Expert slams licencing schemes for red tape that ‘punishes good landlords’

admin    Uncategorized     agents

Propertymark is calling for more local authority funding to ensure licensing schemes don’t unfairly burden compliant landlords.

It says councils’ scant resources and inadequate staffing levels mean processing licence applications takes longer than it should and hampers their ability to deal with admin, leaving landlords frustrated and uncertain about their entitlements while being processed.

In Tower Hamlets, some Propertymark members took months to get their licence.

One of the largest licensing scheme proposals in Brent would cover about 50,000 PRS properties, according to Tim Thomas, policy and campaigns officer (main picture).

“To base an estimate on one staff member visiting three properties per day, it would take over 50 years to complete checks on every property which is a completely unrealistic number to ensure were compliant,” he says.s

Rogue operators

Landlords are paying up to £1,215 per HMO property while rogue operators continue to operate under the radar, according to Propertymark.

It reports that while some local authorities are acknowledging the difference being part of an accredited organisation makes and offering discounts, it believes this offer should be taken up by more councils in order to limit the costs for good landlords.

Propertymark is voicing its concerns to local authorities and local representatives and explaining why it believes licensing is not the best way to improve standards across the PRS.

Adds Thomas: “As more and more schemes pop up, we will continue to engage with all levels of politics and government to ensure local authorities are targeting their scarce resources appropriately and good agents and landlords are not burdened with overzealous licensing schemes.”

View Full Article: Expert slams licencing schemes for red tape that ‘punishes good landlords’

Rent yields outstrip house price rises

admin    Uncategorized     agents

The UK’s highest average rental yields are in Bradford where they currently stand at a massive 11.06%, according to a new report.

Data from debt advisory specialists, Sirius Property Finance, revealed the current average UK rental yield is 4.08%

View Full Article: Rent yields outstrip house price rises

Tenant suing for condensation problems?

admin    Uncategorized     agents

Hello, I have a tenant who is suing me for damp and mould problems. When the tenant moved into the property it was just renovated with a new carpet and painted throughout. The flat is a two bedroom ground floor.

View Full Article: Tenant suing for condensation problems?

Single occupancy AST installs wife and 2 children?

admin    Uncategorized     agents

Hello, In November 2022 I accepted a new tenant on a 1 year AST. The property is a 2 bed first floor flat in a converted building.

He is aged mid 30s (I think of Nigerian origin) and doing a post grad course at a local University.

View Full Article: Single occupancy AST installs wife and 2 children?

SCAM alert: Landlord and agent pics being used to lure rental ripoff victims

admin    Uncategorized     agents

A BBC investigation has uncovered a new property rental scam that uses Facebook Marketplace and then fake accommodation booking sites to lure in unsuspecting tenants.

Called an advance rent payment scam, a technique that has been around for many years, this version of it is more sophisticated and difficult to spot.

Criminals use photographs pinched from the leading portals including Rightmove to advertise real properties for rent on Facebook’s free-to-use marketplace.

As is usual in these scams, the properties are improbably luxurious but offered at very low rental prices.

One example LandlordZONE found (pictured) is a three-bedroom modernist property in Clapham, London recently on the market for £2 million – where they scam lister found the photos – offered for rent at £1,000 a month – at least £4,000 less than its market value.

These listings are used to establish contact with victims, who are then asked to book their tenancies through fake but convincing copies of the either the Airbnb or TripAdvisor websites, via which they are urged to pay for their deposit and first month’s rent by bank transfer.

Designed to take advantage of inexperienced or desperate tenants, the BBC journalist conducting the investigation was hard pressed to tell the difference between real and fake TripAdvisor and Airbnb pages.

Majority

Reporter Shari Vahl also claimed during the programme that the vast majority of properties advertised on Facebook Marketplace in London were posted by scammers, a problem she claimed was likely to be taking place elsewhere too.

LandlordZONE has approached Meta, the owner of Facebook, for comment.

Another example given was a one-bedroom luxury ‘bills included’ furnished flat in Chelsea advertised for £1,300 a month which the real landlord was advertising on Rightmove via their agent for £3,600 a month.

The fake listings are made through the accounts of real people whose accounts have been hacked and then compromised.

Arguably the most worrying aspect of this is that landlords’ properties are being used in criminal enterprises to rip off vulnerable people moving home, often stealing significant sums off them using images taken by agents or their landlords.

Facebook has been investigated before for other rental scams facilitated by its marketplace.

Listen to the programme in full.

Picture credit: Knight Frank

View Full Article: SCAM alert: Landlord and agent pics being used to lure rental ripoff victims

BLOG: Will Section 8 eviction grounds be enough when Section 21 goes?

admin    Uncategorized     agents

With the likelihood of Section 21 evictions being abolished all eyes are on the 17 grounds for possession under the existing Section 8 procedure.

In the near future these are to be the main tools landlords will use to evict tenants who don’t pay the rent.

As it currently stands there are eight mandatory grounds and nine discretionary grounds of which 8,10 and 11 are the most commonly-used for rent arrears.

But only one of these is mandatory so if we are looking to evict on the grounds of rent arrears, our tenant needs to be two months behind when we serve this notice. 

And once notice is served it’s likely the landlord will kiss goodbye to any more rent payments, which means there is a risk of big arrears by the time you reach a possession hearing.

Still, at least a mandatory ground guarantees possession. Or does it?

I spoke to a landlord recently who had not been granted possession despite following this process to the letter. 

The tenant had been paying their rent erratically for three years and after multiple failed payment plans and promises, the landlord finally decided that it was time to serve notice to avoid the debt snowballing.

He also had a very good tenant in another property but it was losing money so he realised that evicting the first tenant would kill two birds with one stone; the second tenant could move into the first property.

