Council advising tenants to stay put?!?

[Aimlessly]

Our family has just returned from living abroad - hello sunny England! and are planning on moving back into our property that we have been letting out.

We just got a call this morning from the letting agents saying that our tenants have advised them that they can not find another property in their price range and the council is telling them to stay put. What?!?

It is not like we are property investors and are just trying to get higher rent. We do not have any other accommodation. My children need to have a roof overhead and be placed in school. How can the council do this? What action can we take and how long should we expect to be displaced?

Totally shocked!

[CishAndFips]

I'm not an expert but my understanding is the council will advise them to stay until they are actually evicted. If they leave beforehand the council will class them as intentionally homeless and therefore have no obligation to rehouse them. Have you looked at eviction procedures and is there somewhere you can stay in the meantime. sorry your in this situation.

[BankWadger]

Councils don't class tenants as homeless until they have been through the eviction process. It's awful for the tenant (and makes it completely unlikely another Private landlord will touch them) and awful for the landlord.

[StrawberryTeaLeaf]

Councils give this advice to people in housing difficulty or need.

If you need possession, start eviction proceedings, which will give the tenants the paperwork they need to access further support.

It's a tough market out there at the moment. I would not like to be a private tenant on average wages with a family.

[howtorebuild]

I would get moving then op, or you will be looking into the council housing you.

[VimFuego101]

Yes, they will be considered 'intentionally homeless' if they move out prior to eviction procedures. It's really shitty.

[MythicalKings]

Yes, start the eviction process straight away. It may chivvy them and the council along.

Sadly, it costs money.

And don't give them a reference so other landlords are warned.

[redstrawberry10]

Absolutely ridiculous system.

[hereandtherex]

No, you'll need to give them 2 months to quit normally.

If they do not go then you need to start eviction procedures via the court.
This take a few months.

The tenants will probably leave when they get the eviction notice.

[hereandtherex]

If you are letting then you are a property investor. Sorry fi that is a surprise to you.

You could have left the house empty but you choose to rent it out.

You cannot chuck out tenants at your whim.

[hereandtherex]

The council would not classify you as homeless. You had a house abroad, which you were living in, then you choose to return to the UK.

[redstrawberry10]

You cannot chuck out tenants at your whim.

is it at a whim? Likely, the lease is up, and proper notice is being given. That's not a whim. What's the point of leases and contracts otherwise?

[hereandtherex]

OP did not say the lease was up.

[AliceInUnderpants]

Is their lease up OP? Have you given them legal notice to leave?

[SweetAdeline]

We are also abroad and let out our house and if this happened to us it would make life really difficult, but I also agree with hereandthere that you are a property investor when you let out a property regardless of your reasons for being a landlord and this is one of the potential risks of being a landlord. How long it will take depends on how far through the process you are at the moment. It sounds like they are going to stay put until you go through all legal avenues so that the council is obliged to help them. Did the agents file the notice properly (ie correct written notice given two months in advance)?

[Aimlessly]

We have given them the full notice period +3 additional weeks.

I do of course feel terrible for the tenants - it is a horrid situation to be in. They are really lovely but their hands are tied. It is the council I am upset with. The 'intentionally homeless' classification is absurd. This is the very reason landlords don't want to rent property out to tenants who require benefits/support.

I guess we will just have to wait to see what happens with the eviction notice.

[SweetAdeline]

More info here.

[redstrawberry10]

that you are a property investor when you let out a property regardless of your reasons for being a landlord and this is one of the potential risks of being a landlord.

I think this is just a label so that we can feel better about how screwed up our laws are.

The OP is not a property investor as is commonly thought, or else any home owner is one. The primary point of owning this property (from what I can tell) is not profit, but to provide a home for the OP.

It seems to me there is something deeply wrong when a council advises people to break contracts.

[wowfudge]

There is - insufficient social housing available due to the right to buy and failure to build new homes for social housing.

The best thing you can do OP is find a six month tenancy in the right area yourselves and commence eviction procedures for your tenants. Are they still paying the rent?

[hereandtherex]

'Commonly thought' is not a legal term.

The OP is a property investor. Stop trying to wiggle out with semantics and 'poor me' stories.

[loveisagirlnameddaisy]

Its the OP's home, and her principal private residence. That doesn't make her a property investor unless all homeowners are?

[ObsidianBlackbirdMcNight]

The housing system is completely fucked and councils are only acting according to housing law which the government is responsible for. Yes it sucks for landlords (not unsympathetic at all it has happened twice to family members) but it's not the tenants' fault precisely. If they have no funds for a huge deposit on ridiculously inflated rents/don't have a guarantor/don't earn 3xridiculoudly inflated rent without tax credits which agents don't count for income then they literally have no choice.

[museumum]

This is ridiculous and seems quite normal unfortunately. It happened to a friend of mine who took a six month sabbatical with work abroad, she had to rent out her flat to pay her own rent in the other country (she works for a university so no corporate relocation package). She told the tenants she was only going for six months and would be back and need the house back. It was all in the open.
When she came back the tenants ignored the notice served and she had to sleep on friends' floors till she could evict them, at some cost. (the cost is why she couldnt' just rent another place in the interim).

[Abraid2]

How can she be a property investor!? She owns one home--which she has been unable to live in due to being based overseas.

[SweetAdeline]

It stopped being her principal private residence when she moved abroad and let it out to someone else.
You don't get exemptions from the law just because you are an accidental landlord. It's a shit situation but it's one of the risks of being a landlord. If the OP didn't want to take those risks she shouldn't have let her house out whilst she was abroad.