To evict my tenants

[Landlordbyaccident]

Name change due to personal info possibly given.

I brought my first home in my 20’s and quickly paid off the mortgage on a 2 up, 2 down terrace in Birmingham. Nothing special and it always needed a new kitchen. I invested very little money in this house as I was so unhappy there.

I brought my current home in 2018 and we are paying a manageable mortgage although other outgoings has become a strain in the current financial climate. We owe around £75k on a house worth around £250 (not sure if this is relevant). My previous house has been rented out to a friends friend for around 2 years before this it remained empty.

They are paying £475 per month, other rentals in the area go for around £800. Some months they pay late or come up short. I know they are struggling. They are from a Caribbean island so I am not sure what benefits they are entitled to to help them.

Anyway my husband would like to ‘evict’ them. Ideally I would like them to increase the rent and remain in the house as they are no trouble and really nice people. I am going to be transparent in saying the house could do with some work being carried out but they never complain as I assume it’s because I am in a position of power and they fear I would evict them if I do.

After writing this I am not sure what I am asking? Would I be heartless in evicting them (goes against my core values) or raising their rent ? Should I just continue with the current contract and seek to cut costs in other areas.

what would you do?

This is such a great initiative. Mind-boggling that it’s been suspended! It’s still active where I am. But how long it’s sustainable is another matter. I am a total idealist. And really invested in a future where private rental becomes a viable and affordable housing option. We have zero social housing left. And when people try and build more, there are a lot of very comfortably off boomers - sitting in their fabulous 4 bed children’s inheritance homes - who object to homes for other families because they are selfish.

Increase the rent to a mid point - around the £600pcm mark. Explain to tenants that you cannot keep the rent so far below market value. Make it clear you are still going to be charging approx £200pcm below market value as a result of their being long term tenants.

Use the money generated to do work on the property to better the standard.

In another couple of years time, give the tenants a long term notice of a further rent increase to market value (like a year).

It's not great for them but it's also giving them several more years of below market rate rent and a lot of time to make other plans.

Genuine question:

If there were no private landlords
salmon where do you think people like Op’s tenants would live?

I completely agree the rent increases have to be fair, we increased ours very recently under advice of letting agent when new tenant moved in. I think that is very fair, one thing that bothered me about OP is that the tenant doesn’t always pay the full amount or it’s late and as the rent is so cheap I think that’s totally unfair on OP. I hope she sees your link because that’s eye opening.

Yes, why would you 'evict' if not causing any problems?

When the children's father wanted to sell his rented out property we sat down and had a proper discussion with them. We felt awful and apologised to them and helped them to find somewhere new. They were nice tenants and always paid on time but we also couldn't afford to keep the property at the time.

Just be honest. Give them notice and try to help them find alternative accommodation if you have the time.

The other option might be to sell with tenants in situ.

I'd never want to be in that position again or be a landlord.

Well that’s clearly not true. The “vast majority”? Source?

You bought it. Unless you moved your house from one location to another in which case yes, you brought it from a former location to its present location.

If you bought your present house five years ago you have had five years worth of rental income , which even allowing for landlords insurance, appliance testing and registration, and tax paid on the income would surely have given you enough money to do some basic repairs since you have nor been paying a mortgage on it.

Many people have to have been living here for over 5years before they can get help from the govt

I think you should just sell it, you'll probably get enough to pay off the rest of your current mortgage and then it won't matter about not having money for repairs

@Justforlaffs As I already said back on page 3, we want tenants to be able to live in properly-maintained properties, at a fair rent, with much more heavily regulated landlords who are made to do their jobs properly. The current system has a huge imbalance of power, with tenants scared to speak up for fear of revenge eviction. The OP has even acknowledged this, yet still wants to increase the rent apparently without fixing anything. It's shitty to become a landlord in the current climate when landlords have far more rights than tenants.

From where?

Yes, why would you 'evict' if not causing any problems?

Because if they can’t afford to pay the rent that op needs to charge in line with her costs, why in earth would she keep them as tenants?

Im presuming Op isn’t doing this for shits & giggles?

It’s a business the same as any other.

Increase the rent op, giving them sufficient notice. If they can’t afford it you will need to serve a section 21. As nice as you sound, it isn’t your job to house people at the detriment to yourself.

Being anti-landlord doesn't mean we want them to all disappear. It means we want more rights for tenants, and we want more people to take our side during disputes. The tenancy deposit scheme was one major piece of progress but it's just the beginning, we need way more protection.

"Just sell it"? It's not that simple.

The market for selling rental properties with tenants in situ is very difficult at the moment. She could try, but many existing landlords are selling up, and this is unlikely to change any time soon.

