To say about bloody time? No DSS landlords breaking the law.

[Whatisthisfuckery]

A judge has ruled that landlords and letting agents refusing to let to people on housing benefit is unlawful.

It’s about bloody time it was made clear that it is not acceptable to discriminate against people who are on benefits. Housing is not just a privilege for those who are employed and able to work.

Obviously this clarification in the court will not solve the housing crisis, for people on low incomes especially, and much more needs to be done to make sure people have access to benefits without lengthy waits that then create rent arrears etc, but it’s a step in the wright direction.

www.bbc.com/news/education-53391516

Everyone has the right to live in a clean, well maintained home and pay a fair rent
Indeed, just as LL should have the right to ensure that the clean and well-maintained property they provide remains so and rent us paid on time.

Sadly that's not always the case and people on full benefits are statistically more at risk to fail on these responsibilities.

The main reasons for this is all the disincentives for good landlords to keep being landlords

It's factor, yes, but unfortunately it's always easiest to go for the lowest hanging fruit. So rogue landlords go right on exploiting loopholes and breaking the law while the decent types suck up whatever the latest idea is ... and that's paraded as a "victory for tenants"

Which is all very well, but few pause to think what happens when the responsible ones get fed up and pull out of the market, leaving only the rogues

As a PP said, sometimes it's wise to be careful what you wish for

I disagree, I think England should stop selling council Houses when there is such a Need for FAO I'll housing. There is no right to buy in Scotland, as it reduces people monopolising by buying up cheaper council properties. Landlords should be able to stipulate no DSS - it's their property. Complain that your government isn't providing enough social housing! If I own a property and rent it out then it is my right to decide who I lease it to!

It is your right to decide who you lease to. When I leave this Earth I want to know that I did what I could do to help. If you can help it is your responsibility when you choose not to.

I want to know that I did help when I could and that I was part of the solution and not the part of the cruel, unjust problem.

I agree it would be better if we could come to see housing as a basic human right, the same as we do education, medical care, access to emergency services, being able to use the roads etc

Yanbu it never made any sense to me. For most of the time hb was a guaranteed income paid direct to landlords, unlike salaries which may end when a job does.

I think we need to revise the phrase 'accidental landlord', imo unplanned landlord would be a better description, it seems to happen when someone finds themself in a situation they didn't anticipate and they decided the best option is to rent a property out
they arrived at being a landlord after making an intentional choice between the available options, there is no 'accident' involved

@mencken

renting property is a business, not a public service. risk, return, etc. and profit. bit hard for some on here.

This. No discrimination towards DSS, but landlords are not obliged to alleviate the housing crisis.

landlords are not obliged to alleviate the housing crisis
^I agree with this, and would add that the housing crisis needs to be managed to by the government.

The government ought to properly legislate the housing market so the people who need homes have access to them, instead they have incentivised people to buy up property and rent it out to those who can no longer afford property because the government has incentivise people to create a property bubble
this is damaging to the economy as a whole and damaging to people who need homes and cannot access them

Everyone has personal responsibility for their actions and inactions.

I think it should be possible to regulate the housing sector in a capitalist economy, just as we regulate other things (e.g. private health-care). I am a full supporter of landlord registers, for example, and it's a shame the scheme that LaLa described, where DSS tenants are taken on but into registered landlord provided housing sounded a good one- typical it is being scrapped.

In my husband's then communist country, it was decided to distribute housing more equally. Family houses were taken from the families (by force of course, as no-one actually just loves giving up their own home), knocked down, small flats were built on the requisitioned land and were given to each according to their needs, so a family would have a two bed flat. If you complained about having your family home requisitioned you got sent to a reeducation camp. Not many people complained. The party members got the biggest flats and the nicest cars. This is in his living memory.

I'd rather have a landlord register and a planned government driven building programme of social housing (ideal what with the economy needing a boost).

For most of the time HB was a guaranteed income paid direct to landlords, unlike salaries which may end when a job does

I'd suggest the key word there is was ... as in it's rarely paid direct to LLs these days, and in any case can be cancelled instantly and sometimes for little reason

Illdealwithitinaminute worryingly, I imagine your DH's country's approach will quite appeal to some; it's just unfortunate that folk don't always think of the other stuff which goes with it

Also, we should look to other countries like Germany that have a bigger rental market and learn lessons. I think part of it is instilling some control and ownership on tenants, which may come if they expect to stay long term - so they look after the place better too. It’s a win win all round.

We do have a real problem with class, an ‘under class’ if you like, in the UK. Whether through poverty, disability etc and also some generations of families living off benefits, in rubbish areas, and not seeing a way out. Why look after a property if you don’t feel that great about yourself or look after yourself? Unless we tackle that I’m not sure we are really going to change ‘No DSS’ significantly.

@IceCreamSummer20 . You are correct to a point. The problem is that some LL have had repeated bad experiences which put them in a position whereby they are losing money which after fees for inspections, high insurance and then maintenance is significant.

The no DSS thing has come about for a reason...that they present a much much higher risk of not paying the rent (ie the rental payments are made by the state to the claimant and they keep it) due to many factors, whether unforeseen demands or inability to budget. They also have far higher risk of property damage and failure to maintain them. However, that isn't the landlords fault and when they have been repeatedly bitten they say no more.

