To think that the renters reform bill is going to kill people with allergies?

[Petallergysufferer]

Just that really. I know many people will see this as a good thing. I know too that the severity of allergy to pets which means they can kill you is rare. But it does happen. I am that severely allergic. So if landlords can't give a blanket ban then there are no pet-free properties for me to move into.

For those who don't know - antihistamines make no difference and the only way to get all allergens out of the place is to remove all soft furnishings including carpets and underlay. Deep cleaning things does not work. So unless the landlords change all carpets, curtains, sofas etc. in between tenants, then it still has enough allergens to trigger a life-threatening reaction. For me that reaction is asthma and I already see a hospital specialist so there is no further treatment that can be offered. Avoiding allergens is the key advice. I'm really worried that the full implications have not been thought through.

Have you actually sat down & read the new proposed bill OP because LL can get a 'Certificate of Exemption'. So this is what will happen in many cases.

I'm afraid this will result in an even bigger crisis than currently as yet more landlords exit the prs. This means further increases in rent. Either way rents will increase as landlords will need to cover their additional costs. Yet another ill thought out piecemeal piece of legislation that fails to address the real issues by a government that doesn't have a clue.

UK should stop with the carpet things and this would solve the problem in 50%. You can always look for the unfurnished house. I have cats and was looking for house with no carpets and where I can have my own furniture. My life is very easy and there's no risk of killing new tenant while I move out.

On your logic---

NO ONE would be able to own pets-
You won't be able to rent privately, from the council or buy your own home as all of these options could have had pets living in them.

Everyone who owns, rents, (social or privately) should never own an animal as at some point you might want to live there, and you do not trust every trace could be removed with deep cleaning etc....

You do realise how ridiculous you sound....

Maybe you should only rent a new build...

Or NOT rent- as you will be able to remove all the carpets etc at your own cost.

Not so easy? Is it for the millions of people forced to rent all their lives, by not having the good fortune to have generous/ rich parents to ask for a deposit, or academic ability to enter the elite professions.

Why should millions and millions of animals be denied homes and be put in shelters to be put down as their owners cannot find homes because landlord refuse them?

Why should millions of children get to feel like second class citizens as they are not allowed to have simple pleasures like a dog, cat, guniea pig etc...?

Why should millions of pensioners not have a companion animal to keep them from loneliness?

Do what everyone else does with allergies as severe as yours----

Move somewhere with wood floor- not too tricky as a lot of places have wood floors.
& Pay for a deep clean yourself- before moving in.

You could >>>. realise that this may be triggering- apologies >>>>>Try to spend time with animals- stroke them (managed) etc.. as the more you expose yourself the better your chance to reduce sever allergic reaction.
(It is true that if you grow up in spending time with animals you will not grow up to have extreme allergies to animals. )

If we insist in having a housing crisis with ever increased housing prices-where much of the population will be renting forever-

RENTERS SHOULD REFUSE TO BE TREATED LIKE A SECOND CLASS CITIZEN

Why should I live a HALF LIVE because I "rent".

Also when you are a landlord you have ownership of the property, and get to keep the value/ capital of that property.

However when you rent out that property-- it becomes my HOME- which I should have some ownership over.
I should be allowed to have children, have a pet.

Or should I never have children, or ever own a pet because I rent.......

Rant over........

The reform doesn't mean that landlords HAVE to allow pets. It means they have to consider it on a case by case basis. The liklihood is that many will still say no, and provide potential destruction or allergies as a reason for doing so.

Well we are currently looking for a new home as our landlord is selling our house after 8 years, and out of the 11 properties I have enquired about, every single one has said no as we have pets. So this would have been very useful for us! It is difficult enough to find an affordable rental property, without the pet issue.

do people not see the difference between living and sleeping in a property everyday where a pet has spent possibly 24/7 and a shop which may have occasionally had a dog walk through it?

lots of renters will want pet free properties for allergies and cleanliness reasons. Problem is that people often sneak pets in despite any clauses. At least when you take on the tenancy you’d have more recourse to insist on new carpets in a ‘pet free property’ that stinks of pets. Easier for the landlord to claim for new carpets from the previous tenant too

They will have a choice, they just won't say it out loud.

As for your allergy a professional deep clean including carpets will remove most/all traces of a pet. Steam cleaning will finish off anything that gets missed. There is a carpet treatment (silvering?) that can be applied too. Even without pets the previous tenants 'remains' will probably set off an allergy, so asking for, paying for your own, deep, end of tenancy clean is probably always going to be essential!

It's not about one issue trumping another, it's about being sensible and managing risk.

Buy your own house

Any landlord, by definition, is either -

(1) Not motivated by money
or
(2) Motivated by money so that they put the rent up as much as the market can bear at all times.

Any landlord who is putting the rent up because their costs have gone up is an idiot who should have put them up before.

Market forces set rents, not landlords costs specifically.

At least when you take on the tenancy you’d have more recourse to insist on new carpets in a ‘pet free property’ that stinks of pets. Easier for the landlord to claim for new carpets from the previous tenant too

Nope! Neither of those will work. You cannot insist on anything. You take a property as seen / smlet and ask if the landlord will agree to any changes.

And replacing carpets isn't a given either. Pet staining can be cleaned. Might leave a residual discolouration but still be perfectly clean. Only the very heaviest of staining would lead to a carpet being replaced - and the outgoing tenant couldn't be charged for new carpets either, just a proportion of costs - unless the carpet was brand new and the tenancy only 6ish months.

