property types available claimants can be shipped to where the cheap accommodation is.
This will cause claimants to lose their ‘local connection’ and then these tenants will have limited opportunity to return to the expensive council area they were bussed out from.
LL will just accept a lower income and invest in ‘normal’ properties.
This will impact on tenants and the availability of suitable property.
The days of sweating the asset I think are now unviable based on the disgraceful way these councils are behaving.
I thought the deficit was supposed to be reduced.
B & B costs a fortune, far more than HMO accommodation.
If I had the money I would be buying up B & B in cheap coastal places like Margate and Hastings.
We will be going back to the days of housing benefit claimants living in ‘sink’ coastal towns.
I pity the council tax payers of these coastal towns and shopkeepers as crime goes up.
The dregs of society wil be farmed out to these cheap places.
What a ridiculous situation we as taxpayers, LL and tenants face at the hands of these incompetent councils and silly govt edicts on planning allowances; Article 4 and all that.
Am I glad I am not involved in multi-occupancy property.
Though B & B’s would be an attracive proposition if I had the money!!!!

IPIN Global says:

As much as I think there should be some sort of regulation/licencing – this is over the top by a long way. The US has an efficient system in the form of Section 8 without it costing a fortune to landlords or tenants – why can the UK not do something similar?

Logan5 says:

Think of it as the first step in having your BTL profits taxed into oblivion

Chazsmash says:

Authority is a form of control,nothing else. It has no inherent wisdom. Do not be fooled by the Government. You are its slave. You have to support their deceitful ways.
Silence is the peoples enemy!!

Chazsmash says:

People. May you be reminded by the PM himself, that you DO NOT NEED TO GO TO WORK the Government will take Tax money to pay thier salaries and take care of the following;

The official email of the
British Prime Minister

David Cameron hails historic moment of
Welfare Reform
Today marks an
historic step in the biggest welfare revolution in over 60 years. My government
has taken bold action to make work pay, while protecting the
vulnerable.
Key elements of this
include:

The “Benefits Cap” which
ensures no one can get more that £26,000 in benefits (that’s the equivalent of a
taxed income of £35,000).
The “Universal Credit” which
will ensure that work always pays more than being on benefit.
These reforms will
change lives for the better, giving people the help they need, while backing
individual responsibility so that they can escape poverty, not be trapped in
it.
Past governments
have talked about reform, while watching the benefits bill sky rocket and
generations languish on the dole and dependency. This government is delivering
it. Our new law will mark the end of the culture that said a life on benefits
was an acceptable alternative to work.
While we’ve been
putting in place a sensible, modern welfare system that protects the vulnerable,
our opponents have shown they are on the side of Britain’s something for nothing
culture.
We’ve stood up
against the abuse that left taxpayers footing the bills for people on £30,000 or
even £50,000 a year in benefits. It’s a fair principle: a family out of work on
benefits shouldn’t be paid more than the average family in work.
This is a core part
of the government’s task of turning around the legacy of debt, overspending and
waste we inherited. We want money to go to people who need it, not subsidising
the consequences of our broken society. By reforming welfare we will get people
into fulfilling jobs, not abandon them to poverty and dependency, save billions
of pounds of taxpayers’ money and make sure those who really need help get
it.
That’s compassionate
modern government in action.
It’s also a huge
tribute to the Secretary of State for Welfare, Iain Duncan Smith, who has worked
tirelessly and with real moral purpose in tackling the blight of welfare
dependency.
Best
wishes,
David Cameron
MP
Prime Minister

Some Key Welfare Stats:
Universal Credit

Around 2.8 million low to
middle income households will be better-off on Universal Credit (UC).
The average overall gain
will be £29.00 per week under UC.
UC will lift around 900,000
individuals out of poverty, including more than 350,000 children and around
550,000 working-age adults.
Government will invest an
additional £300 million into childcare support under Universal Credit, on top of
the £2bn already spent under the current system.
Removing the hours rule will
mean that around 80,000 more families with children will benefit from childcare
support for the first time.
By October 2017;
approximately 12 to 13 million tax credit and benefit claims will be transformed
into eight million Universal Credit payments.

Benefit cap

The benefit cap of £26,000
will mean that no family on benefits will earn more than the average salary of a
working family (£35,000p.a. before tax).
67,000 households will be
affected by the cap.
Benefit cap will provide
savings of £290m in 2013/14 and £330m in 2014/15 (cash terms) or £275m in
2013/14 and £305m in 2014/15 (at 2011/12 prices).

Housing Benefit

We will set Housing Benefit
at a maximum of £400 a week so that we no longer have the scandal of families on
benefits living in houses that hard working families could never afford.
Housing Benefit costs over
£21bn in 2010/11 [or nearly £23bn this year] and, without reform, would increase
to £26bn by 2014/15 (cash terms). The Housing Benefit reforms that we announced
in the Emergency Budget and Spending Review will result in annual savings of
over £2bn by 2014/15.
Social Sector Size Criteria
will stop the practice of the state paying for rooms that are not being
used.
This will help tackle the
social housing shortage that blights many lives in our towns and cities.
5 million people in England
alone are waiting for social housing.
In London 70,000 households
are getting Housing Benefit for extra bedrooms they do not need – costing the
tax payer £80million a year.

Neil Onions says:

It’s only the reputable landlords like me and hundreds of others that will register.
The unsavoury types will continue to provide a bad service to thier tenants and Newham will be non the wiser.
Of course Newham will then put up the charges, creep HMO requirements into all rentals and generally make a meal of it, to our financial loss.

S Titmus says:

OOps! I meant 4 fingers, not 4 dingers.

ANON says:

daylight robbery – Landlords are already paying tax on renting out – bastards!

MO Faz says:

Newham council is the richest council in the country and the greediest, they always look for ways of ripping public apart. Unsocial behaver as they say, go to council estates first thing walk into is sticky urine area where the council should be treat like, poverty high crime drug dealing you name it in council estates. They need to get their act together before picking on hard earning landlords. I bet those properties which the council owns will excepted from licencing scheme. This another way to make serious free money without them investing any money at all Robin Smith should voted out with NO Confidence. Scrap this scheme stop being greedy, learn to sort your own mass out before picking on the private landlords. I have friends and family members living in Newham councils properties, go and see what state there in. Selfish, greedy, worse borough to live in.

Overseas landlord says:

I am a landlord of a property in Newham, living overseas. I have just become aware of this (despite paying a registered agent to manage my property for me.) I cannot register as a landlord as I do not have a UK address, but the agent suggested I name someone else living in the UK as the licence holder, despite them having no interest in the property.I have owned the property for many years. We already pay an agent to manage the property, and if the property needs any maintenance or new furnishings we act on the tenant’s and agent’s requests and recommendations.Our existing tenant has lived at the property for two years now, so he is obviously happy.This new registry of landlords is a blatant tax grab, evidenced by the fact that as overseas landlords we can’t register ourselves but any person in the UK could register as our licence holder. I hope this will not become standard in boroughs across the UK.