To hate landlords?

[MsPeachh]

Last month, I had to move suddenly. I found the flat I’m in now, it had just been bought by my landlord and I’m the first person in after the former owner moved out. It’s an ex-council house that the owner had purchased under “right to buy” and now I have to pay a third of my salary to a private landlord for what was originally meant to be affordable housing.

I’m a scientist in my late twenties with good qualifications and I feel total despair that I might never be able to afford my own home, and I will be lining someone else’s pockets via rent for the rest of my life. Let alone what anyone in a position less fortunate than mine is supposed to do.

To make matters worse, I looked up my landlord’s info on Companies House and I discovered that they have 22 properties in my area! It’s a village on the outskirts of a town where lots of people move when they are ready to move out of the hustle and bustle and settle to raise kids. And more and more of these properties are being snapped up by this landlord. It makes me sick, honestly. I know a lot of people become landlords accidentally in later life due to remarrying etc and ending up with two houses between one couple, but this landlord sucking up 22 houses in such a small area disgusts me. I feel like I’m completely losing hope for the future of people my age and younger as house prices keep soaring and soaring.

AIBU?

Same happens here. Multiple houses owned and rented out to people who commute hours to a city while people who have grown up have to move out of their community as they can’t afford the extortionate rent. You are definitely not alone in this.

We rent because it suits us right now - we're not exploited or priced out or taken advantage of. If the boiler packs up at 8.00pm on a Sunday evening our landlord will have an engineer out straight away and I don't have to worry about the bill or finding somebody to come out. We will buy in the near future but this works for us at the moment. I don't doubt that there are unscrupulous landlords out there but there are decent ones too who provide a wanted service.

I had to rent for years as I had to keep moving for my training. I'd have been screwed if there were no landlords.

Yup. I know exactly what you mean. My landlord happily tells us we are paying for his retirement.

So where would you live if the landlord had t provided you a place to rent?

YANBU. Landlords are parasites and the older I get, the more firmly I believe this. I have spent tens of thousands of pounds paying off the mortgage of the person who owns my home. It's such a waste of my money - I hate it. Partner and I are in our early thirties, above average income, one child. We have no hope of buying a house.

On the fence about this. I get it if its high rent and making homes in the area unavailable for people to buy. But I don't get it where the renter can't afford to buy anyway, the rent is not high but reasonable (albeit more than mortgage because, to be frank, the landlord will have costs involved and will want to make a bit of profit), and the person wouldn't have qualified for a council house/the council didn't want the house anyway (its always open to a council to buy stock)

@Mascaramademehappy

So where would you live if the landlord had t provided you a place to rent?

I’d buy here, if I could afford it. Problem is, it feels like the rug is constantly swept from under the feet of first time buyers by these landlords who can afford larger mortgages and place better offers on houses.

I'm lucky enough to own with a maneagable mortgage (and I'm oldish) and OP's and other PPs situation does make me a bit pig-sick too. High Rents to cover BTL Mortgages + etc. Little chance for Tenants to save anything for their own mortgage.

And the Tenant gets to be regularly inspected, often with absurd 'rules' - no putting up picture, no pets and often not even any kids.

Vetted to the nth degree with no guarantee that this is their home.

Makes my blood boil it does.

Do you live alone ? In my twenties I was still in a house share in order to save for a house . Then I moved back home for a couple of years before I got married . It’s never been easy to afford a property.

And renting will suit a lot of people because should the ‘shit hit the fan ‘ they can claim housing benefit .
A mortgage isn’t without its problems too .

Sorry but YABVVVU

It was entirely your choice to rent the property and pay a third of your salary for the privilege.

If you don't want to rent then save up a modest 5% deposit and buy somewhere with a similar government scheme to previous owner.

Just as you have chosen your job, your landlord has possibly chosen to be a property owner/developer or whatever.

Just because they own multiple properties doesn't mean they haven't worked exceptionally hard to do this.

Very unreasonable to hate your landlord for this reason.

YANBU. I think there is a place for temporary/rented housing for many reasons - moving for work, simply not wanting to commit to purchasing etc - but it needs to be regulated much tighter and there should be a cap on how many properties one person can own

So where would you live if the landlord had t provided you a place to rent?

In a small village, people like OP’s landlord can have a serious impact on the availability and affordability of housing for people who would otherwise be in a position to buy. Perhaps without him monopolising the local housing market, OP could have bought a home in the village.
We have a similar situation going on in the village we want to move to (and where I grew up) where a couple of local big shots are snapping up every single desirable family home that comes onto the market before anyone else has a chance. They are making cash offers on the day the property is advertised. It’s ridiculous. These are homes that we (and many other local families) could afford, we just aren’t getting a fair chance.

I don’t know how it would work in practice but there really should be a system whereby homes are only available to people who intend to live in them for an initial period before being offered to landlords.

If the government/councils hadn’t sold off those properties for buttons and then used the money to fund things other than housing we wouldn’t be in this position.

You’re a scientist, you say. So what if you were seconded to work on a major research project for six months in a university city miles from home? Would you turn down the opportunity - or would you rent from an evil landlord for six months?

Not everyone wants to buy and settle down. Not everyone wants to stay with their parents until they can afford to buy. As for ‘hating’ people who bought under Right to Buy, maybe save your ire for Thatcher.

