EXCLUSIVE: Don’t let this happen to you, says landlord after losing £40,500 to guaranteed rent scheme

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A landlord is fighting to get his money back after two if his HMOs were left in an appalling state after a three-year contract with London-based RHP Properties went disastrously wrong.

Gulam Sumar handed over the two six-bedroom houses in Harrow to the Walthamstow company in early 2017, after he and his business partners spent £185,000 on renovations.

It agreed to pay them a monthly guaranteed rent but within months had fallen into arrears. If that wasn’t bad enough, neighbours at both properties were complaining about anti-social behaviour and Dr Sumar could see bins over-flowing and evident drug use going on.

He tells LandlordZONE: “They wouldn’t pay us on time or give us access to inspect the properties – and wouldn’t even answer our emails or phone calls. Last year they changed their name from RHP Services to RHP Lettings, but with the same staff.”

Using a two-year break clause, Dr Sumar served notice in August 2019, with the help of Landlord Action, but the process was disrupted by Covid earlier this year.

He was beginning to despair when a tenant from one of the properties called him to say he was the only legal person living there as the others were squatters.

“I rushed round to find stolen goods, credit cards and drug paraphernalia, so I called the police and Harrow Council and changed the locks to get forced possession,” he says. Not long afterwards, a similar situation occurred with the other HMO and he was able to do the same.

But the nightmare didn’t end there as, after taking stock of both properties, he could see the extent of the necessary repairs, so got builders’ quotes with estimates of £24,000 to bring them back up to standard.

RHP insisted it could do the work in three days – but only sent round a painter for four hours.

Dr Sumar is still owed £16,500 in rent and was forced to foot the repair bill himself. He’s written to the firm insisting that they pay up but is resigned to going to the small claims court with the hope of getting at least £10,000 in costs. He’s since discovered that there are a number of other landlords with similar experiences with RHP – and some have even sued the firm.

He adds: “It was a miserable experience and I’m glad it’s nearly over. Now I want to warn other people not to make the same mistake.”

LandlordZONE has contacted RHP owner Toki Khan for a comment.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – EXCLUSIVE: Don’t let this happen to you, says landlord after losing £40,500 to guaranteed rent scheme | LandlordZONE.

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Ill woman turned down for property investment course refund turns to ombudsman for help

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A sick woman fighting to get £13,000 back from Touchstone Education has been told by the firm to take her case to an ombudsman.

The woman, who wants to remain anonymous, was told it was at deadlock with her and its latest communication reads: ‘After reviewing all the evidence I will not be upholding your complaint on this occasion. If you remain unsatisfied the next step would be for you to contact the complaints ombudsman.’

She tells LandlordZONE: “I will be going to the ombudsman but as owner Paul Smith has already claimed that the ombudsman has never had it find against them, I have limited hopes – despite the strength of my claims.” 

The woman first paid £1,000 for a Touchstone Education online course and then another £12,000 after attending a very persuasive ‘free course’ last year – which was to pay for about seven courses and a monthly meeting.

But after being signed off sick for six months with complex physical and psychological problems, her GP agreed that attending a course could seriously affect her health and wrote to the company supporting her claim.

She says she was left feeling violated when the firm asked to look at her medical records but then refused to refund her.

Compassion

Landlord leader Ben Beadle recently joined the chorus of calls urging Touchstone Education to show compassion and provide a refund.

She adds: “In their marketing, they continually talk about business values and ethics, but I have yet to see any evidence of these. Mr Smith, are you going to continue your war of attrition in the hope I give up, or are you going to do the right thing and refund me so that I can use my energy towards getting well again?”

Paul Smith has told LandlordZONE that he can’t comment on an individual case due to GDPR rules, but that when people ask for a refund it’s better to encourage them to finish their course.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Ill woman turned down for property investment course refund turns to ombudsman for help | LandlordZONE.

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Half of student landlords to look elsewhere for tenants as campus exodus continues

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More than half of student landlords would consider opting out of the student market if they have the same problems as they did during the last academic year.

After a rocky start to the autumn term, with students late in confirming accommodation and having to lockdown, the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) quarterly report found that 56% might soon look elsewhere for an income.

However, two-thirds say they wouldn’t want to switch to renting to those on Local Housing Allowance, usually for fear of letting to claimants (43%) and the drop in income being too great (31%).

The pandemic hit student landlords’ revenue stream last term as 20% had requests for rent reductions while 19% saw students leaving their properties early.

Rent reductions

The survey’s responses from 243 landlords shows that most granted rent reductions when asked (61%) but that they tended not to grant students rent holidays, with 60% turning down requests.

