To think that if you private rent your life should not be dictated to by the landlord whose mortgage you are paying

[Nursejackie1]

So many of us are stuck in private renting with no choice paying over the odds, while landlords are making a mint. Most landlords have all these rules that you can’t decorate without permission, can’t even put a wall hanging up without asking. Often can’t or need permission to have pets, have regular inspections. I pay loads for my home and due to that cannot save a deposit. My kids have never had their bedrooms decorated in the way I would like.. having to stick with plain magnolia. Why should somebody else decide whether my kids get to grow up with a family pet or not? AIBU to think that if you are paying somebodies mortgage for them then while you are in that house you should be able to treat it as your own within reason and not have your life dictated to and controlled by them?

Therefore it’s reasonable for them to be able to live and make choices within reason. Such as being able to hang a picture or mirror or paint a wall without asking for permission!
So check the contract before signing.

We took out and changed some clauses in our contract before we signed with landlord.

Our contract already said cosmetic decorating was ok as long as it was put back like for like at the end of the contract.
It's not hard to ask for that to be put in and If it's a deal breaker then find a different property.

A clause for like for like return to original is totally reasonable, but I can see a lot of CF thinking a single badly applied wash of magnolia with drops on carpet and skirting counts and would be raging about losing their deposit to cover the 'return to original state element.

We've rented and bought. Unlike claims of some on this thread that people are viewing renters as subhuman and other such nonsense, the reality is that a landlord owns the property and it is up to them what goes on with the property. If they've shelled out thousands regularly repairing the house and want to have much narrower rules on decorating and pets etc then that's up to them to do it.

Laurie

Your comment suggests that you think it’s perfectly acceptable for tenants to behave appallingly, to steal 2 months rent from their landlord and trash their property because they have no assets and the evil landlord does and should just accept such awful behaviour as a fact of life. You clearly have an huge distaste for landlords per se.

Reflect on that. That’s the sort of thinking that prevents would be decent landlords from renting their properties out, leaving the way clear for those who are out to make everything they can out of others in decrepit properties on minimum outlay.

They may have decorated "properly" but if the walls are a colour that nobody else would like it will have an impact of whether they can rent out the property in the future. Insurance wouldn't cover revolting decor.

But then you have to wonder if they are looking after the property properly in the first place.

Decorating between tenants is pretty standard, or should be. So you have to look at the cost difference between standard decorating and covering a hideous colour and then apply for that to be deducted from the deposit (and you can get it from DPS - a LL I know recently had a deduction for a wall painted black).

Also in my experience with tenants the number of people who want to paint in hideous colous is limited. Most people want something that's just not magnolia, or is currently trendy (so grey atm it seems is everywhere). Neither of which impact on future tenants, especially if said future tenants are also allowed to paint.

Your comment suggests that you think it’s perfectly acceptable for tenants to behave appallingly, to steal 2 months rent from their landlord and trash their property because they have no assets and the evil landlord does

I don’t think that at all.

However I do think you need to consider your own privileged position in the system.

It's such a British pov.
I'm from France where tenancies are secured. You can do anything as long as you return the flat in the same state.
Tenants invest a lot of money in their flats. My mum has redone her kitchen and bathroom countless times over the years. As well as the flooring and decorating.

*I've lived abroad most of my life and private landlords did not really exist where I lived. Home ownership was not really a thing.

Ultimately the shitty state of housing in this country is because people voted for it. I truly believe that the British people want this. It is the British way to want to feel superior by being mortgaged to the hilt and having window treatments.*

This.

I agree with the pet statement unless it's a pet that doesn't crap and knor. A goldfish would be fine in my property.
I don't get the not hanging things or choosing your own colours, you just have it in the contact that when/should they leave they paint/ pay for decorator to make it neutral again.

I've been a landlord and a tenant and am currently both - most places/landlords allow decorations etc as long as its restored to a good condition when you leave- and there are plus sides to tenancies - my tenants seem unable to change a lightbulb on their own - all repairs are my responsibility etc. I'm a tenant for the first time in a while and although I miss some aspects Its quite nice to have someone to call when something goes wrong or needs replacing.
As a landlord I'd love to see long-term tenancies with more rights - but having suffered huge costs of having to evict someone (who couldn't be bothered to pay- she had the money) - its not always that simple.
I do support social/council housing though and wish there was more focus /campaigning to bring this back properly- I grew up in council housing and it did feel secure.

