DD’s nightmare flatmate.

[Timble]

Hi all,
do you know if landlords or agents have a responsibility to protect tenants?
do tenants have any rights at all?

my DD is in her third year. Living with three lovely girls and one who they are all terrified of.
she has locked them all out, refusing to let them in (I wasn’t told until the next day and told DD she should have rang the police at the time). She’s rude, threatening. Makes a lot of noise in the middle of the night. She keeps calling the girls racist (there has been no racist comments towards this girl aside from this girl constantly calling them ‘stupid white girls’ or similar. She messages the girls regularly to tell them to stay out of her way or they’ll regret it. To shut up and be quiet or she’ll make them. (No loud noises, they’re all in their third year and studying hard/on placements). All the other girls now want to move out as they can’t face living with her anymore. I just can’t believe we have to pay and even though they’ve reported this girl to the estate agents and they’ve had meetings nothing has changed. They believe this girl has been kicked out of uni and hasn’t paid rent but they don’t have proof.

my DD is 20 and she manages most issues herself/with the other flatmates but currently she’s had enough and needs help.
I guess it’s not really an AIBU but can we refuse to pay last terms rent or we pay and chalk this up to a horrendous experience? No idea where dd will live if she moves out!!

thank you xx

But she didn’t follow your advice?

You did say that she didn’t attend university, and never left the house.

This girl was a last minute addition that the landlord forced on them

oh don’t be daft. They accepted her because it reduced their share of the rent
all the LL was interested in was getting full rent so if they had all stumped up for the friend who had dropped out…. He wouldn’t have presented an alternative

Indeed

so she doesn’t go to uni

but… she does?

If you have individual contracts then no other tenants will be named.

If they are all on one contract then that is an entirely different problem.

how did they eventually get in?

Id be tempted to try for non molestation order, followed by occupation order by all the girls against this one threatening them

Is it a licenced HMO?

They need to speak to the uni. Is she on the same course as any of them?

It is likely you will find that you are liable if she doesn’t pay, and her guarantor doesn’t either.
We found we were guarantors for DS’s flat mate as the parent had paid the rent up front, and the very small print of the lease said that we were acting as her guarantor in this case. The agent didn’t tell us this and luckily nothing went wrong but I felt very vulnerable as guarantor.
Her home address will be on the lease - can you contact her guarantor to put them in the picture of the harassment and to work out a way forward? They may be unaware.

Some thoughts:

Do you think the LL knows this girl/her family? Why did he insist she in particular move in? Is it not odd that the LL found a replacement tenant rather than the tenants? Eg If 5 of you are paying £500/month in rent and someone moves out, you’re still liable to pay £500/month. The LL generally doesn’t care who’s paying as long as they’re paid.

What are the termination terms of the contract? If they all went to the EA to say this has gone on long enough and we’re done, what are the penalties? If you’ve got J&S liability on the rent (ie you’re all liable if someone doesn’t pay) then technically she’d be liable to pay the others’ rent if they all left. They’ll know they don’t have a hope of her paying it if she’s already behind on the rent. Might make them keener to sort things out.

Point out to the LL that if he doesn’t kick her out for unreasonable behaviour then he will lose the rest of you which will cost him a lot of money. Play hardball. Yes all the parents are liable to pay the rent, but they’ll need to take you to court, it will take ages, cost them money etc, etc, etc. Get clued up so you sound like you know what you’re talking about. EAs aren’t always as familiar with the law as they should be.

Is the deposit in a deposit scheme?

Has the LL done anything else that would make them a “bad” LL?

What ethnicity is the girl? You said she called the girls “stupid white XXX” (which is racist) so I’m guessing she’s not white. Are you in contact with her dad? Would he know she’s potentially not at Uni running up debts for him to pay? Would he take that well?

Be the squeaky wheel. The EA & LL don’t really care. The property is so they’ve done their bit. It makes no odds to them if you’re daughter is living with a nightmare, being locked out and intimidated in her own home. Make it their problem. CC both of them in on the emails. Give them time limits to reply/do things. Tell them what you will be forced to do if they don’t comply. This will also give you a paper trail in case things go to court at a later sate.

If she’s not at Uni then they might not be able to help. They and the EA will probably site GDPR about not giving you information. Having a non-student in student accommodation changes the nature of the tenancy and has implications that the girls didn’t sign up to. They’ll be due council tax I believe. Will it impact his PP/HMO if he’s got a non-student living there?

Good luck!!

How on earth would you “eject” a troublesome tenant?!

It’s difficult enough to evict a non paying tenant even after court involvement.

You are living in cloud cuckoo land if you think you can “eject” someone for being a pain.

Could they speak with the landlord about this option?
maybe if all spoke to her she would get the message.

I've had bad housemates but she sounds next level.

It’s March..they are in their third year ..can they see it through for the few months they have left? It’s not nice to be living like that and they shouldn’t have too but at least theres an end to it

Alternatively .. have all the girls actually had it out with her? Safety in numbers etc. Sounds like she is feeding off appearing intimidating but nobody’s actually challenged her. ( I dont mean challenged her to a fight)

If the girls get together then they can stop this behaviour by being strong as a group.
So they reply to the threatening messages saying that they will report her. If she makes noise in the middle of the night, then they make noise in front of her room early in the morning. They can record her noise and play it back to her.
If she lock them out, they call the police.
Frankly they are 3, they can actually make this girl's life way more miserable than she can make theirs.

This all sounds like you and your DD are very confused whether the contract was for a joint tenancy or not.

If it’s a contract relating solely to your DD and her individual room why would it make any reference to any of the other girls??

You really need to take a look at the contract and whether it’s a joint tenancy or not. No one here can offer you much valuable advice otherwise.

Is there any chance at all this woman is becoming mentally unwell? Her behaviour sounds quite extreme. Are there any grounds to contact student welfare? Not to get info which rightly wouldn’t be allowed. But to let them know her behaviour is quite bizarre. I don’t know if this could make things worse for the flatmates though. But welfare could perhaps contact her and maybe her family if she has consented to that.

You say they are in placement. Is this to do with teaching or the NHS or social care? Could she be a risk to vulnerable people?

Your poor daughter.

She sounds so awful. Hope it gets sorted.

But the OP said the landlord insisted that this girl moved in

So surely it's very much to do with them?

You would be guessing wrong, read the OP properly

Is it one agreement or separate? If she has left uni there will be council tax due too

Yes I then posted that the LL would not have forced this tenant on them. All he cares about was full rent .

so if they had not filled the missing room, they’d have been liable for that share unless it was individual tenancies per room.

The girl sounds deranged.

I don't think the girls have any rights, really. It would be better if the mad one moved out but if she is not paying rent, I doubt she can.

The others can leave though, find other places to live and just vanish.

It's a sad business but I hear stories all the time about rows between flat mates, some that don't speak to each other for months!

If separate it is likely she is in breach of the agreement and ll could give notice.

My add and the other three are quite quiet. They’ve heads down in their final year. Barely go out and they’re quite chilled. I did put an update. My DD lived elsewhere for first 2 years. The other 3 lived together for the first 2 years. They invited my DD and another friend to move in, they agreed and signed contracts. The other girl had a family situation meaning she couldn’t continue at uni (only told the others very late so all other people they knew already had homes sorted) This left them with one room spare. Landlord said this girl would move in. She was rude immediately. I told dd give her a chance, maybe she’s nervous etc but everything they tried she was aggressive. They told the estate agents that they didn’t want her to move in and they basically said no choice as they hadn’t found anyone else. They’ve never been friends with this girl but they would have been happy to be civil. She on the other hand is making their lives hell!