Aug

Landlord faces prosecution after Tribunal uncovers illegal eviction

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A landlord who chucked a tenant out of his unlicensed HMO has been handed a £2,825 Rent Repayment Order by a First Tier Property Tribunal.

Imtiaz Khan admitted that he had not given the tenant notice but instead entered the man’s room without lawful authority and re-let it without properly terminating the tenancy. Newham Council now has to decide whether to bring a criminal prosecution for illegal eviction.

Penalties for such actions can be severe – last week a landlord in Liverpool was given a suspended jail sentence for a similar illegal eviction.

Khan’s six-bedroom HMO in Upton Lane, London, comes under the authority’s mandatory licensing scheme; Khan also admitted that he had not applied for a licence until November 2020 – after the tenant’s application for an RRO.

Legal requirement

The tribunal ruled that Khan was not a professional landlord as he only owned one property, but that as he had been a landlord for more than five years, should have been aware of the legal requirements of licensing.

It heard that he could not substantiate his claim that the tenant owed £1,200 in rent arrears, and which the tenant agreed was £725.

The arrears and the £1,900 paid to the tenant in Universal Credit between August and December 2020 were deducted from his original claim of £5,450.

Read the decision in full.

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