I think you are making some large assumptions if your LL and also blaming them for things which aren’t anything to do with them.

You are paying for something, and getting it in return. The same as hiring a car, or having horse riding lessons, if it’s not yours it will always come with ‘rules’ and restrictions.

Yabu

I also think a huge part of the problem is that there are so many shitty landlords that tenants assume they are going to lose their deposit and be treated badly so they take a bit less care, paint a wall without asking, take the piss bit. Which makes that landlord pissed off and harsher on the next tenant, who gets pissed off and so on and so on.

If the shitty landlords were removed from the system and tenants had a bit of security that they were going to be treated well and fairly then there would be more give and take between both.

Which is why I think landlords should have to be registered, and like the Scottish system I think some people should be banned from being LLs. Properties also have to be a certain standard there also and that should be an absolute minimum.

As a landlord I'd love to see long-term tenancies with more rights - but having suffered huge costs of having to evict someone (who couldn't be bothered to pay- she had the money) - its not always that simple.

I agree with this. I'd happily see long term tenancies, but I'd like to see a quicker eviction process for non payment of rent. Especially when that's a choice (funnily enough the one that didn't pay me also could easily afford it).

However, no government is going to assist with quicker eviction for non payment of rent while they are responsible for a lot of it with the farce that is Universal Credit.

'It is the British way to want to feel superior by being mortgaged to the hilt and having window treatments.'

I can't help agreeing with this, too.

As i said upthread, where I live renting is very different - and much more common - about half of people do it. Owning is also a very different experience from in the UK. There isn't a 'property ladder'. In many parts of the country, most people who own have inherited the house from their parents, and when people buy it tends to be for the long term. We would be in a position to buy, but have chosen not to because we may want to move to a different area of the country in 5-10 years or so and the housing market is so slow here that it may be difficult or impossible to sell. Things are different in some of the big cities, but even there, renting is an entirely normal choice - while there are some parts of the country which aspire more to home ownership than others (this is seen, and slightly mocked, as a regional quirk by the rest of the country) there is no social stigma whatsoever attached to renting, whereas it oozes out of many of the posts here in a way that may be more obvious to me as an expat - all the lecturing about working hard and giving up takeaway coffees, the stuff about tenants not doing LLs a favour (only one person pointed out that LLs don't tend to be in it philanthropically either).

You are fortunate enough OP that your home doesn't cost you anything in maintenance. If your boiler packs up, it's sorted for you. If your bathroom springs a leak it's sorted for you.

I'd calculate we've spent at least £40k on ours over the last 20 years - boilers, wiring, floorboards, accidental damage when our storage tank in the loft burst, replacing tired kitchens and bathrooms, double glazing, new doors front and back, keeping chimney and roof maintained, drive relaid, garage roof repairs. The maintenance is ongoing and never ending.

There are positives to renting as well as negatives.

And FWIW the process of home ownership, specifically buying and selling, in the UK sounds so immensely stressful that I have no desire to aspire to it. And going through that every few years to climb 'the ladder'? Um, no thanks.

The decorating issue aside, in the main landlords are raking it in. Yes they might get the odd bad tenant, but if they are careful who they choose, probably not. Some of them charge less than they could if they are not greedy and have a good tenant, to keep them. What some people seem to forget, is apart from the rent, the value of the property is also going up, and in many cases by quite a lot. So win win for the LL.

All the fucking assholes on this thread, talking about renting a house as being the result of a lifetime of mistakes and bad choices, need to take a fucking look at themselves.

You NEED people in badly paid jobs; you know...nurses, delivery drivers, cleaners. Your world would soon fall apart without this role AND with no one to rent your ridiculous pile of bricks.
Jesus fucking wept 😠😡😠😡

If I sold my property you live in would that help you?
I doubt it
I am an accidental LL. Inherited my parents bungalow on their death. A lovely area. Our tenants have been there a while. They can easily afford the rent but couldn’t afford to buy it, whilst they could in another part of town or a smaller house in same area so they’re happy renters. Their kids are in schools they’re happy with
If I sold- would they be better or worse off?
You make massive assumptions about how and why people are landlords and why people are tenants
You come across as hugely entitled