If she wanted to sell with vacant possession, see my post above. It would almost certainly be a long drawn out and expensive process.

I would hand the entire situation over to a letting agent and tell the tenants that this is the plan.

Market rent, formal contract, all money collected by letting agent. Letting agent will of course take a fee, but all this nonsense will then be out of your hands.

If repairs are needed, tenants tell letting agent and letting agent arranges it and charges you.

Fair to all.

Nowhere for £475 pcm. But typical market rent is considerably higher than monthly mortgage payments. Which makes saving for a deposit nigh on impossible. If you’re from a nice seaside place in Devon (for example), even if mum and dad stumped up a deposit for you, all the property has been swallowed up by second home owners. The OP isn’t a social landlord. The LHA rate for a two bed in Brum is about £630 pcm. It is reasonable that she charges that. As long as the state of repairs isn’t below standard.

This seems like a reasonable approach.

OP, I feel you shouldn’t be asking for the full market value of £800 until it’s refurbished.

How many adults are in the house and do they work? I’m wondering why they’re struggling to pay £470 between them.

Unfortunately you have gotten yourself into a bit of a pickle by charging so far below market rate that you are unable to fund the upkeep of the property from the rental income. I think that the longer you allow that to continue, the farther you will fall behind with maintenance, until you may have difficulty keeping the unit in sufficiently good condition as to be legal for tenancy. I understand why people think that "landlords are scum" but the reality is that rents need to be set so that upkeep of the property can be performed on a reasonable basis. If you need to go into debt you can't afford to do necessary maintenance like replacing the boiler (which you may not have to do today but sounds like you will have to do fairly soon and how will you fund that?), then you have probably set the rent too low.

For those who think landlords are scum, it may be helpful to remember that if someone owns their own home, they have to replace their broken boiler themselves, with all the cost that entails. It's not on the landlord to gift you a free boiler out of the goodness of his/her heart. The way it works is that the cost of the boiler goes into your rent, either on the front end or the back end.

I am going to be transparent in saying the house could do with some work being carried out but they never complain as I assume it’s because I am in a position of power and they fear I would evict them if I do

Wow very telling sentence here. You have been taking advantage of people in need by not paying for work to be carried out knowing they won’t speak up and now you want to kick them out to get more money. Are you planning on paying for these repairs? Or just going to find another desperate family willing to pay the rent to live in this state?

So you are not a landlord then? You haven’t the first clue what you’re talking about.

It currently takes around 18 months to evict a tenant - even if they haven’t been paying rent during this time. I’m not sure where you get the idea that the law is on the landlords side?

Do you understand the first thing about why LL’s are getting out in droves, causing rents to spiral massively - partly to do with the many arbitrary rules brought in along with the staggering rise in interest rates and it simply not being a viable option for most people to own a couple of rental properties any more.

With the enormous shortage in social housing and ZERO plans for building any where near enough in the future, I ask you again:

If all the smallerLL’s get out of the buy to let market (news flash: it’s happening now!) where will people like the Op’s tenants live??

There is a national housing shortage. Where are people going to live?

Do you and people like salmon think that the people who manage, for instance, Asda are scum because they are profiting from selling food to people?

If not, why not?

"My previous house has been rented out to a friends friend for around 2 years before this it remained empty.

They are paying £475 per month, other rentals in the area go for around £800. Some months they pay late or come up short. I know they are struggling."

OP, do you feel restricted by the fact that your tenants are friends with a friend of yours? Do you feel that 'connection' might be why they "pay late or come up short"? And when they pay late or underpay - what do you do? Have you discussed this with them? How do you know they're struggling? Are they telling you, or your mutual friend?

Sorry, bit of a 20 questions, but I suspect you'd have acted differently if this connection didn't exist.

You are paying interest on your mortgage, think carefully whether appreciation of asset value minus depreciation would actually be higher than your mortgage interest.

I don’t know statistics on this but most flats I’ve stayed in (about 12 in total) were indeed overpriced and under maintained. The exceptions were mainly when I had a live-in landlord. Funny that, people will always make sure their own living space is nice and comfortable.

I stated in one quite nice flat in London years ago and when it came to renew the yearly contract I asked for the mould problem to be looked at as my incoming flatmate said she was asthmatic the landlord got annoyed and said I was always asking him to fix things ( the other two times the washing machine had broken down) so he decided not to renew the contract and I had to find somewhere else with little notice

They are from a Caribbean island so I am not sure what benefits they are entitled to to help them.

What does this have to do with anything? If you want to evict them then just evict them. If they know their rights they may say they’re not going anywhere without a section 21 notice anyway

Totally anecdotal and irrelevant then.