Leading Berkshire landlord fined over HMO safety breaches

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Rogue landlord Nidan Singh has been fined £6,000 for ignoring a long list of problems at his Reading HMO.

Singh, 76, from Earley, admitted six offences under the Housing Acting for failing to comply with HMO regulations and admitted one offence of failing to comply with two enforcement notices.

Reading Borough Council housing team officers inspected his property in London Road twice in 2019 and found defects including faulty fire detectors, a bathroom in significant disrepair with large areas of missing wall tiles and the toilet seat held on by string, a rat hole and droppings in the kitchen, and damage to a fire door.

Several radiators had also been removed from the central heating system.

Singh was fined and also ordered to pay £1,956 costs and a £181 victim surcharge.

Substandard accommodation

James Crosbie, interim assistant director, planning, transport and regulatory services, says: “We continue to bring successful prosecutions against landlords who offer substandard accommodation.

“Our goal is for all residents to live in quality accommodation and where this is not the case we will do everything in our power to change that. Reading’s landlords must do more to ensure they comply with the rules, or we will take action.”

But Singh got off lightly compared to another landlord, Mohammed Naseer Zamir, who was fined £66,000 for similar offences in January.

HMO plans

In the meantime, Singh has applied to build a property on land in Eastern Avenue, Reading, sparking complaints from local residents that although the original application was for a two-bedroom home, this was changed to a four-bed property.

They fear it will eventually become an HMO with not enough room in the street for parking.

Read about Reading council’s HMO scheme.

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LATEST: Leading veterinary body urges more landlords to accept pets

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Influential veterinary organisation the National Office of Animal Health (NOAH) has launched a campaign urging landlords to let more renters live with their pets.

The body, which represents the UK animal medicine industry, hopes to encourage wider use of the model tenancy agreement and wants to work with landlords and tenants’ associations to promote new pet-friendly policies and responsible pet ownership.

As part of its campaign – Securing the Right to Rent with Pets: Making One Health Housing a Reality – it’s urging supporters to send a letter to their local MP or the Housing Minister, Christopher Pincher, calling on him to make legislative changes to support pets in rented accommodation.

NOAH believes that despite the significant and clear benefits, owning a pet in rented accommodation remains very difficult.

It says that according to rental start-up Home Made, only 2.8% of property owners in the UK advertise homes as suitable for tenants with pets, while Tenants Voice reports that 78% of pet owners experience problems finding a suitable rental property.

Chief executive Dawn Howard (pictured) believes that widening access to pets will actually bring benefits to landlords that outweigh their often-inflated fears.

She adds: “The RSPCA found that tenants who are given permission to look after a pet in their rental property were likely to live in that property for twice as long compared to other tenants – creating long-term, secure tenants for landlords.

“Allowing responsibly kept pets also increases the pool of prospective renters for properties, meaning landlords are far less likely to struggle to find tenants, and will in turn have a more secure stream of income.”

In January, the government updated its model tenancy agreement, aiming to end blanket bans on pets in rental properties.

However, the agreement is voluntary, and it has since hardened its position on the hurdles that tenants will have to clear before a landlord needs to allow pets into their property.

PIC Credit: Antti | Flickr

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BREAKING: Carbon Monoxide alarm laws need reform, says MP

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An MP has gained support for proposals to make carbon monoxide (CO) alarms compulsory in any room of a rented property containing a fuel-burning appliance.

As the Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015 currently stand, landlords are only required to install CO alarms in rooms where there is a solid-fuel appliance such as a wood burner or open fire, and checked at the beginning of each tenancy.

But MP Stephanie Peacock (main pic), Labour’s Shadow Minister for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, told parliament that following several tragic cases, rooms containing gas-burning appliances such as boilers should also be fitted with the alarms, and the requirement made compulsory.

Currently, the government’s own guidance is that it only ‘expects and encourages’ reputable landlords to fit alarms in room containing gas appliances.