The agent served the Section 8 notice and papers were hand delivered to court on 23rd December 2022 seeking mandatory possession of the property.  The hearing date was scheduled for 7th February 2023.

No evidence

The rent arrears tenant did not submit any defence in advance of the hearing and brought no evidence of their claims to the hearing.

Following a brief hearing, the judge exercised their discretion to ignore the ‘mandatory’ aspect of statutory law, and instead ordered a suspended possession order. 

This means that while there is a legal requirement for the tenant to pay the rent plus a contribution towards the arrears each month, they can stay in the property; possession was not granted. 

To add insult to injury, the judge also only awarded half of the landlord’s costs.

Worrying outcome

This is a worrying outcome. Landlords are a service provider and most strive to provide the best service and work hard at developing good relationships with their tenants. 

These negative experiences only serve to harden the heart, meaning that many landlords will be less inclined to be patient with defaulting tenants in the future. 

This is, of course, a business with contractual responsibilities on both sides. But the compassion element, certainly in this instance, was diminished by the actions of the judge.

When the government abolishes Section 21 their idea of a “robust alternative” needs to be demonstrated, as even a statutory statement of the “grounds on which courts must order possession” can be ignored if the judge is so minded. As this case proved.

Victoria Valentine (main picture) is a client co-coordinator at Landlord Action

View Full Article: BLOG: Will Section 8 eviction grounds be enough when Section 21 goes?

NEW: Consultation launched on how to stop unfair council tax re-banding of HMOs

admin    Uncategorized     agents

The Government has launched its promised consultation on its plans to reform the way HMO properties are valued for council tax.

If enacted as proposed, this will ensure that all HMO properties within England are banded as one property and have one council tax band, other than in ‘exceptional circumstances’.

Ministers at the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities are seeking the views of landlords on the proposals, which include several options that would force the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) to consider an HMO to be a ‘single dwelling’.

This aims to redress a problem highlighted by LandlordZONE last year by several MPs and leading landlords who protested over Portsmouth City Council’s policy of asking the VOA to reassess HMOs for council tax in such a way as to attract a band for each individual room.

This is designed to help councils like Portsmouth’s raise more funds via their council tax as their central funding has been cut. Last year the city warned of a £6.8 million ‘black hole’ within its budget.

But it is not alone in doing this and campaigners say some 50 councils across England have used or are considering using HMO council tax re-valuations.

Rebanded

Back in October last year leading HMO landlord Darryn Brewer revealed to LandlordZONE how 68 of his bedrooms had been re-banded in Portsmouth as individual properties which would rake in an extra £72,000 a year for the council.

The Government is now seeking to remedy this situation and says it wants to “provide greater certainty and consistency in the way that accommodation in the HMO sector is banded for council tax, and to ensure that HMOs are banded as one property and have one council tax band, other than in exceptional circumstances”.

Examples of such exemptions would include when an HMO includes self-contained accommodation, the consultation says.

Respond to the consultation.

View Full Article: NEW: Consultation launched on how to stop unfair council tax re-banding of HMOs

Property not registered with HM Land Registry after 16 months?

admin    Uncategorized     agents

Looking for some post-completion help, please. We are new to property investing and we purchased two buy-to-let properties within a month of each other, using the same conveyancing solicitor. The first property we were able to refinance 6 months after works were completed without a hitch.

View Full Article: Property not registered with HM Land Registry after 16 months?

Fear of harrasment/threatening behaviour claim?

admin    Uncategorized     agents

Hi everyone, it had to happen. I have got my hands on some troublesome tenants. My fear is the chance of a harassment/threatening behaviour claim by them and thus a possible rent repayment order.

It is a HMO (licenced a bit over a year ago and a half ago) student property and has valid gas cert/electrical safety cert: house has smoke detectors in each room (more than required) EPC rating C for 8 years now.

View Full Article: Fear of harrasment/threatening behaviour claim?

Property giants slam Government’s lack of action on EPC upgrades

admin    Uncategorized     agents

An influential new report has slammed the Government’s lack of progress on its much-heralded desire to see the property sector reach ‘net zero’ by 2050.

Published today jointly by the British Property Federation and property giant JLL, the report is critical of Government policy and implementation on the ground within the residential sector to make properties greener.

This includes how a lack of good housing data means many EPCs can be hopelessly inaccurate, and the BPF says this makes it difficult to calculate accurate operational carbon and set realistic carbon reduction target.

The report also cites official policy and regulatory uncertainty and a lack of financial incentives to support the retrofitting of buildings are ‘hindering progress’.

Considerable cost

“Transitioning to net zero comes at considerable cost, and without robust evidence of a return on investment, many property owners lack the confidence to invest in major energy efficiency upgrades,” it says.

The two organisations are calling on Ministers to set up a task force to look at the funding and practical challenges faced by home owners and private landlords, and also:

• Publish the results of its consultation on its proposed ‘performance-based’ energy rating system for properties;
• Confirm the details of its new MEES regulations;
• Reveal how landlords will be helped to reach the looming higher EPC targets for private rented properties;
• Zero rate VAT on residential repairs and maintenance;
• Overhaul capital allowances to incentivise investment to decarbonise.

Read the report in full.

Melanie Leech (pictured), Chief Executive, British Property Federation, comments, “The property sector is fully committed to decarbonisation but there are huge barriers and costs to overcome.

“We urge the Government to adopt the policy recommendations in this report and to work with us to make sure we can deliver a net zero built environment by 2050.”

Read more: Key dates - what does 2023 have in store for landlords?

View Full Article: Property giants slam Government’s lack of action on EPC upgrades