Mary Latham questions landlords rights to reposess

Pearces, thats the stall

the reasons why the courts and DPS side with the tenant is because they see accommodation as a BASIC NEED.
without which an individual could loose his job and render himself a problem for the authorities.

the thing is there are 3 BASIC NEEDS every orang-utan, human and tenant requires.

1; food and water
2; accommodation/a safe place to sleep
3; a mate/ to procreate/to reproduce.

the odd thing is the courts jail people for a couple of months for stealing food from shops and restaurants and they get several years for rape, keeping someone hostage to procreate with.

I wonder why landlords have ended up with such a short straw.

should we encourage theft of food or rape in the same way tenants are encouraged to steal accommodation on the grounds that all 3 are every human beings' BASIC NEED.

Totally agree; there is also the issue that a tenant's basic NEED of accommodation seems to take precedence over a LL NEED for accommodation.
A tenant could cause a LL to be bankrupted and to lose his own PPR.
Admittedly this would take a a fairly long legal process; but the net effect of facilitating for free a tenant's NEED for accommodation until evicted; which could take many months would mean that a LL becomes homeless.
Who would rent to a bankrupted LL with very limited resources!?
Why should a tenant's NEED for accommodation take precedence over a LL NEED fro accommodation!?
There seems to be a presumption that a LL will always be able to cover any losses so that it would never compromise his own accommodation circumstances!!
I speak from very personal experience of these exact circumstances.
The tenants who had use of my rental properties for free until I managed to evict them have walked away from that accommodation with no detriment to themselves at all.
I have suffered massive losses which will be unrecoverable as long as I live.
So I say again why should a tenant's need for accommodation take precedence over a LL's.
Had I not been savvy about being able to manage things I wouuld indeed have been bankrupted and homeless.
There clearly is no justice here.
I do not understand why a tenant should take precedence over a LL for accommodation.

Some might argue that both you and the tenant were equally savvy if you both continue to have a home Paul. We all know the risks. If you hadn't have loaned lots of money to people who couldn't afford to repay you would you have lost those properties? Choices, choices, choices

Yep BS would be a little too provincial for you and Frazzles.
It is no coincidence that the Jaimaican Olympic team stayed in Birmingham and by all accounts loved the time there.
I think there is the largest Jamaican community in the UK in Birmingham.
I would say that opportunity beckons in Birmingham.
You are NOT your average TRO!!
Clearly you have a lot more going for you and would suggest that your obvious talents are NOT being fully utilised, being burdened by the dead hand of a council job.
Irrespective of that you have managed to do an awful lot more than your average TRO would in the time you have been in post.
Perhaps a looming possible redundancy should be viewed as an opportunity to strike out for pastures new.
I reckon time to start making some serious enquiries about what is available in sunny Birmingham!!

Agreed but what about other LL who are not able to cover circumstances.
I have been lucky todate but if house prices shoot up I will be made homeless from the effect of a tenant who chose NOT to pay rent who NEEDED my free accommodation until I evicted them.
It is the principle of the issue that is the point.
Which is the point that cosmo was making.
I vehemently agree with him.
When will LL be protected from wrongun tenants.
Tenants are permitted by the law as it presently stands to be able to bankrupt a LL by NOT paying rent for accommodation until evicted.
So again why are a tenant's accommodation NEEDS allowed to take precedence over a LL's accommodation NEEDS?
Especially when it has been caused by a tenant refusing to pay rent for a service which results in a LL possibly being homeless.

I understand your point and I also understand Cosmo's Paul. However, as landlords, some of us have made the same mistakes as the banks. Those of us who are under capitalised have taken greater risks. I accept that the banks were bailed out but not all of them were, look at Northern Rock and Bradford and Bingley Group, you wouldn't have wanted shares in them would you? The banks that were under capitalised and over geared have paid the price and so have their shareholders who invested into them. It was always going to be more important to save the banks than landlords and it always will be. Our entire economies are reliant on the banks, had they been allowed to collapse we might be operating in a state of anarchy now. We must take responsibility. Your none paying tenants aren't that much different to you not paying your mortgages on the properties you had repossessed or the people who failed to pay you back the money you lent to them when you think about it. You freely admit that you will not pay the banks back. You freely admit that you went several months into arrears on your mortgages and it took the banks several months to repossess the properties so how is that any different to the situation that your bad tenants and borrowers have left you in? It's not nice and in a perfect world everybody would pay. It's not a perfect world though and not everybody does pay. Therefore, given that landlords will never have the same protection as the banks we must ensure that we have sufficient capital reserves and if we don't then we know the potential consequences and so do the banks. That's why they have tightened up on their lending criteria. No point moaning that the 2003 - 2007 business model has changed, clearly it had to, it didn't work. We all start with nothing, sounds to me like you have most of that left Paul so what's the point in constantly bashing the banks and moaning about bad tenants? Maybe it's time to accept responsibility for some of the choices you have made? I too may find myself in your position one day, I'm doing everything I can to ensure that doesn't happen but I don't have a crystal ball. Best I can do is keep learning. It's a cruel world out there but there are people that continue to prosper whilst holding true to their beliefs and ethics. If we use the analogy of crossing a minefield, I will be following in the footsteps of those who have already made it across.

