Tenant evictions: It’s time for an uncomfortable conversation

A little sobriety here. I have been a letting agent for 25+ years (and a landlord and I have been a private tenant twice) and might I suggest we are all in this together.

Good landlords should enjoy having their mortgages paid and their properties well looked after by good tenants who, in turn, should be able to rely on their landlord to provide accommodation that is fit for purpose as a response to the rent being paid on time.

Anything else is a distraction. I agree that those with vested interest on both sides should have their views heard and that government should make its rules to the betterment of the sector as a whole. As with all things there will be winners and losers. The principle here is that landlords and tenants should benefit equally from the PRS. Tenants should be able to rely on not being abused or unfairly evicted by their landlord and very much vice versa. It is right that tenants should enjoy some security of tenure if they abide by the terms of their tenancy. It is their home and the bosom of their family in most cases.

A far bigger issue here is the optics. Landlords are leaving and not being replaced so currently I spend my days sorting through many applications for fewer properties and simply turning down 80% of those who are kind enough to apply.

My loud voice here is to do something about the optics and encourage people to invest as landlords. It remains a great thing to do and I find it rewarding. My mortgages are paid, I have rental insurance against non payment and I enjoy 100% of the capital growth (notwithstanding CGT if I ever sell).

Let's all work together to make the PRS continue to be the real solution to the housing crisis that it has been for 20+ years. After all, where else are people going to live?

Oh and if the government wants a housing tsar, I'm their man 😂

Andrew Strevens

Let me write out the future for you .... This is an incredibly good article and the comments are even better. Journalists and politicians please all read this and you have all the perspectives from a tenant and landlord perspective ! Let me in addition to the very valid comments some of which I was about to write myself, give my prediction of what will happen in the future - regardless of this Rent Reform and banning of S21 (which I agree entirely will make things worse, not better). I'm an economist and strategist and researcher for decades already. The approach by the government, fuelled by a vocal minority of tenants on social media, combined with any political party having no downside but lots of upside demonising and further burdening landlords, will lead to the future which is: a large fund like Blackrock will end up properties from exiting small landlords, then it will become clear how much the current large army of tiny landlords do for their tenants, which is always overlooked and not written about as it does not grab headlines as it is very boring. For a large insitutional fund like Blackrock to give the same service as small landlords, the employees they will have to hire to deal with that in both an administrative, legal and property maintenance sense - will show the real, very high price of these services currently given by small landlords that work 18/7 for tenants. To have not a huge amount of small landlords providing private rented property, but a large institutional player, will drive up rents beyond everyone's belief. And the large players will be able to pressure the government into being more realistic and kinder to Landlords - where currently the situation is the opposite - the government can push tiny landlords about as much as they like because all the tiny landlords cannot defend themselves against that - apart from the fact they are too busy working their socks off for tenants (and there are more bad tenants than there are bad landlords - read that again please). There is only one solution for landlords - who can only express their thoughts and concerns on forums like these at the moment, but not much more than that. And that one solution is a landlord organisation that is as well organized as a trade union. The NRLA which the government rules effectively force you to sign up to is entirely useless and pathetic, incompetent, unable and unfit !! If all small landlords could unite in a strong trade union style organisation - then the government would have to listen and so finally listen. My further comments in telegram style 1) inflation has risen more than rents - journalists do not understand the compounded effects of inflation but love totally incorrect headlines that hurt landlords 2) journalists - rents are not rising because of the aforementioned but you keep writing they are but at the same time have no memory of mere years ago - covid hit and zero help for landlords - and BBC media and politicians hurting landlords by broadcasting "mortgage holidays for landlords" which tenants interpreted as "landlords don't have to pay mortgages - so we're not going to pay rent!!" directly hurting a silent majority of landlords whilst they still had to pay mortgages and if they had a temporary reprieve to delay their interest payments this came at a commercial penalty - it was not a holiday at all so why call it that misleadingly 3) the only solution is: the government needs to allow more houses to be built - but won't do that - and if it would - there would not be enough builders 4) every single year, net migration is 700 thousand - 1% of the entire population of the UK - a city the size of Liverpool or Southampton - and the houses are simply not there. If Suella Braverman speaks these truths she is cancelled. Hotels are now being emptied of asylum seekers and the government is paying a fortune to Serco who are offering crooked deals to small landlords to get houses they need to evict their normal tenants from - but like the Blackrock example above, Serco unlike Blackrock will not buy houses from landlords but rent them and beware landlords, if you read the agreement with Serco you will never sign it as it shifts all the risks to you small landlord and you will get back a wrecked property and a huge loss given to you whilst big Serco makes a massive margin as they always do with deals with a government that is entirely incompetent making any deal with Capita or Serco or anyone and will overpay massively, as the civil servants trying to negotiate and write a contract with Serco are incompetent business wise compared to the professional lawyers Serco put on this; and these civil servants do not care as it is not their own money at stake. 5) I am a landlord of decades - like many other landlords responding in this thread - I have never used S21 to get rid of a good, rentpaying tenant - only had to use it once in 20 years for a big problem tenant 6) I love 95% of my tenants, I provide eco friendly high EPC homes, solar, ash, etc no expense spared and they reward me by staying many years in a warm house with low bills 7) other people wrote the same - I too only once was in court and was shocked being a lawyer and economist by training how the judge was absolutely corrupt - I had emails from the tenant agreeing to stay for a few more months where I was helping them to tailor the end of their tenancy to match when their new house could be moved into. Of course they went early and did not pay, leaving me with a void, no notice and the judge said by "letting them leave, you varied their agreement" - varying the agreement requires my agreement which I never gave. When I stated that, the judge said "well, you let them leave did you not ?" I responded "what did you want me to do - lock them into the house ?" and the judge said "well, you let them leave without putting up any resistance". That taught me that a landlord cannot rely on justice - of course landlords do not write about that as landlords know they are weak already. A tenant just has to throw a coin in the washing maching to wreck it .... they can poke a screwdriver through the roof and create leaks .... they have all the power in England in the tenant-landlord relationship but this is never expressed and I should not do this here either as it shows how weak landlords are and how quickly and easily they can financially die from bad tenants. And you're a landlord so you must be rich, so you can do your work for tenants, work hard, give everything you make away in taxes, then for doing all that as a free slave for society, you will get vilified and spat on by the media fuelling this hate, then we will put rent controls in (but not mortgage controls) and then we will expropriate you as if in a communist state, then we will charge capital gains tax at that moment, then you die and we charge 40% inheritance tax. Meanwhile 10 million people of our 60 million population do not work by now, and are now on benefits that taxpayers have to pay 100 billion for. With social media - they have the control as they have time to sit on facebook all day long to manipulate weak politicians who are also addicted to tech as that has given them insight in how to get votes so wrong effects are now quickly reinforcing everything leading to our children having a massive problem of a failing state which will fall apart. Add 100k illegal male military age migrants with entirely different values, (which are not allowed to work) than the Eastern European hard workers that came in and built houses and lifted up our economy to accelerate the downfall. the UK needs to leave the two party system paralyzing it immediately but we all know in the UK nothing will ever change - until it suddenly falls apart into chaos and civil war - to everyones surprise.