There are ways of avoiding it...ie we don't buy houses in areas which tend to attract claimants. If they were DSS the rent would be too high anyway as we aim for a different client. Our houses are higher spec. The client is expected to keep them to that standard, wear and tear excepted and they understand that if they don't, they will get warned and then evicted. We also absolutely refuse to allow animals which most LL tend to do now as they make a house unrentable once the tenant leaves and means they require a refurb before renting again.

Our strategy has paid off and we have several long term tenants. They pay their rent on time and keep the houses nice. In turn we ensure they are maintained to a high standard and deal with emergency breakdowns as an emergency.

If the No DSS gets traction (as there are ways around it) then the decent LL will most likely sell and there will be less property available to rent overall which means the DSS clients will have even less opportunity. No judge can legislate to stop that!

You don't think the houses would be bought up by those happy to let to those on benefits then....thereby removing the discriminatory landlords from the equation.

@Bearnecessity
No I don't. If those landlords were there then they would be in the market already. The ones that do generally have awful quality housing

Before the buy to let boom encouraged by Blair, homes were more affordable for first time buyers. Then increasingly they were outbid by landlords. Maybe that's one reason why dss tenants never used to struggle to have a roof over their heads. Landlords had less options. They had to let to dss tenants as working tenants were able to buy.

It's a recent issue. DSS (so very often disability) has meant likely homelessness only in the past twenty years.

I agree the law change preventing benefit being paid direct to landlords is another problem. I never chose that option myself. I always prioritised rent and skipped lunch to afford it when on sickness benefit, but I know some tenants struggle with money. It should be an option for all who want it, landlord or tenant.

Problem is UC never pay on time , rarely pay landlords direct and lenders and insurers (mine)won't allow it or I would happily let to DSS tenants.
My partner rented his Mum's house when she died for a while before he sold it , the tenant was DSS and never paid any rent, it was months , she basically lived there for free until he could get her out. She paid one lot of rent and because we went by the book through an insurance company it took 10 months to get her out.
Obviously I know not all DSS tenants are like that.
I think lenders and insurers will have to change now because people who were not claiming previously may have to now due to Covid job losses.

I genuinely wonder what happens to the tenants who don't pay rent for months. I know if there's children they'll still be housed but likely in a horrible single room b&b at least for a while. Single tenants won't even get that. It must be people who have somewhere to live after they leave. Maybe if they've bought.
Why a blanket ban though? I was turned down by so many places when I last looked. At the time I had enough savings to pay upfront six months. I was working part-time because of health and dss was top-up only. Why refuse all DSS without looking at individual cases including records showing years of rent paid in full on time.

UC terrifies me. I'm on legacy benefits and dread moving to it. I wish the law would change again, to revert things back to how they were. Benefits to cover at least 50% of market rents (not including bed in shed illegal slums), dwp/council pays on time, and direct to landlord if requested. I don't expect it to happen though. I'm resigned to things just getting worse. I think it's more realistic to hope for a dignitas style set-up made legal here.

Why a blanket ban though? I was turned down by so many places when I last looked. At the time I had enough savings to pay upfront six months. I was working part-time because of health and dss was top-up only. Why refuse all DSS without looking at individual cases including records showing years of rent paid in full on time.

A lot of the time it's because mortgage or insurance forbids tenants on benefits

Also Letting agents are utterly biased against tenants on benefits. The first time I rented out I used an agent thinking that was better because they knew more than me. The had a benefits ban that I wasn' even aware of until my tenant left.

@MarieG10 I agree - I was an ‘unplanned’ LL for a few years, and I did have trouble with some tenants which I still have the debts to prove! I agree that as LL we do have a big responsibility, so no matter how we got into it we have to keep the house in good repair and provide a decent home. We have to do repairs quickly, not have horrible damp houses etc. They need to be safe.

I was a ‘good LL’ in that I had a house for low to middle income or DSS - even though I wasn’t officially allowed DSS for insurance/mortgage. The house was much nicer than most and my rent was lower than most - and I always did repairs no question.

However if was forced to continue as a business I would steer away from lower income and DSS - and go into the higher end. It was too much stress - I had good tenants but ultimately for all the effort and no returns, I had the house trashed once costing 1000s and had rent arrears. Business wise it is safer to rent out the higher end. Unfortunately so I imagine that many good LLs end up going away from DSS and the more unscrupulous stay with DSS.

MarieG you have a very narrow understanding of DSS people and the housing available to them it does not represent the reality. In a free market economy new and old landlords wanting to make money will always find a way to do so, including renting to those on benefits.

I’d imagine insurance companies will have to chance their terms

And the cost will go up so rents will once again rise. The same with mortgage companies.

Every time the rental sector is messed around with it causes rent increases.

We’ve had very bad experiences with tenants on housing benefits - we’ve lost thousands. So no. Never again. Appreciate not everyone is like that, but twice and a court case is more than enough thanks.

I think this is great news, it's extremely discriminatory to not rent to donor one in these grounds.

I do think that more needs to be done to protect landlords though, like going back to the old system of benefits being payed straight to them. A few months of mortgage, no rent and a hefty repair bill can ruin someone financially.