Thanks Paul. I think I was affected by my 8 years out of the job from 2001 - 2009 when I was a self employed trainer of housing law. I was able to make my own decisions and act on them whereas in a council there has to be a million meetings and a project team put together to decide who goes to the toilet. I never settled back into that and have been a thorn in managers side ever since but they also know I have oodles of energy, am bloody good at my job and my work doesnt end when I walk out the door at 5pm - housing is what I do which I think annoys them.

However we are currenlty facing another round of cuts to be announced in October and oficially sealed next January so they will have a chance to removed the wasp in the room, so Brum maybe a distinct possibility

Yes I absolutely agree with what you state.
However you miss an important reality.
That is most LL are NOT in the ideal position of having sufficient capital to cover losses if a tenant chooses not to pay.
Of course in an ideal world ALL LL would have enough resources to cover these worst case scenarios.
The reality is that small LL struggle to achieve the mortgage required and use all their assets to invest in the property.
I know that they should have something in reserve to cover say 2 months voids ansd some repairs but that is about the most that a small LL can sustain.
The straw that breaks the camel's back is when a tenant chooses NOT to pay rent knowing it can take many months to evict them.
This situation which is facilitated by the law is an unacceptable state of affairs.
The vast majority of small LL have no choice than to be highly leveraged as they do not have anymore resources.
Now as you have correctly stated this is not a very wise situation to be in.
Your comparison with the banks and myself is totally correct.
My choice was to invest on the basis of hoped for rising property values whilst having return on investment in the form of rent to cover the mortgages.
This I accept was a very tight business model.
In fact it was a loss making investment as all my properties barely washed their faces.
I had no alternative though apart from not investing at all.
In hindsight that may well have been an appropriate course of action.
It is very difficult to time entry into an investment market and like most people I no reason to consider that the housing market was going to suffer the calamity of the credit crunch; obviously my crystal ball wasn't working very well the day I made the decision!!
However had I not invested I would not now be able to make the purchases I did then with the same amount of capital.
Now as I was in for the long haul; capital values whilst useful were not an absolute requirement;, rental income , however was.
My investment choice was predicated on the basis that a tenant would pay rent and yes I could suffer a few months voids but not 9 months with a tenant living for free until evicted.
The whole business model is based on a tenant paying rent; and if as I did suffer because of non rent paying tenants and then the banks suffered as a result of those circumstances there is not a lot LL could have done in the same situation.
In this case I was able to work it so the bank took the hit and not me.
But this was only caused by their refusal to capitalise debts on each property of under £10000, which had they done so would have increased the rent by about £25 pm.
This was easily covered by the rent recoepts that could and were being achieved at the time.
the banks made the mistake of thinking they could have it all.
I even warned them what would happen but still they went ahead and it all came to pass.
The weakness of the system is yes LL don't have enough capital and the law allows tenants to remain rent free in a rental property until evicted.
Small LL do whatever they can to get into the market and yes they are treading a fine line.
Following your advices; which are absolutely correct ,most small LL should not even be in the game.
I would heartlly concur.
But we as small LL are not going to let the richer LL have all the business.
So we stretch ourselves to the limit to get a piece of the pie.
Cosmo's contention that what tenants are allowed to get away is wrongwith is absolutely correct.
Were that matter addressed there wouid be less LL reposessions.
Very few new entrant LL are aware of the hazards of a non-rent paying tenant and the potentially disastrous effects that could have on the personal financial wellbeing of the LL.
It is clearly unacceptable that tenants can cause so much financial detriment to a LL.
I have to say faced with a tenant who refused to leave and the possibilty of being bankrupted and being made homeless myself I would remove the tenant myself.
Wrong I know; but I would take that risk.
Now I will not go down that road now as I have found RGI.
So I am sorted.
Therefore I won't have any future issues of non-rent payment as the RGI company will be picking up the tab.
I will have to build up some cashflow whilst the claim is being processed so I can service the mortgage payments.
Very few LL are aware of all these hazards and had I read your extensive advice blog as how to be a LL and what to do; I reckon I would not have been stitched up like I have bgeen in the past with obvious massive detriment to myself and the poor old victim banks.
I think you have stated it on many occasions but knowledge is the real empowerer of any LL.
Just wish 5 years ago I was aware of sites like this!!

Thanks for sharing your thoughts so honestly Paul, I pretty much agree with everything you have said. The fallout of the credit crunch has been immense, the banks got the bail-outs but let's not forget they also had a ton of new rules thrust on them in terms of capital adequacy and underwriting criteria. landlords have not been subjected to the same requirements. maybe there is an argument to say that we should have been? Perhaps the controls on the banks are not stringent enough? Perhaps it should be a condition of lending to landlords that the landlords must clearly demonstrate their own capital adequacy?