Problem is, it feels like the rug is constantly swept from under the feet of first time buyers by these landlords who can afford larger mortgages and place better offers on houses.

Landlords almost always make lower offers on properties than people buying a home. They are more likely to have solid finance in place, so the sale is less likely to fall through due to mortgage issues. Plus a landlord is only interested in rental income and/or capital growth potential - they’re a lot less likely to decide a property is ‘the one’ and push themselves to top of budget.

I pay an extortionate rent for a tiny (and I mean tiny!) studio flat. There's not even room for a sofa. I too looked them up on companies House and they have dozens of properties, turnover of well over a million quid and they seem to have retired in Spain.

You would still be lining the pockets of someone albeit a bit more indirectly, if you paid a mortgage though. I don't really begrudge someone making money out of an investment or I'd drive myself nuts with resentment. I think it's a bit much to call landlords parasites tbh I have a friend who rents out a property and he really doesn't make that much, just covers his costs because all maintenance falls to him. But he has the value of the property which will hopefully go up.

It's not something I can get worked up about. I had a need for housing, couldn't get a mortgage and you have to pay wherever you live.

I feel that this is an area that the government needs to deal with.
Around where I live , there has been an incredible explosion of housing with estates of up to 5000. Green field sites have suddenly been declared brown field sites and all of these sites are advertised as ' luxury 3/4/5 bed properties.
Many of these properties get bough by avaricious landlords who then rent them out for high rents and tenants get trapped as they struggle to save for mortgages.
I've yet to see "affordable housing " advertised which is what the current and previous government stated was needed.

However, there are many landlords who are middle aged couples who have inherited a property and decide to rent out to create a pension for themselves.

Added to this are the unscrupulous landlords who just want quick money and have little or no regard for tenants' rights or even quietly allow sub letting which can often result in tenants, who have paid rent regularly, being evicted.

The housing industry really need to be properly regulated and monitored.

This all started in the 80s with the Right To Buy scheme and the effects are coming home to roost now. YANBU at all, OP.

@ApplePie86

Sorry but YABVVVU

It was entirely your choice to rent the property and pay a third of your salary for the privilege.

If you don't want to rent then save up a modest 5% deposit and buy somewhere with a similar government scheme to previous owner.

Just as you have chosen your job, your landlord has possibly chosen to be a property owner/developer or whatever.

Just because they own multiple properties doesn't mean they haven't worked exceptionally hard to do this.

Very unreasonable to hate your landlord for this reason.

I can’t buy my council house as I don’t live in one, nor would I ever be offered one- there are literal homeless people who are waiting for one. Plus, I’d be depleting the stock of social housing even further for those who need one.

Also I have to laugh at your ignorance if you think it’s realistic for first time buyers to be offered a 95% mortgage.

It all really kicked off with Tony Blair. He really encouraged people to profiteer from other people's need for a roof over their head. He did very well from his own advice. The Blairs own a multi million pound property empire.

Buying council (affordable) housing & renting it out privately is disgusting & should not be allowed... At any time but ESPECIALLY during a ‘housing crisis’ in a lot of areas.

Landlords like to act like they’re ‘offering a service’ or ‘providing homes’ but it’s all horse shit.

They’re earning £££ from it, obviously. If people weren’t allowed to purchase additional homes then banks would have to lower their expectations of people applying for mortgages (& rightly so!!) Or loads of us would be bloody homeless & there’d be loads of empty houses. Wouldn’t make sense would it?

& before someone chimes in with ‘But, but, but some people WANT to rent!’ Fine... CHOICE is fine.

It’s being forced to pay 1.2k rent a month (can you tell this is my personal experience yet?) for 8 years, never being 1 minute late. But being refused a mortgage (which would be around £900pm) because apparently, I’m just not trusty worthy enough.

All I need to do is... save 20k! While paying 1.2k rent per month! 😃

& breath....

YANBU op. Fuckkkk!

In 1997 it wasn't too late to save a large percentage of our social housing, but instead Blair enthusiastically continued the right to buy.

@StillCoughingandLaughing

You’re a scientist, you say. So what if you were seconded to work on a major research project for six months in a university city miles from home? Would you turn down the opportunity - or would you rent from an evil landlord for six months?

Not everyone wants to buy and settle down. Not everyone wants to stay with their parents until they can afford to buy. As for ‘hating’ people who bought under Right to Buy, maybe save your ire for Thatcher.

Problem is, it feels like the rug is constantly swept from under the feet of first time buyers by these landlords who can afford larger mortgages and place better offers on houses.

Landlords almost always make lower offers on properties than people buying a home. They are more likely to have solid finance in place, so the sale is less likely to fall through due to mortgage issues. Plus a landlord is only interested in rental income and/or capital growth potential - they’re a lot less likely to decide a property is ‘the one’ and push themselves to top of budget.

I don’t hate the woman who bought it at all, my ire is directed at the landlord.

The woman who bought it before she sold it on to my landlord was a receptionist who lived alone- it’s great that she could afford it back in 2005. However, in 2020 and I earn a fair chunk more than a receptionist and yet I find myself in the position where I am not able to have the same opportunity, because house prices have shot up far faster than wages. Landlords have taken advantage of this horribly.

Username - there aren’t cheaper properties than 1.2 k a month ?
I don’t think council housing should ever be available to buy on the open market . If the tenant who bought it under right to buy wants to sell it , it should be offered back to the council .