Why are people so against private landlords?

[StopRainingNow]

I don't get it (and I'm not a landlord), no one shouts at Tesco that it is disgusting that they make money off selling something (food) to people on UC, when people need food TO literallysurvive/ live. But if someone has a business renting houses to people who need them, they are the devil. It makes no sense to me.

To make it worse, Tesco are also making profits by not paying a living wage to employees who then have to claim UC to top up their salaries and so benefit from profit from employees and customers.

Why do private landlords get such a hard time? They are providing a service to people that need it - AIBU?

When you see new housing being built with "1 in 5" being made affordable as the contract, the building company will often pay the fine to circumnavigate the planning permission to provide this (and then not lose the profit). Same with planning including parks, Dr surgeries etc. They pay the fine and take the profit.

When landlords state they aren't making a profit, what they are actually saying is they're not making a monthly cash profit but the value of their property has gone up and they have made a profit that month but not in their purse.

As to "the value can fall" yeah right. That's the problem isn't it, house prices haven't fallen, not in real terms. Profits may have dropped at times but you still own a house with the mortgage being paid. When the mortgage is fully paid off and you have the profit from years of renters, will you reduce the rent as your not covering costs? Yeah, thought not.

I also don't understand how we mustn't blame "all landlords" but landlords can blame "all tenants" after experiencing a rubbish one.

@Momstermash94 you don’t have to let strangers in for viewings. You are entitled to ‘quiet enjoyment of your home’ and can refuse any viewings until you leave

I’m a landlord and have asked if tenants mind the agent doing viewings after they have given notice, but they can say no

Reason people are harsh on landlords I think is that like most things, you always hear more about the bad than the good. I have tenants who have been in up to 18 years, I repair things quickly , charge below market value and don’t do stupidly high rent increases. But that’s not a newsworthy story to share!

Issue is the housing market is in crisis. We need the government to build 250k houses a year, and that is never going to happen. So private landlords are a necessity. We need better laws and protections for tenants and landlords.

Whilst most tenants have been good I’ve had people not pay for months and just leave without saying - I will never get that money back. Had houses left in the most disgusting condition - feces, urine, vomit, fleas, rotten food etc. A deposit limited to 5 weeks rent doesn’t cover having to rip out every carpet and piece of flooring and pay for bio-hazard cleaning and disposal!

There are shit landlords and tenants, and decent ones - human nature unfortunately

we rent privately and need to keep renting - there is so little rental stock now its harder to find places and the demand for private rentals is pushing to prices up.

there are always going to be people who need to rent - its madness that more and more landlords are pulling out as there is not enough stock and their houses are flooding the sales market making it harder for home owners to sell.

Our last two rentals we moved as owners wanted to sell the properties.

Because a lot of private landlords don't maintain their properties and evict people at a moments notice. Because they put profits before people

This shows the true cost of building affordable housing though. Paying the high fine is preferential to building the affordable housing so the reality is that the developer makes a big loss building affordable housing. Then people have the cheek to suggest affordable housing isn't on anyday subsidised. You can't have it all ways.

Lots of landlords have interest only mortgages so the tenants may be paying the mortgage but this doesn't mean that they are buying the house for the landlord. If the landlord goes on to sell the property then they will hope to profit from any increase in the housing market but they never truly 'own' the property in the way you suggest.

If the landlord has a repayment mortgage then of course in most cases they wouldn't lower the rent once the mortgage is paid. They would be financially much better off selling the house and putting the money in the bank than doing this. People forget if you have money then you can always get paid for simply having the money or owning the asset bought for with money. You may feel cross about this but this is economic reality and something we all experience every time we borrow money from anyone that isn't a friend. Would you lend me £300k you have saved up and allow me to repay the amount over 25 years for free knowing your money was getting eroded by inflation the whole time and you were missing out on compound interest? Would you let me live in your house that you have ploughed that money into and let me live in it for a discounted rent because you didn't have a mortgage anymore despite the fact you could get more money and a whole lot less hassle just putting the money in a bank?

I’m with you OP. A lot of people who have opinions on it, have never been in a situation of having to rent. I rented privately for a number of years as a single mum with children, but wasn’t entitled to social housing. If it wasn't for private landlords I would have been living in temporary cramped accommodation, or on a street bench. My experiences with landlords was a good one, and I was grateful for having somewhere to call home for me and my children. MN seem to think that someone renting out their home shouldn’t make a profit from it, and should be just offering their home out of some sort of moral obligation. It’s a business, and a much needed one. It’s the quality of landlords that should be regulated. Slumlords give the industry a bad name, but these aren’t what you’d call proper landlords as they stay under the radar and don’t conform with regulations.