It is true that if you grow up in spending time with animals you will not grow up to have extreme allergies to animals.

absolute rubbish. And advice to expose yourself Willy nilly to your allergen is dangerous advice

I think renting to families and pets is fine however provided they pay to cover the additional maintenance required. Whilst normal wear and tear is part of parcel of living in a house the additional 'destruction' from kids e.g. scribbling on walls, breaking things or pets e.g. smell, pet hair, destroying furniture is something that should be an additional cost that those renting have to pick up and pay for. Just like if they owned their own house they would have to pay to repaint walls, replace furniture etc.

I think you'll find increased costs are a market force 🙄

God forbid people actually want to occupy and use the property that they are paying thousands of pounds to be in. Jesus Christ.

We will have to apply for an exemption due to allergies. I would be delighted to rent to you OP because we cannot risk animals in the house either. Our current tenants have allergies and we were able to offer them a safe home. The number of allergic landlords is unlikely to match the number of allergic tenants, so I understand your concern.

@SamphirethePogoingStickerist More recourse to insist isn’t actually the same as saying that you can insist. However, You can insist before you take a tenancy, it is of course up to the landlord whether they rent to you and whether that is cost effective for them
I’ve had pets, staining and odour isn’t effectively removed with cleaning. Neither is damage from claws, chewing etc. I’d choose a pet free property every time

It’s already the case that many many landlords will rent to pet owners. In any event, service animals would always be exempt so even a strict no-pets clause doesn’t mean there have been no animals living there. If you are severely allergic then you need to rent something uncarpeted and unfurnished. It sounds harsh but there are way fewer severely allergic people than pet owners and renters get a shit deal in this country as it is. I think this bill is a good idea and that YABU.

Yeah this isn’t true at all. I grew up in a household full of cats and it didn’t cure my pet allergy. All it did was ensure hospital A&E visits a few times a month due to severe asthma attacks, pure misery at year round “hay fever”, and pneumonia/bronchitis several times every year due to opportunistic lung infections requiring a few hospital stays that last weeks. I now have COPD due to lung scarring. All because my parents believed that constant exposure would toughen me up and cure my cat allergy.

In addition, the studies that say children who grow up with pets are at lower chance of developing pet allergies only applies if the parents do not have allergies themselves. They found the exact opposite to be true if either parent has any allergy, most especially if the mother is asthmatic.

I do have lots of sympathy, OP. My little boy has a severe allergy to cats and can't go round friends/family who have cats. We just stay in the garden or they come to us.

We rent. As PPs have mentioned, some people lie about pets anyway, so I'd always start with the assumption a cat had been there. If we move, it'd be unfurnished, I'd change curtains, get an additional deep clean before we moved in, and hope our air purifiers make a difference. I can see both sides: it's horrible to see how much cats affect DS, but at the same time, pets bring so much love to a home. We will be getting a dog, if our landlord allows us.

I grew up with a dog and a rabbit. I was constantly sneezing and itchy.

there was a thread about holiday homes and pets a while ago when someone was asking if they could take their dog to a pet-free home and let it sleep in the car and not come inside

several people replied saying they had severe allergies and can’t stay anywhere where pets have ever set foot or they will be ill so they always seek out ‘pets not allowed’ holiday homes

but then many more holiday home owners came onto the thread to say their places are marketed as ‘pets not allowed’ because they don’t want the hassle and risk of people taking their own pets, but they as owners regularly stay there with their own pet, so a ‘pets not allowed’ tag is absolutely no guarantee that dogs don’t regularly stay there

so how do you manage the risk when staying anywhere that there aren’t regular visiting pets

Tbh, you’re never going to be able to exclude the possibility of pets not having been in your space, even pet free hotel rooms/holiday let’s will have had animals in them, what if the house has ever any vermin problems etc

im on the flip side. My dog has literally saved my life through years of PTSD. So I would rather be homeless than give up my dog.

but as others have said, a lot of small landlords will prob sell up. And before someone gets all excited about a property price crash, it will prob just be big cash buying property companies that will swoop in.

Apologies, Discovereads a strongly worded statement,
was a red herring----

allergy may of been worse if you did not have exposure to animals growing up.

Ancedental -My brother had allergies that got better...and much worse when he stopped having pets-- when visiting my mums.

Studies do back this up......
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31829464/
www.newscientist.com/article/2188610-the-more-pets-you-meet-as-a-baby-the-lower-your-risk-of-allergies/

I'm not suggesting the OP gets a pet....I just think banning anyone else ever getting a pet because she may want to in the future move into that property an absolutely over the top response.

Anyway the point remains.......

The majority of people in this country have animals ......

The original poster would have the same issue if buying a property as well.....

She would need to choose somewhere with wood floor and do a deep clean....

Many animals end up in shelters because of pet bans.....

Pet bans will mean people will be forced to not mention they have pets ( which happens at the moment). Not helping the OP

We cannot ban all pet keeping---

What is the solution.....

Having a severe pet allergy it is your job to mitigate against it by moving into wood floor, having a deep clean etc....

Can't believe that landlords could be forced to accept pets in THEIR PROPERTY if they don't want to. We're looking to rent, have no wish to live in a place that's had pets in it, and when I speak to agents to see if a place has had an extra deep clean to get rid of pet smells/fleas or whatever (yes I know - not all are like this ) they say they are not allowed to charge those tenants extra for this. So surely bad news for landlords, who already cannot charge extra deposit for potential damage, cannot charge extra for deep clean - so of course deep cleans will not be done. By mandatory pet acceptance it's pleasing a minority of tenants and allowing lots of potential damage/expenses for the LL, while alienating a majority. And yes, surely there would be a lawsuit re allergies?