“Many campaigns, such as CO-Gas Safety, led by its hard-working president, Stephanie Trotter, and the all-party parliamentary carbon monoxide group, and many survivors and victims’ families have lobbied the Government for decades to raise awareness and change the law, with very limited success,” she said.

“That is where the law is incredibly weak. We know that gas appliances can and sometimes do emit deadly carbon monoxide gases.”

She also said that a government consultation on the matter, which closed in January this year, has yet to produce any action from within Whitehall.

Property installation

Following her remarks, Minister Paul Scully – whose BEIS department has responsibility for this issue – revealed that a cross-Whitehall group had by coincidence met earlier this week to discuss the issue of carbon monoxide poisonings which, although in decline, still kill 50 people a year and hospitalise hundreds.

“I reiterate that carbon monoxide alarms are a useful additional precaution, but they are not a substitute for proper installation, maintenance and the safety checks of combustion appliances,” he said.

“We say to landlords: ensure that you know the legal and moral obligations on you towards the safety of your tenants from the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning.”

Conservative MP Peter Bottomley (pictured), who has been campaigning on the issue for many years, said: “May I suggest to the Minister that he invite Stephanie Trotter, who has been doing this work for 25 years, and representatives of the all-party group to a meeting with him, advised by the HSE, along with the National Residential Landlords Association?

“If the good landlords are doing what they should, the bad ones need to be encouraged.”

Read more about CO alarms.

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Covid: Boilers fail under the strain of home working and furloughed tenants

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Widespread working from home and tenants on furlough put a strain on boilers last winter, according to heating specialist Hometree, which saw a 12% increase in year-on-year boiler breakdowns.

As many tenants wanted warm homes all day, the most common complaints were a lack of heating, low boiler pressure and leaks, while during colder snaps frozen pipes problems peaked. 

More than 50% of boiler breakdowns take place during the winter, which adds up to just over 2.5m UK households suffering a heating failure and then having to pay an average of £200 to get their boiler back up and running.

Hometree says the figures are likely to represent a 12% increase in overall heating use, meaning that the average household will see their bills increase by an extra £55.

Wear and tear

Kemley Sellars, head of marketing, says: “With the boiler being a crucial component in ensuring that homes are kept comfortable during the coldest months, the additional usage whilst working from home has meant increased wear and tear.

“It really highlights the importance of having your boiler serviced in the coming months, ensuring that it’s working for next winter where many may have transitioned post-Covid to working from home more often.”

To prepare boilers for next winter, Hometree recommends that landlords check radiators, service boilers, insulate pipes and check boiler pressure; to avoid a pressure drop, it suggests they check and use the filling link/loop, and bleed radiators if the pressure is too high.

Top 5 boiler problems and how to solve them.

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FREE ENTRY: Online summit to reveal the future of better renting

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Landlords can pick up some tips on making renters happy at the first virtual Tenant Satisfaction Summit.

The free event brings together landlords, property managers, estate agents and real estate companies to discuss improving the experience in residential housing as well as PropTech, smart homes and the future of green cities.

Topics range from examining the past, present and future of property viewings with James Morris-Manuel (Matterport) and Karl Thomas (Foxtons), to John Stewart (NRLA) and Ellis Street (Folio) debating whether professional landlords will dominate the housing market. 

The summit – on 29^th April – also includes six interactive breakout sessions where attendees can learn how to design highly desirable homes for tenants and how to manage property repairs and maintenance to keep tenants satisfied. 

They will also be able to message one another and schedule one-on-one meetings directly on Hopin, the virtual event platform. Companies already signed up to attend include Blackrock, Nuveen, BNP Paribas Real Estate, Knight Frank, Chestertons and Get Living.

The Tenant Satisfaction Summit is organised by PropTech start-up Kiko, which believes the estate agency sector still has some work to do.

CEO Valentin Scholz (pictured) adds: “The British government has made some effort to improve the lives of residents, like introducing tenant satisfaction surveys, banning tenant fees, and mandating minimum energy efficiency for rented homes – but the United Kingdom is still only the 18th in the world in life satisfaction.”

Free tickets for the event are available here.