Reply to the comment left by Lisa008 at 20/04/2024 - 08:12
The birthrate for western women is declining rapidly, which means there soon won't be enough [indigenous] people working and paying taxes to cover the needs of the State. Illegal migration and the benefits bill is out of control, with no sign of it reducing. Indeed, Labour will see it increasing as they welcome yet more to our gold-encrusted shores in the misguided belief that immigration is the answer to our declining birthrate. Only one problem. While those from countries such as India, Philippines, Hong Kong etc... want to work and integrate, there's a whole sub-society which refuses to integrate but insists on imposing it's own culture on everyone else, while being handed every benefit going, including prioritised social housing.

Reply to the comment left by Accommodation Provider at 20/04/2024 - 11:40
We are all thinking it because we see the effects on our income and property. I believe it will come to a head during this next Labour Parliament, because they have clueless politicians in their front bench, who will continue to end over backwards for their union paymasters, those who live their lives on benefits, minorities, and illegal migrants. And when it does all kick-off, they will overreact.

Reply to the comment left by Slooky at 20/04/2024 - 08:17
Why indeed, especially considering how biased the judiciary against landlords.

Reply to the comment left by Andrew Strevens at 20/04/2024 - 10:53
I’m a landlord and nothing winds me up more than someone saying that a tenant pays my mortgage.

I only have one one mortgage out of a number of properties. I paid cash for the rest.

The one with a mortgage costs me £3k in interest this latest tax year. I owe the same today as I did last year. A new boiler and other maintenance, repairs and insurances will see me breaking even on this property - if I’m lucky.

Tenants are not paying my mortgage. They are paying for a safe home that I manage for them.

Reply to the comment left by Cider Drinker at 20/04/2024 - 18:56
"nothing winds me up more than someone saying that a tenant pays my mortgage."

I thought the same. Eg I let a house worth 650k for 2000pcm.(Actual real life figures). As I have prioritised paying off mortages for 30 years, I have no mortgage on it. However I do have other mortgages that I coud pay off. 650k at 5% = £32500pa. Because of s24 I would need to be getting roughly £40k a year rent. not £24k just to pay my notional interest and that ignores all the other costs.