Horrified at how many parents guarantee rental agreements without reading

[PinkDino33]

This might sound brutal but I am regularly horrified on Mumsnet when I read posts from parents desperately seeking advice because things have gone terribly wrong with the property their child has rented, and they are shocked to discover the full extent of what they and their child are liable for.

Their DS has just found out their flatmate hasn't paid a single month of rent in the 12 months they've lived there.. Does he really have to pay what the other boy owes?

The DD's flatmate is making life hell and her and all the other flatmates want to move out and stop paying... surely this is allowed?

The DS signed up to a house with his friends but now he wants to move back home.. Does he really have to honour this contract and pay the rent for a whole year?!

It's like parents don't really think of a tenancy agreement / guaranteeing a tenancy as being a real contract, and don't know anything about what they've signed.

Is it a joint tenancy agreement? "No idea"
Can you give notice or is it for a fixed period like 12 months? "Don't know"
"I'm going to have a proper read of the contract tonight.."

It's no good properly reading it 6 months after you've signed it!

People seem to think the contract / how it works with the Landlord must be based on fairness.. It's not fair that their child is financially liable because another tenant hasn't paid, so the landlord can't possibly have the right to try and get the money from him. It can't possibly be the case that they've guaranteed the full rent amount and not just their child's - because that would be madness!

Say it's a 6 person property on a 12 month joint agreement with each person paying £750pm.. that's a total rent of £54,000 that you are guaranteeing!!

I say this, not to shame parents but because if there was more awareness of what parents are actually signing this would cease to be the norm amongst estate agents and landlords. You've got tens of thousands of parents every year signing up to these things which no one in their right mind would sign if they actually read and understood the thing!

It's horrible when these things go wrong and you're living with someone who's a nightmare or doesn't pay, so I do sympathise. But if your child is signing up to a tenancy agreement (especially if its a joint agreement and you need to guarantee it!) ask questions, READ the contract, look up terms like 'joint tenancy' online, ask for proper legal advice if you don't understand anything.

Op asking for the thread to be closed is highly offensive. This is a good thread for educating others. 2 posters who have said their dc are going to uni next year have said it's helped them.

Op doesn't have uni aged children. If she did, like a lot of us who do, she'd know how tricky this situation is.

How old are your dc op?

Unfortunately jobs are no longer for life so a piece of paper saying I am about to employ someone just isn't enough these days.

The reality is although people are stuck with having to sign these guarantees for uni the OP is correct that they should at least read it all beforehand and know what they are actually signing up to. It shouldn't be a shock when it goes tits up what they are actually liable for at that stage.

Luckily MNHQ rarely 'closes' threads at the request of the OP (except for privacy reasons).

I agree with OP's broad point that many people sign contracts without reading them and then are surprised if eg nurseries can raise fees with the right notice (a month or a term or whatever the contract states)

I also agree with posters who have replied that they hate it for uni housing but there's not much alternative to signing it.

Its not only for Uni, if you are looking to rent but where I am but cant demonstrate that you earn three times the rent then you need a guarantor as well. For a £1000 a month rent you need an income of £36k otherwise they are asking for this!!!!

Put your money where your mouth is then: Taking the NRLA standard tenancy agreement as an example, I'd be interested in your list of "loads and loads of things" in it that are not legally enforceable. Please list them.

Hmm, but this has always been the case..that’s my point…during 1980s when I first graduated and moved into my first rented house as employe£ grad, unemployment was at 3 million. Stated unemployment of those actively seeking work.

and everyone rented (or home buyers for that matter) , no matter what age, is at risk of redundancy, or working flex economy .

that hasn’t changed. It’s no different for anyone even thos3 in work for years. In fac5 taking on new grad with letter of employment is better than a tenant of 5 years where you have no guarantee they are even still employed!

so it’s a scam. It is merely a scam to ensure they don5 have to go through courts to get their money from defaulted tenants that they would have to in any other circumstances.

and as laws make it harder for landlords to evict tenents (as it should) this is going to spread. Like a nasty disease. The agents are doing it because they can. Until someone puts a stop to it.

Being unable to take rent payments up front and ot taking longer to evict people by s8 will only increase rents and means guarantees are likely to be more stringent than ever.

Yes it is the renters reform bill going through parliament at the moment that is changing the rules.

My dad told me afterwards he'd crossed out loads of it and not signed. The agent obviously didn't read it either 🙄

Oh, and I will add..no job has EVER been a job for life, outside of public sector

my exh made redundant 5 times in 8 years between 1990 and 1998. I was made redundant 3 times in my career form 1985 to 2020 . We lost or house at one point. And had debt piling up. We had to move up and down country to find work.

I don’t know what sound bites you’re listening to - fgs unemployment (active job seekers) reached its peak in 1984 at 12% . Go back to Great Depression, before statistics and it’ll have been even higher.

jobs have NEVER been for life.

For those blaming landlords... If one tenant is not paying, it's not possible to evict a single tenant. If one tenant wrecks their room, it's not possible to single that tenant out- the costs are borne by all tenants. Who should hold the risk here for non payment? I'm not sure it should be just the landlord. The tenant should be liable for services that were provided- but if that tenant has no assets or income stream, what can landlords claim?