When the survey was completed in June, almost a third of student landlords expected to lose more than 20% of their business in the next 12 months and a quarter reported that they either had no students signed up or had cancelled upcoming tenancies for the next academic year. Most landlords (65%) reported no problems with lets for this academic year.

The NRLA says: “How universities respond to new measures could affect student landlords and their business at a time when they are hoping to bounce back from coronavirus and potentially disrupt the end of the 2019-20 academic year. Flexibility is required to ensure the supply of accommodation is maintained and sustained.”

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Half of student landlords to look elsewhere for tenants as campus exodus continues | LandlordZONE.

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Minister promises help for landlords caught up in cladding scandal

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Housing minister Robert Jenrick has promised to help landlords and other owners of the estimated 500,000 leasehold flats caught up in the cladding remediation scandal.

In an interview with a national newspaper over the weekend, Jenrick said he would lobby the Treasury to ‘do more’ for leaseholders facing ‘life changing’ financial problems.

He said he understood that many leaseholders face both enormous costs while owning properties that, until the cladding problem in their buildings is sorted out, are worthless and un-mortgageable.

His comments follow mounting criticism of the government’s handling of the problems faced by home owners as the fall-out from the Grenfell tragedy has unfolded.

Hundreds of privately funded towers blocks around the UK now need their cladding to be replaced but the Treasury has so far declined to foot the entire bill.

Funding

Following the Grenfell fire, it released £400 million to pay for the removal of aluminium composite material panels from social housing-controlled blocks, and later gave £200 million towards helping some private blocks. It then this year pledged £1 billion towards helping fund the removal of other types of potentially danger cladding.

Jenrick did not clarify what ‘do more’ means but it likely to be an attempt to find the estimated additional £2 billion needed to pay for non-ACM cladding to be replaced on towers.

The urgency of the situation was highlighted two weeks ago by a Public Account Committee report into the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s handling of the crisis.

“The government must step up and show that it will put a stop to the bickering over who is responsible, who’s going to pay for the remediation – and just put this right,” said its chair Meg Hillier.

Read more about the cladding scandal.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Minister promises help for landlords caught up in cladding scandal | LandlordZONE.

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Council must re-house when tenant is given notice not wait for bailiffs – Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman

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In a groundbreaking decision, The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has declared that a council should not have waited until the eviction date to rehouse a mother but should have rehoused her when she first informed it that she was being made homeless.

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HMO prejudicing the sale of my property?

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I bought my Aberdeen flat March 2014 while working overseas and did not step foot into it until April 2018. During this period the property was being utilised by a friend and her family for the first 2 years followed by 2 years of rental.

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Leading landlord launches evictions petition. Will you sign it?

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Leading property investment mentor and landlord Ranjan Bhattacharya has launched a petition calling for tenants to face eviction if they fall more than two weeks behind in rent payments.

This, Bhattacharya argues, would put the UK on the same footing as Australia.

“You can’t go into a supermarket and steal your weeks groceries,” he says.

“There are laws in place to protect shop keepers large and small. Not paying rent is also theft with the Landlord being the victim.”

He is asking fellow landlords to sign his petition and help him get it to 10,000 signatures at which point the parliamentary e-petition rules require the government to provide a response.

At 100,000 signatures the petition would have to be formally debated within the Houses of Parliament.

Bhattacharya argues that the existing evictions system – even when the current restrictions on evictions are discounted – are unfair to landlords, claiming it can take up to a year in normal times to evict a tenant.

“In that time the landlord still has to pay mortgage and other costs,” he says.

“This can ruin many small scale Landlords. Furthermore, it incentives landlords to only rent their properties to tenants with higher than average income who are likely to care about getting a bad credit rating.”

Bhattacharya’s follows a similar and successful petition completed last month which garnered over 126,000 signatures. It called for landlords to freeze rents for the duration of Covid and was debated in parliament on 17^th September.

Bhattacharya hosts the Baker Street Property Meet and has a popular YouTube advice channel.

©1999 – Present | Parkmatic Publications Ltd. All rights reserved | LandlordZONE® – Leading landlord launches evictions petition. Will you sign it? | LandlordZONE.

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Average UK rent up to £987

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The September 2020 HomeLet Rental Index has been released indicating on their figures that the average monthly rental cost in the UK is now £987. This is an increase of 0.2% compared to August and 2.1% annually.

Excluding London

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Satisfaction not Guaranteed

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Given current economic circumstances, many more landlords than previously will accept tenants who are or may in future be in receipt of benefits. With the ending of furlough and possible widespread redundancies, many tenants may find themselves in financial difficulties.

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