INVESTIGATION: Exasperated landlord warns others not to use unlicensed evictions firms

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An exasperated landlord in North London is warning others to beware of unregulated eviction companies after paying one £2,000 – but has yet to evict her tenants two years later.

The elderly landlord used Tenant Eviction 21 Co Ltd after deciding to renovate her house in London and sell it.

She says her contact at the firm, Michael Turner, told her he had served notice to the tenants in February 2020 – then Covid hit while she was out of the country for two years.

She became suspicious when her phone calls went unanswered. “I checked with the court and was told they had had to produce the papers 15 days before the review in April 2021 but had failed to do this, so were given another review date but failed to produce the papers a second time,” she tells LandlordZONE.

Back in the UK, she approached the estate agent that had recommended Tenant Eviction 21 and had provided the receipt for her payment – Marble Agency in Seven Sisters Road – now Theodore & Charles Ltd.

She was told Turner was ill, has been unable to contact him, and now despairs of getting her money back.

While regulated eviction firms have a solicitor acting for them, unregulated firms can only give guidance to clients, but their status is not always clear.

LandlordZONE was unable to contact Tenant Eviction 21 but Turner told us: “It’s not my company and I only did some consultancy work for them – I haven’t worked with them for several years.”

More information

The landlord believes there should be more information available for landlords to help them make decisions. “There’s not enough regulation around eviction companies,” she says. “Most of my savings have gone on solicitors and it’s affected my health. I hope my experience will at least stop this happening to other people.”

Theodore & Charles director Charlie Kleanthous tells LandlordZONE that it passed on the landlord’s money to Tenant Eviction 21.

He adds: “We’ve worked on successful cases with Mike Turner but in this case, communication was poor and that company didn’t fulfil what they set out to do.

“We wouldn’t recommend them again. The landlord should have been given an explanation – it’s possible that court papers were sent to the property where her tenant lives and were intercepted.”

Read LandlordZONE’s spotlight on the problem of unlicensed eviction companies.

View Full Article: INVESTIGATION: Exasperated landlord warns others not to use unlicensed evictions firms

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