So the answer is to increase social housing rents?
There was another thread recently which suggested that social housing rents should be means tested - so those who earned more paid more, with those above a certain salary paying local market rent but maintaining benefit of a long term lease. This was thoroughly dismissed as unfair, but could be an option.

What hasn't been mentioned as far as I can see is the role of divorce/separation on the housing crisis. When a couple seperate they then need 2 homes rather than 1 for same number of people. This has increased demand and therefore prices.

Not necessarily, but it's a political decision that needs to be made. As I see it, we have two options:

1. Carry on as we are and allow people with SH tenancies to enjoy subsidised lower rents for a lifetime irrespective of what they earn and their ability to pay more. This will inevitably mean that people will be financially incentivised to retain their SH for as long as possible despite the fact they are earning enough to afford to buy/rent privately. This will therefore reduce the supply of SH for those who are most in need.

1. Allow SH rents to rise with earnings. This will probably increase supply over time as there isn't such an obvious incentive to hold onto SH tenancies when you can afford something better privately without paying too much more. Conversely though, people feel like it disincentives people to earn more and therefore be subjected to higher rents.

I personally think option 1 is a no brainer but people will have different view. What isn't an option is people simply suggesting we build loads more SH. That isn't going to happen!

@StopRainingNow I’d like to think I’m a good landlord, if something breaks in the house I get someone out straightaway.

I charge below the average but in return for that I expect the tenants to take care of my property.

I’ve lost count the amount of times the house has been left in a state, kitchen drawers broken, new carpet burnt with an iron, fireplace scribbled over with a biro, the list goes on.

Fortunately the house is with a tenant who takes care of it now. I have no intention of increasing her rent or turfing her out.

It’s not easy for tenants but it’s not easy being a landlord either xx

It’s complicated but I do agree with you to a point as private lets are an important part of the housing infrastructure and always have been - this idea that council housing was available for all just isn’t true plus it was rigid, you can’t just exchange for elsewhere in the country because of a job opportunity, it stifles social mobility to a lesser or greater extent too as it doesn’t encourage bettering yourself. I’ve rented twice beyond young adulthood link to specific situations and both landlords were lovely, fair and full deposit returned without question (once due to relocation and not managing to buy as well as sell due to purchase falling through, second time due to divorce) I now own and am grateful that twice I’ve lived for a year in someone else’s home for a fair rent roughly the cost of a mortgage I suppose but seemed ok

Private renting is an important part of the housing mix. But frankly we need to drive amateur landlords out of the market. You are delivering a service and an essential one at that. Too many landlords just see tenants as simply a way to cover their mortgage

Tesco have massive sales, but the profit in only quite a small percentage - maybe around 7%.
If it was perceived that private landlords were making profits at a similar percentage then it would probably be. However most are not.

Because my son's landlord is a lying scumbag who won't repair anything and the house is dangerous. He is an utter piece of shit and I'm so glad my son is moving out next week.

Fuck me OP, wind 'em up and watch 'em go eh?

Only if people are foolish and don't protect their financial interests.
Why should dine pay and others not?

I had the opposite experience as a landlord, completely screwed over by the tenant. I only rented my house out for a year while abroad to cover the mortgage. I was then renting in the different European country and the rental system was very similar but more people rented.
The tenant I had would often not pay the rent and, when contacting the agent, they would say that they would pay it the following month, doesn’t help when you have a mortgage to pay.
They broke the same appliance 3 times in a year and I paid for the repair, until the engineer told me emphatically that it was what they were doing that was causing it to break.
They left the house in a complete mess, burnt the kitchen sideboard, had an animal in the property which had scratched all the doors, put lots of holes in the walls and other damage. The damage far outweighed the deposit that was paid and the estate agent just told me to be grateful that they had actually moved out and I wasn’t having to spend money going to court while they stopped paying rent and I was paying the mortgage.
Rents have gone up because it is no longer an attractive investment for a lot of people so landlords have sold up.

Yep, same.
I was (waiting to be jumped on) an accidental landlord. Bought a flat straight our of uni, worked and lived in it for 2 years but the area I wanted to specialise in had no jobs available im that area, so moved to London to work at Great Ormond Street hospital to get specialist training. Tried to sell my flat, told I couldn't as no one could get a mortgage on it due to leasehold length left being too short, and the landowner who could grant an extension was unresponsive and then later passed away and his estate was stuck in probate for several years. So it was a choice between leaving my flat sitting empty or renting it out. I did it up when moved in, was a state but most I could afford, put in a new kitchen,bathroom,boiler and double glazing gradually. And my first tenant broke brand new appliances, I replaced within a couple days at higher cost as gave benefit of the doubt that was an accident and didn't want them going without. When they left they had made a complete mess, took me 3 months to get it back on rental marker.
I eventually sold it after about 10 years renting it out (took that long to get lease extended), and definitely made no profit, what I spent on doing it up, and then repairs was more than the price increase over this time.

