With all the discussion about housing benefit tenants and the problems they have finding accommodation, I thought it would be helpful for people to read about one real-life story.
One where a well-meaning landlord came unstuck. Some details have been changed to preserve anonymity.
Kate’s story
Kate instructed me to bring proceedings for possession towards the end of April. Here is what she told me:
My tenant Jenny is a lovely person and so I hope this can all be done as amicably as possible. The reality is that she finds herself caught between a rock and a hard place. This is what happened :·
- The council told her in ’09 to get a 2 bed flat as she has a little boy and they agreed to cover the rent of £1,215 per calendar month
- The Government then reduced her benefits. Whilst she has been trying to make up the shortfall she has been struggling to do this (she has no other source of income)
- When she asked the council to re-house her into a cheaper property, they told her she needed to bid on flats
- She has told me that she has been bidding on flats for over a year but every time she bids on anything, she loses out to others who are in bedsits or 1 bed flats
- She mentioned this again to the council and asked if they could help her and get her “up the list”, they said they can’t do anything
- She has also been told that she can’t just move out and give me back the keys otherwise they won’t re-house her
She has come to me as her last resort and asked me to evict her so that she can be re-housed. She wants to get a job but can’t do anything until she’s out of the flat as even if she got a job, the rent is too much for her on her own.
Kate used my All in One eviction service which cost her £840. (Note that this is no longer available – read about our current eviction service here).
How long it took to get the possession order
Kate had already served a section 21 notice so we were able to issue proceedings immediately. The forms were therefore drafted up, signed, and sent off to the court a few days later on 30 April. The proceedings were issued by the court on 18 May and served on the tenant.
I duly applied for possession at the proper time and the court made the order for possession on 12 June. The order gave the tenant until 26 June to vacate.
So the time from issue to the tenant being ordered to vacate was six weeks, or eight weeks to the date she was ordered to vacate. Which is fairly normal for the ‘accelerated procedure’.
How long it took to get possession
As is usual, the tenant was told by the Council to stay put and so we had to apply for a bailiffs appointment. Which I duly sent off to the court on 27 June. Being a London court however there was then a six-week delay, and the bailiffs’ appointment was finally made for 9 August.
So looking at the procedure as a whole, it has taken about three and a half months from first deciding to instruct solicitors to actually getting the property back.
Reflections on the case – what Kate learned
Talking afterwards to Kate, she told me that as a result of this experience she definitely won’t be letting to housing benefit tenants again. This is what she told me she had learned from the experience:
In hindsight, I was very naïve and just wanted to help her out. I should have walked away as soon as she mentioned she was on benefits and it never occurred to me to ask her housing benefits officer any of the following questions:
- If their benefits get cut, who pays the shortfall? I now know that’s ME
- What if I decide to sell the flat?
- Can I give notice? I now know the tenant would just stay until I evict them
- What if I decide to put the rent up? I now know that this wouldn’t have been possible either !!!
Had I asked any of those questions, I think I would have realised that I was going down a one way street…..
It may also be worth mentioning that as well as the rent arrears the flat was left in a poor condition and so Kate also had to pay for refurbishment before the flat could be re-let.
So there you are. A real-life example of someone who was willing to give a housing benefit tenant a chance, got caught out and will now never knowingly rent to benefit tenants again.
Sad but true.
Thanks to ‘Kate’ for allowing me to use her story.
Landlords wanting to evict their tenants may want to check out my DIY eviction service >> here.
Contrary to what some landlord’s advisors would say, this illustrates that, done properly,a possession order can be obtained in good time (even in a London court).
However, if the underlying issue is rent affordability following a change of circumstances (whether that change is a reduction in income or increase in rent) the advice from the local authority would not have been any different.
People are prone to confuse Housing Benefit claimants with people who rely on homelessness assistance from local authorities. They can be the same, but not automatically so.
I suspect that the landlord in this instance would have preferred the tenant to have found somewhere else once she could no longer afford the rent. It is the fact that the tenant was reliant on assistance from the local authority that meant that a possession order was required, not necessarily her reliance on Housing Beneift.
The questions that this landlord asked after the event are ones that should have been addressed before becoming a landlord, let alone deciding who rent to. Sorry if that sounds harsh.
Yes, this is a fairly realistic timetable. I am often amazed by the time some landlords say it takes to get possession and also how much apparently they have had to pay for it!
It makes you wonder about the efficiency of some firms.
Chris you took the words out of my mouth. If a landlord serves a section 21 then the tenant needs to start looking around for another place and if they find one, all is hunky dory, it’s only if they apply to the homelessness unit for assistance that the wheels come off.
People go “Dahn the ‘omeless” because they want social housing, as PRS rents, particularly in London, are unsupportable for so many, particularly those on benefits, because LHA doesnt meet the market rent and they cant afford the shortfall. Its a vicious spiral that will worsen with Universal Credit.