OP I completely understand.
We were in rented property when I fell pregnant. It was a 2 bed flat and both rooms had massive king size beds in them, leaving very little room for the wardrobe, let alone other furniture.
I had to bed my landlord to remove the bed from the second room so I could put a cot in there. I ended up sleeping on the floor in the second room with DS as there was no room for him in our room and we couldn't cosleep.
I did ask if we could paint the nursery but I had to send the colour cards of the paint we intended to use to the LL so he could approve. Basically it had to be the lightest shade of the colour we chose so it would be easier to cover once we moved out.
I bought lots of wall stickers (the ones which don't damage the walls) to help personalise his bedroom. I also bought lots of those strips to hang picture on which don't damage the walls. It was a bit more expensive but felt like we were putting our own touch on everything.
But we could y secure the furniture to the walls which upset me as I wanted to make the space safe for DS. When he was 1 and on his feet, I had to be creative with where we placed toys and furniture to try and block the big (light) sideboards etc.

I understand your frustration, you are living there. Yes you don't own it but you live there. It's where your baby takes their first steps, where your partner proposed, where you had sleepless nights etc. It's a home. It means a lot to you (the renter) because of the sentimental value. To the LL you are nothing but a tenant. They sometimes forget that you are a very real family living a very real life.
That said, it's not unreasonable for them to want to keep what is there's is "perfect' conditio , ready for the next person. If it got a bit crapper each time someone moved in, it would cost a fortune for them to get it back to how it was

Laurie

I don't think that spending the money we earn in the way we choose and committing to doing that every month for 25 plus years so that we could finally end up owning what we’ve paid for qualifies as a privilege, its felt more like hard work.
No-one is entitled to use and treat someone else’s property in a disgusting way because they for whatever reason don’t have the same “privilege” of owning.
I couldn’t live with my conscience if I let out a sub-standard property. Neither could I disrespect someone else by treating their house like a pigsty while I occupied it.
Both are bad behaviour and equally wrong but you only seem able to see wrong doing on the part of landlords.

My sister has lived in rented flats for twenty years. She has never once moved into a freshly painted flat. It's always shabby beige with scuff marks, blu tac rips etc.

The idea that all landlords assiduously repaint between tenants doesn't apply in sellers markets like ours.

If I was a landlord I'd be delighted to discuss personal decor with my tenants. If they were proposing normal colours then why not? Do people really insist on every room being tatty vanilla? That would put me off.

Some people will never 'get it', OP.

You only need to look at the home/DIY boards on here or FB to see how much pleasure people get from painting/changing flooring/tiles/worktops or whatever. Liking your home makes a huge difference to quality of life - of course it does!

As does having a pet - according to the many child/wellbeing articles/programmes I've read.

But if, like me, you can't earn enough to single handedly support yourself and your children while paying extortionate private rent on, in my case, a shithole and also save enough to buy a property outright (I'm too old to be considered for a mortgage), then tough. Suddenly, all the advice about how important it is to grow up with pets, a room of their own, study space, playdates, outdoor space doesn't apply to my children!

There are positives to renting as well as negatives.

The negatives far outway the positives and unless a renter had substantial private income (unlikely) those negatives will become even more pressing on retirement.

It is self serving and disingenuous of you to fail to acknowledge that.

You can always put pictures on the wall with removable hooks. Bedding can be changed to reflect a theme.

None of the places I’ve lived that prohibited putting pictures up allowed removeable hooks - it was strictly nothing on the walls at all. And I have actually had a landlord who specified what colour the bedding had to be in each room. Yes she was barking mad, but she’s not the only landlord convinced she’s magnanimously doing her tenants enough of a favour just by letting them live there.

I’ve had landlords state that I needed to get their advance written permission if I wanted a guest to stay overnight.

The housing market in this country is massively messed up, and the insecurity and general unpleasantness of private renting is part of it. Making it some kind of moral “reconsider your life choices” issue if you can’t afford a house is fucking horrible, and betrays a very dim understanding of just how much house prices have risen relative to earnings.

Some people only own one property and rent it out. My cousin does this as her job (own business) requires her to spend around six months on each project in different locations, so rather than sell the house she owned she rents out, and just rents or air bnbs wherever she works. YABU of you want that freedom that's why people buy. It's why DH and I worked two jobs for plenty of years and waited until we were mid thirties to have children. You have your priorities and choices don't blame others for the restrictions they come with

You've made a business decision to cover your costs by renting your house out.

Quite.

There can't be many investments that give you both a decent income and (most of the time) a significant capital gain if you decide to sell it.