I spent a lot of time renting in my twenties. I had one amazing landlord in that time who never increased the rent in the almost 6 years I was there (so I stayed there as long as was practicable!), but the rest (through letting agencies) were awful. To be fair it’s sometimes difficult to tell who the evil entity in the letting relationship is when an agency is involved.
Agencies artificially keep rental prices high and some are just terrible at reporting repairs etc. to landlords. So when a repair is needed it can go a long time before anything is done whilst an otherwise small problem gets bigger and bigger because either the landlord doesn’t care, the agency doesn’t report it promptly, or one or both are wanting to cut costs as much as possible by sending round multiple workmen for quotes, then deliberating for a month or more before anything actually happens.
The final rental I had the extractor fan in the bathroom stopped working (no window in the bathroom either). I reported it a total of three times in the last 6 months I lived there. Someone came early on to quote, I waited but no work went ahead. I reported it again, heard nothing. The final time I said that the loft space was damp and mould was starting to form. Still nothing.
When I moved out and they did the final inspection they patronisingly said to me “the bathroom extractor doesn’t work, did you never think to report it?” I saw red it was so bloody insulting. I 100% blame the agency more than the landlord for that.

There was no mortgage charge on that final rental (I’d done my research as I considered putting in an offer to buy it). I was there 18 months and when I moved out the new monthly rent had increased more than £300 per month. Criminal.

GCSE Marxism with no understanding of how the real world functions.

Quite unbelievable.

I get plenty of hate on MN but irl my tenants don't give me hate. I think many people hate LL's because a few LL's are bad and don't get repairs and maintain their properties well. In my experience most LL's do maintain their properties well because maintenance is tax deductable so they'd be fools not to. I'd much rather give a tenant a new kitchen or a new garden fence or bathroom and maintain the value of my assets than pay the money in more tax to RR. Another reason is jealousy. Some people see a person is successful in renting out properties and they are jealous. They don't always see the work the LL does repainting rooms and getting carpets cleaned or replaced and garden tidy ups between tenants during which period no rent is coming in and the mortgage still has to be paid. Not that I'm grumbling at all because I do make a good living from renting my properties out and it supplements my other job which is fostering DC with learning disabilities. I currently have 2 DC and they have a lot of additional needs do I pay for private tutoring for them twice a week each. They need lots of enrichment and opportunities given to them because they have had horrible early lives. I couldn't afford to do the latter if I didn't have the additional income from the former. People often like to see things in black and white so all LL evil and all tenants equal saints. Neither is true you get good and bad LL and good and bad tenants. All I know is in real life my tenants seem happy. I rented a house to 4 sisters. When 1 got married and pregnant and wanted a 2 bedroom house to rent she rather waited until I had 1 become available 8 months later than go with a new LL who had 1 available immediately she could have had.

I didn't until.our seemingly reasonable landladies decided to evict us out the blue after saying we could stay as long as we wanted. They simply repainted the walls white and changed a carpet then put the house back on the rental market for £500 a month more. Then they had the audacity to keep our deposit by spending £1400 on garden clearance after we left ( we had been quoted £120 to cut the garden right back i really wish we had it done before we left)

I'm not currently in the UK and just woke up. I didn't realise this would blow up quite as much as it did!

I actually cleaned for a woman who was a legal advisor for landlords. She said "if you need the rent payments to cover your mortgage you can't afford to be a landlord" (dont go mad at me for this thryre not my words)

Same here, turfed out after a many years of being a good tenant just to put the rent up. They literally made me and my children homeless. I don’t know how they sleep at night for a few more hundred a month. I hope the new tenants are massive arseholes.

Yes some landlords are shit. I had one myself that said "what do you want me to do, come hold an umbrella up for you"? When I had water pouring through the roof. But they still put a roof over my head when I couldn't afford one myself.

Yes they are making money, but it's not as far as I can work out a huge amount of money, considering that the return on that investment, for most, will be a long time in the future. I suppose I don't understand why people have a great aversion to "paying off someone else's mortgage using" taxpayer money", but don't have the same thoughts about people using taxpayer money to buy food that a supermarket is profiteering from.

Tesco and other supermarkets are literally not paying enough to stop people being on UC but then also taking the UC back in exchange for food. No one expects Tesco to not make money, even though they mark up food by 100% the cost they bought it at, no one says this is wrong. And before anyone says yes but Tesco have to pay to package the food and get it to the shops and to open shops etc, I know. But landlords have costs too.