Why the victimisation of landlords shames everyone

Reply to the comment left by Keith Wellburn at 22/02/2025 – 08:33
There is a difference between a corporate landlord who builds new properties to rent out and a person who purchases second hand properties to rent. One increases the supply of housing, the other doesn’t.
You must see how one benefits society while the other doesn’t?

Reply to the comment left by Steve Rose at 22/02/2025 – 08:57
A corporate can, but doesn’t have to build new properties. By corporate I mean entities that are incorporated. That spans the range from the FTSE Grainger (who do build properties) to the various one man/woman bands who have bought the various properties I sold via the limited companies they set up for the purpose.

I owned 8 properties outright and expanded considerably with borrowed money at a time when it just was not the way things were done for individuals like me to do it via a Ltd company. Osborne changed the rules very arbitrarily with S24 with no clear and easy way for existing operators to incorporate without serious financial implications re CGT and SDLT on the transfer of properties.

To sum up, the five HMOs I owned (as in my equity stake plus borrowings) for the best part of twenty years and were not eligible for interest offset under S24 are now all in the ownership of small limited companies and all have mortgages (bigger than when I owned them) getting full interest offset.

S24 along with SDLT premium is a disincentive for smaller landlords (someone with a decent job would be affected by S24 one just one property – but one property isn’t generally sufficient to offset the additional cost of setting up a limited company). Whether that individual would have bought a new or a secondhand property, it is still new demand in the market which would feed through to demand for new builds overall.

Osborne originally used the argument that weeding out some smaller players would be a good thing – but it is a poor argument now for using a blunt tax clobbering approach when the sector is being professionalised through the huge increase in regulation over the past decade and yet to come in the RRB.

Reply to the comment left by Steve Rose at 21/02/2025 – 10:05Some years back there was a “Rogue Tenants Register” and very effective it was too. I used it and checked in (on line) every week to get the lastest postings on relcalcitrant tenants in my area (North Wales.)

The register allowed the viewer to filter to the area of interest. It did not always provide the names of the rascals but there was more than sufficient intel on them to allow the LL to reject them. Failure to make payments, thrashing of property, breaches of agreement were all there when necessary. False names or previously named alias were recorded on platform.

Along came the Human Rights (for tenants) Act and GDPR (protection of villians and rogues) legislation and the advance of wokery . The Register was taken down – a green light for the tenants.

Carchester.

My hope is that abolishing Section 21 will encourage bad tenants to behave better.

No longer will they be able to hide from the real reasons for their eviction.

Reply to the comment left by Cider Drinker at 22/02/2025 – 11:18I dont think that getting rid of section 21 will necessarily encourage bad tenants to behave better.
It could embolden them because they will know that it might take years to eventualy get rid of them especially with all the levers they can pull when the RRB becomes law.

I would make two comments about the article.
The first is that when Margaret Thatcher instituted the sell off of council houses and flats it was to reduce the ever increasing costs of their maintenance, which bill falling to council tax payers, who already paid for the maintenance of their own private homes.
Also, I suspect that the most likely reason for current landlords to plan to sell is probably the proposed raising of EPC ratings in the next few years, coupled with ever more demanding inspections and permits.

Reply to the comment left by Steve Rose at 22/02/2025 – 08:52
“I can see where you’re going wrong if “Is he up to date with his rent” could be considered anywhere near a sufficient reference.” – Not me going wrong, that was the reference I gave to another landlord because it was the only positive thing I could say and they didn’t ask anything else.

“I bet you’ll miss S21, it doesn’t bother me one bit.”
Yes, I will. I have used it twice in 30 years and it has been a pretty useful tool on both occasions.
Why would we want to lose anything that could potentially be useful? You may not have ever used it. You may never need to use it – kind of how one might describe an insurance policy when you think about it.

It matters not though. I am getting out of the game now – I’ll leave the ever increasing legislation and ever diminishing yields to people like you.

Taking a tenant on benefits is a disaster. Universal Credit do not pay the full rent if the tenant decides he/she doesn’t want to work. No back pay. No payment of arrears either. They don’t care if the landlord receives no rent. No-one is living in my property for free. One tenant didn’t pay the rent for a year and Universal Credit encouraged the situation and did not want to entertain me, the landlord over what I was(n’t) receiving in rent. They think we’re all loaded but the truth is, it helps towards my mortgage as my husband cannot work due to a serious accident in 2011, where he hasn’t received one benefit because he doesn’t fit the criteria, but he’s expected to house a tenant for free.
Well that’s easy then, no-one on benefits will get a look in. They think us landlords are going to suffer at their mercy but it will all backfire. I wonder if Starmer will let a tenant stay and not pay his £75,000 a year rent he receives (if this is true!). They’re so thick. How come the councils and the like are not being punished for renting out the most poorest and damp-ridden properties. They want to offload all the wrong-uns on us and leave us high and dry and punish us still in the meantime. I’m not being dictated to by this inept government when they are obviously doing their best to get us out of the market and snatch our properties off us.
I’ve never known an unfair system as we have which demonstrates there is no justice in this country.