If landlords wont rent to benefit claimants, and I understand why they wouldnt, then where will these people go? To the only place they can go, the homelessness unit. So the homelessness unit gets overwhelmed and does what Croydon got caught out for this very week, spending £1.5 million in 7 months keeping families in a run down B&B because they havent got anywhere else to put them apart from up north where rents are more affordable, but they get penalised for that too.
Either London PRS rents have to come down or the government have to introduce regional variations in benefit caps if we are to avert this shameful crisis turning into a full blown social catastrophe.
I’ve worked in housing and homelessness since around 1980 and I’ve never seen things as bad as this
Just to show another side to letting to HB.
I have HB tenants. They have been there 5 years and look set to be there at least another 5 (or until they die, as they intend). They keep the place spotless and appreciate the property far more than some of my non HB tenants.
I have a home owning guarantor and a months deposit and have referenced them thoroughly. I am also confident I can get them out in 3 months if necessary.
So the downside is possibly 2 months rent loss and a trashed property which I would have to refurb on changeover anyway. + I would have a good chance of going for the guarantor and I could/would(?)apply for direct HB payment.
The upside is no voids. In 10 years with that property and non HB, I would expect 4x 2 month voids and a light refurb each time. About £6k. Admittedly the rent is now slightly below market and the prospect of any increase looks slim, maybe £3k less over the 10 years. + I’m not worried about them losing their jobs (genuinely can’t work). They are also lovely people.
Nothing wrong with letting to HB as long as you go into it with your eyes wide open.
I may not be popular here, but what we have is a council who do not want to use up valuable social housing at the tax payers expense when they don’t have to. We also have a tenant who is (for whatever reason) utilising their rights – rights that are not affected by their social status and a landlord who did not understand either of the above when they entered the business of letting property.
Sure, the court process takes too long, but we have to deal with the sitation as it is, not how we hope it will be!
I’d also point out that after a 3 year tenancy, it would be unreasonable for a landlord to expect not to have to do some refurbishment before the property is fit to re-let. Some of the c£44k rent could be spent on that.
In summary – LHA tenants can be absolutely fine, so long as the landlord is realistic, appreciates the implications and protects themselves with deposits / guarantors / insurance whatever.
Thanks Dave and HBW for a couple of positive notes there.
That benefit tenants dont often come with a range of problems I wouldnt dispute, not least of which is having to deal with my lot, councils. It takes a different mindset and set of skills to manage than what I would term a straightforward letting but they can work.
What I am pushing for, and hopeful of, is a paradigm shift in the way that council’s see their role in relation to landlords and tenants.
As social lettings get denuded councils should be asking themselves “What do we do now?”, the answer is, roll your sleeves up and get involved as enablers and facilitators rather than providers.
Its already started in the shape of a growing trend for social lettings agencies. Its a hard slog changing mindsets but it will catch once we hit the tipping poiint
Reading this, I once again am thinking that I am not willing to touch any tenant that is ever likely to be on LHA unless they have a very good home owning guarantor.
Given that there is no defence against a correctly drafted S21 and it should take under 1hr for a court to check that the S21 is correct, I don’t see way the court process should take more than 1 week from start to finish. I don’t see way the court should every give a talent more than 24 hrs to vacate in a S21 case, as the tenant has already had 2 months and knows what the outcome will be. Why is it that a bailiff’s appointment is not automatically granted within hours if the tenant does not leave when order to vacate?
Yes, the time it takes for eviction is unfair on landlords. I wrote about this in my Bigger Picture series here https://landlordlawblog.co.uk/2012/09/10/housing-law-the-bigger-picture-bad-tenants/ and made some suggestions.
Unfortunately the courts are severely underfunded and understaffed so it is hard for them to respond quickly to anything
Ian, following on from Tessas comment, I guess it all comes down to priorities. The courts are not just there for we landlords – domestic abuse injunctions, illegal evictions, trespass & squatters are all much higher on the tree than you or I trying to get a business asset back.
TBH, in practical terms, most s21’s don’t really need a court decision, but that would take a change of legislation and the gov’t has other things on it’s mind right now.
And lets not forget that county courts do more than housing issues, the also do family law, small claims, disrepair, contractual stuff. ON any given day in any of the 3 courts I work in it is literally standing room only and security are run ragged keeping warring ex-partners apart in child custody battles while mortgage lender’s lawyers haggle over payments with duty advisers and advocates like me. It’s more like a market place than a court.
This is why I have in the past suggested having seperate housing courts working like tribunals as they have in some states in the US, to take on the more procedural cases like section 21 claims where there arent complex counterclaims flying back and forth.
I don’t know if the solution is separate housing courts or something else. But if the eviction system does not start working it I think there will be two outcomes.
a) Many more illegal evictions.
b) “Not having a home owning guarantor” -> “must sleep on the pavements.”
As few landlord will be willing to take to risk of the cost (including lost rent) of sorting out a tenant that gets into problems. The home owning guarantor will just have to risk losing their own home or arrange for the tenant to be removed in another way.