Haven’t paid rent in months!

You did deliberately overspend though and bought luxuries; and you just admitted it.

You said you were on a limited income and buying your kids clothes from M and S and Next instead of paying rent. You knew you couldn't afford it so 'buried your head in the sand' and handed over the card 'praying it wasn't declined'.

You justified it to yourself by telling yourself they were essential items but it wasn't essential that you dressed your kids from M and S and Next when their clothes could've been bought much cheaper elsewhere and would be just as functional and nice.

It makes no sense you justifying it by saying as long as your kids were well-dressed they weren't going without so it was justified, when you were putting their actual housing at risk.

It's the equivalent of someone saying they didn't pay rent but also didn't think they overspend or buy luxuries but bought all their food from M and S or Waitrose because food is essential so that's justified.

You can dress it up however you want, if you are refusing to consider renting to anyone on benefits, you are breaking the law.

You don’t have to care, but that’s what it is.

My wife rents her flat out via OpenRent. There is an option to exclude benefits candidates, but all tenants are credit checked anyway.

We received so many applications that we immediately filtered out all the candidates with an income of less than £60k.

There's just no way that anybody could bring a complaint if you're renting out the property based upon objective criteria such as credit reports, references, income and ability to pay the rent.

Exactly. Have things automatic so you don’t have to remember. But I can see how this happened if there wasn’t enough in the account to cover the standing order, it would fail, the computer would try again a few times and fail over the following days.

So say the rent is £500, she had £400 in the account so the standing order failed, rent isn’t get paid month one.
She didn’t realise.

She carries on as normal and manages to spend £400 too much that month and again the standing order fails again month 2.

Her payday is after the rent date again or there is some mix up with dates, it happens again month 3. She is unwell and doesn’t even look, just assumes it’s all working grand.

It could happen.

I could easily easily spend £400 extra a month on things and not be able to tell you where. Actually you could hand me £4000 and I could spend it this weekend, no problem to me.😁

Yes, but I can choose to rent to someone with financial stability. Which is what I do. I dont advertise my property.

I think it is telling that the OP hasn’t returned to the thread. She isn’t fooling anyone by pretending she didn’t notice all the unpaid rent in her account.

I'd like to know which bank allows spending each month until your card is rejected and ignores six bounced standing orders.
Being on benefits likely means a basic bank account where the bank makes nothing or little from the customer. Treat it badly and the bank may close the account. Then you really are in a mess.

Quick Google search.

Has the rent for similar properties risen significantly since you moved in and your LL hasn't increased your rent proportionally?
It wouldn't surprise me if the LL was gearing up for possession order, you being in arrears and unable to pay the outstanding balance would be a very strong case to get you out and would be an opportunity to increase the rent to market levels for future tenants.

I appreciate mistakes happen and there is a lot of people (tenants and LL alike) who don't check their online banking on the regular especially if you are under the assumptions that payments should have been set up and that your tenant is a reliable payer. I wouldn't assume malice from the LL behalf either but I'd be prepared for the worst case scenario of needing to find somewhere else.

Afaik good credit score is not a protected characteristic like race, religion, children etc. Please show me the recent change in laws.
The only thing I care about is my tenant must pay on time.

Exactly. The landlord has lost his son so I’m sure he can do without having to chase feckless tenants for their rent.
And yes, I do know what it is like to have severe MH issues but if isn’t plausible that the OP has spent 6 months rent without realising she had it.

If you're behind on bills, I recommend you go talk to citizens advice bureau. They can give free advice and sign post you to the right areas.
I have been diagnosed with ADHD and I tell you the best way to manage all of this is to make sure all your bills go out on pay day and on the same day altogether. Have your bank app pinned to your front screen of your phone so it prompts you to look. My bank alerts me with notifications of when things go out so set this up too.

As an extra precaution measure, you can set up a monthly calendar reminder on your phone with multiple alarms to check your bank at the beginning of each month.

I would then start going through each itemised bill you have. Look for cheaper options or if you can't afford it then get rid of it. I use now tv as it's a lot cheaper than most options. I use smarty mobile (which uses 3 network) I pay a tenner a month for 60gb (should be 30gb but I got a deal and they keep giving me it)

It is doable to get your affairs in order. But don't stick your head in the sand as we tend to do. Just be honest, work out a plan with your landlord and other bills you owe. And stick to it by direct debit don't leave it to yourself to transfer because you will never remember if you have adhd.

Part of treatment for me and making life less stressful is setting up things so it doesn't happen again. Use your phone for stuff like this. Technology is fantastic for us with reminders Etc. But you have to take ownership.

If you need someone to talk to, feel free to message me on here.

@JaneFondue maybe you should keep up to date on recent renting laws if you're a landlord... yes it was recently made unlawful & discrimination.

Is it? I only rent to working professionals. When I was renting myself, every landlord asked to see my salary statements and a hefty deposit.
Perhaps I am a leech then.

@OneSparklyHelper well aren't you a delightful human being full of compassion. 🙄

It's unlikely ops rent is cheap as it's private and she has three kids so probably not a small place unless she lives somewhere really cheap which most people don't. Plus she hasn't paid ANY rent for six months I just don't believe anyone can accidentally not notice they havent been paying their rent for six months. Like fair enough you may accidentally not pay some of your rent but she apparently hasn't paid any for six months without noticing I just don't believe ut

You can contact the DWP and ask them to pay the landlord rent directly

People saying it’s easily done I don’t get this,if you’re spending more than you think you’ve got then surely you must think you need to check the bank account.
you can’t keep going to the shop and spending you would expect the card to be refused due to lack of money.
if you get £300 a week benefits/wage and you’re spending £500 are you not asking yourself where is the money coming from ?

its been 6 months so potentially over £3000 extra (if it is really cheap rent ) and potentially over £6000.how do you not notice this extra money ?

id be expecting the guarantor to be contacted to potentially pay this off,and maybe an eviction notice,

Who cares? Can’t prove it 🤷‍♀️

Yep. Didn’t the law change around this recently too?

How bitter, not to mention inaccurate.

Isn't that discrimination...?

My rental is private, it’s £750 pcm and housing benefit covers £500 of that, so I make up the £250 shortfall. Yes I would notice the extra money in my account, but it would be very easy to “lose” £250 a month when everything is so expensive. It’s also easy to spend it thinking you’ll top it back up, but that never happens when you’ve got next to nothing anyway does it? Split down over a four week month it wouldn’t even cover a weekly shop for a family of four.

I don’t agree with what the OP has done, but I can see how it’s happened.

EDITED - I didn’t realise the housing benefit didn’t go direct to the landlord in this case, apologies!

My landlord when I was unemployed was the opposite he solely rent out to people on benefits because the money is guaranteed every month whereas someone self employed their income can vary every month for example. That's what he told me and no I didn't not tell him when I found a new job 😂

Tbh I think op is lying there's no way someone can not notice having an extra 6k spending money. I used to think people were being paranoid when they'd say bots/trolls were posting on Mumsnet to wind people up but there's been a lot about landlords and renting in the news recently so maybe it is a troll

Not true for everyone on benefits