For separate contracts, there are different requirements in terms of house set up etc (and obviously contracts...).

Another thing to bear in mind is that many parent guarantor salaries do not cover the whole liability.

I'm sure when I was at uni in the 2000s they just had some agreement that if you didn't pay you didn't graduate. Are they not allowed to do that anymore?

I started my employment peak recession in 1982. However then (especially public sector) there were plenty of jobs that were very much touted as jobs for life. It is a standard turn of phrase and I apologise if it caused your distress and offence. But also people very much had different viewpoints about getting into debt and not paying your rent was unheard of. People went without to ensure they did keep roofs over their heads. There was an adequate supply of social housing not putting pressure on a private rental market. Nowadays they are actually told to wait to be evicted if they need to be housed by the council. This process takes months with debts being racked up and invariably being written off. I can see why landlords need and want a backstop of someone sharing liability - often parents who are homeowners and whose own homes will be put at risk if they don't pay under a guarantee that is called upon.

Economic, social and political factors have all fed into this. Whilst I agree the Renters Reform Act is needed in principle unfortunately the student sector has not be considered properly/adequately and are about to be shafted.

However, the guarantor contract I signed for my daughter states the actual amount I am liable for, which is her share only. Although she is jointly and severally liable, I am not.

As long as a limited guarantee uses specific phraseology then it can be limited to a specific amount. If people can get one like that then that is a good option. However, they should make sure that it refers to the liability being discharged as she makes payments rather than her pay her share and the guarantor still being tied in for that amount should others default.

Great news that you managed to get yours limited.

The reality is parents (or other guarantors) should take legal advice which wouldn't cost very much as the AST and associated guarantees aren't very long especially if you ask for advice purely in connection with what the guarantee covers.

I agree with all you’ve written.

I am also blown away that most houses with 6 people aren’t HMOs

A house in multiple occupation ( HMO ) is a property rented out by at least 3 people who are not from 1 'household' (for example a family) but share facilities like the bathroom and kitchen. It's sometimes called a 'house share'.

if they were HMO the rental agreements would be by room.

I thought this was the law

That was probably uni owned accomodation. Even in my day in 1980s most had to go private for 2/3 rd years,

generally there’s little of that left. Even for first years. Been sold off.

also Been made more expensive by en suites, in accommodation gyms, study areas etc. All very nice I’m sure, but as a student you’ve got no income and it doesn’t hurt to share communal bathrooms for a few years (ok they were strictly bio female segregated bathrooms and corridors in those days so had dignity- but that’s another issue). It certainly doesn’t hurt to walk across to main uni to use gym/sports facility, bars etc. either . These started to go up I think for the rise in foreign students paying with wealthy parents, and now landlords have cottoned on to fleecing students, they’re making it standard nearly everywhere.

We had a private landlord but they seemed to have some agreement with the university. Maybe this isn't a thing anymore.

It's a shame as it's not going to do much for social inequality if it puts youngsters from less well off families studying in other parts of the country.

We have this too

We signed, through gritted teeth,

So did we, and took out insurance with Guarantor Insure. I didn't need it in the end, but it gave me peace of mind.

From the replies it seems that maybe there are more people than I thought who fall into the camp of knowing the risks but sadly feeling there's no choice other than to sign.

Sadly, you are right. In DD's university city very few rentals were not joint and several, and the landlords/agents weren't prepared to negotiate on this.

@PinkDino33 one of the examples in your OP was completely out of the poster's control. I read that thread and it sounds like one of the girls is a huge problem. Signing or not signing a joint and several liability contract wouldnt have changed that.

A real problem is that there is simply not time to go through long discussions with the landlord or agents. They simply don’t care. My son was panicking from November of his first year when they didn’t have a group to find a house. When it was finally sorted in January, they were picking at the scraps of what was left in their very expensive university town. As soon as they found somewhere, they had to sign that day or somebody else would take it. There was lots of frantic emailing and forms to sign. The students get desperate and don’t want to miss out.

It really disgusts me. Especially as friendships are barely formed at that stage. Having said that, my son would not have wanted to live alone or in halls again. He wanted to live with friends in his second and third year.

Thankfully, we have gone through the uni experience with our kids without having any tenancy issues. Same with our friends. But I guess when it goes wrong, it must be horrific to sort out.

I was aware of types of tenancy agreements however when houses are being snapped up hours after being advertised, in some cases, there is a lot of pressure to find a house when student property is in demand.
I don't think its because parents are too stupid to understand tenancy agreements, it's because if you want to secure a house for the second years there is little option but to accept.

Halls are allocated to first year students, and although there are some flats in halls/student accomodation thry are few and far between. There was 1 2 bed flat available in the halls DD is currently in.

It is not my area of expertise but will the renters reform bill have positive or negative consequences for students in the future? I can see decent landlords pulling out of the market and leaving the corrupt ones with huge portfolios of poor quality housing monopolising the market.