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MPs slap down Labour attempt to cancel ‘perverse’ SDLT holiday for landlords

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An attempt by Labour to have the stamp duty holiday cancelled for landlords has been heavily defeated in the Commons.

Labour MPs tried unsuccessfully to prevent the extension of stamp duty being used for buy-to-lets, investment properties and second homes, labelling it unfair to first-time buyers.

All properties under £500,000 are currently covered until 30^th June when the nil rate band will be set at £250,000 until 30^th September before returning to the usual £125,000.

Abena Oppong-Asare (pictured, above), Shadow Exchequer Secretary, told MPs the stamp duty holiday – coupled with rapidly rising house prices – had had the perverse effect of temporarily removing first-time buyers’ advantage.

She said: “It is unbelievable that, at the same time as the Chancellor is pressing ahead with a £2 billion council tax rise, he has given another tax break to second-home owners and buy-to-let landlords.

“This half a billion pound tax break is the wrong priority in the middle of an economic crisis that is hitting family incomes.”

Oppong-Asare added that in Wales, the equivalent tax relief had not been extended to property acquired as an investment or as a second home.

Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Jesse Norman (pictured), replied that although those buying second homes or buy-to-let properties would benefit from the tax change, they continued to pay an additional 3% on top of the standard SDLT rates.

He said: “The stamp duty holiday aimed to give a boost to the entire property market, of which developers and landlords are important parts.”

Conservative MP Anthony Browne added that it aimed to stimulate economic activity.

“Whether a home is being bought to live in or as an investment property, that still involves economic activity in the housing market,” said Browne. “Our focus here is on stimulating the market, and both those activities have equal effect.”

The amendment to the Stamp Duty Land Tax (Temporary Relief) Act 2020 was defeated by 364 votes to 212.

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Managing Agents overcharging for nothing?

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I own two flats in a small block of four flats. There is a Managing Agent for the Freeholder. They don’t do anything, there is no cleaning of the communal areas, no window cleaning, no gardens to maintain etc.

However

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The ULTIMATE Guide To Landlord Tax Planning

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Mark Alexander’s latest  video interview on Ranjan Bhattararya’s “Succeed IN Property” YouTube channel has just been released and you can watch it right here.

If you’ve watched one of their previous video’s, chances are that you will have watched them all.

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COVID: Oz landlords take a tough attitude to rent arrears

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Landlords in Australia are turning on tenants who defaulted on their rent during Covid or asked for rent reductions.

The country is notorious for its tough approach to tenants who get into rental arrears, and the pandemic in Oz appears not to have softened hearts.

An Australian fan of British TV show Slum Landlords, Nightmare Tenants, which is a popular fixture on its television schedules, has been in touch with its star Paul Shamplina to highlight the different approaches the two countries have taken to rent arrears.

The UK’s governments have protected tenants from eviction in all but the most egregious rent arrears cases since Covid struck in March last year.

Correct thing

But on Australia’s Gold Coast where there is currently a serious shortage of rental properties, landlords are not renewing tenancies or ‘leases’ for tenants who ‘did not do the correct thing’ during the pandemic, local media report.

Tenants living on the Gold Coast were allowed to delay paying their rent and/or set up rent repayment agreements with their landlord’s agreement, but those who did not – and even those who did – are now facing harsh treatment.

The CEO of Tenants Queensland, Penny Carr (pictured), says: “Some of those tenants had absolutely no choice but to pay a reduced rent and many of them are still battling accrued debts,” she said.

“Simply because they’ve followed the procedures that were available to them, those things that were set in place to protect people that were affected by COVID, they’re now having retaliatory action.”

Australia operates several for-profit and controversial tenant databases where tenants’ details and rent payment records are kept, and which can be accessed by landlords as part of the referencing process.

PIC Credit: Lenny K Photography via Flickr.

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Majority of leaseholders consider service charges unfair

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Research from property management specialists, Keller Williams UK, has found that the majority of leasehold homeowners consider service charges unfair, with a lack of transparency around how they are spent also a prominent issue.

Along with ground rents

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