How much trouble could I be in for refusing to offer this person a tenancy?

[Imalreadytorn]

Name change for this as I am aware that landlords aren’t always popular even under normal circumstances.
Please note I am posting in Legal for advice, not in AIBU.
Briefly I have had a room become available in a house share. Existing tenants have been there 4 - 6 years. They are a real mix, but get along well although I wouldn’t describe them as friends.
It’s a nice room and there’s been a lot of interest. So far no one has ticked all the boxes I think are necessary to gel with the other tenants.
I’ve had a viewing today and the applicant is clearly ND. A really nice person but spoke and walked about without stopping the whole time. I felt completely out of my depth after a viewing appointment which lasted about 5 times the usual length. Added to that there were numerous messages before the appointment ( 16 texts and calls during my 90 minutes journey there). Since the viewing I have had 12 text messages, even though I explained that I couldn’t make any decisions until I finished my appointments and got home, likely to be at least 9.00pm.
I’m not at my strongest right now, and even at my best I would struggle to meet the frequent need for information/ reassurance/ interaction from this individual.
One of the existing tenants who was in the shared area for part of the viewing has already messaged me expressing concern. ( he works incredibly long hours and the others know to give him space when he gets home exhausted).
The applicant has a housing support worker who has already called me ( I didn’t answer as driving) quite forcefully confirming that full rent will be met due to disability and is easily afforded due to PIP.
I cannot offer this person a tenancy, it’s unfair on the others, but I can’t deny that it is due to behaviour, which is clearly linked to disability.
Unfortunately I haven’t found a suitable tenant so the advertisement is still running.
I assume that I have no ‘defence’ and will just have to accept the consequences?
How likely is it that action will be taken?
I have 2 house share properties

Another view here. My experience of support workers is that most of them have been sensible and realistic in knowing what their clients are capable of.
It may be that they are trying to get facts about how this client behaves and interacts in ordinary everyday life. Perhaps she is trying to make a case that supervised care is needed which is comparatively expensive compared to living on their own.
Perhaps a factual email listing the harassment, the refusal to take NO for an answer will be sufficient to get her off your back and help for her client. Other case workers will know about this already.

Just the number of contacts is a reason in itself. You were being harassed. You can say that you turned them down because of harassment.

You don't know that this person's level of contact with you is because they are neurodiverse however I think it's probably an accurate guess. If the support worker pushes you can say you can say I've xyz number of calls, texts etc from the prospective lodger including overnight and xyz calls from you despite explaining you need time to make a decision and it's becoming harassing. But ideally just avoid the contact and say I will not be engaging further before the level of contact has been overwhelming while you try and make a decision. You're not turning them down because they are potentially neurodiverse it's due to their level of contact. I imagine there are neurodiverse people you would rent to not them.

It could be the opposite.

I'm not an expert on ND but I do know that change is difficult and anxiety making.

And the thing with someone who is ND is that often you can be blunt and say, "If I give you the room you will have to X, Y and Z.

Could you offer a limited trial? Or say the final say is the opinion of the other tenants as they have to live with this person.

This.

They aren't suitable because you have been harassed to this level and it's affected you to the point you feel you had to switch off the phone.

If they threaten you with legal action it adds to that. It's intimidation.

You have sufficient evidence and grounds for defence for this alone.

If it continues I'd actually say that. Can you imagine living with that either? No. It's not fair on the existing tenants.

This candidate isn't suitable.

You can demonstrate harassment was part of your decision making not disability.

Exactly this. It is the level of contact. Disability requires an appropriate level of reasonable adjustment to be made. Being woken at midnight with the 57th call or text of the day, is very unlikely to be considered a reasonable adjustment.

I would just go no contact. Give no reasons. Don’t email the support worker the facts. Just block and ignore. You don’t owe anyone an explanation, it’ll just cause more hassle.

And if they refuse to move out? @Imalreadytorn have you checked the support worker is genuine as their behaviour is highly unprofessional with the harassment of you!

Surely the person contacting you at midnight is a good enough reason for you to say no!
Surely the amount of tog calls is harassment.

As @snowflake2 said, I strongly suspect that the support worker is being so pushy because she is having trouble finding a place that will accept her client. That is not your problem, not should it be used as a reason to guilt you into explanations or changing your mind.

It's fairly standard for potential employers to refuse to give any reasons for an unsuccessful job interview, and I would assume they have less legal rights in this situation than in a job interview, not more. If the harassment starts up again perhaps say that you don't wish to provide feedback and request that they both stop contacting you now.

Keep it simple. The other tenants felt they would not be a good fit.

It passes the decision from you to them and its not arguable.

I own a house share too and have passed over responsibility for finding replacement tenants to the existing tenants which ultimately gives them the choice of who they want to live with. They offered to do this and if they ever wanted to pass that back to me that's fine. I do get a say in it but ultimately I trust them and they've never made a bad choice (one has been there 8 years and we get on well). To be honest I hadn't really thought about the legal implications of this but just assumed that it is their right to choose who they live with for whatever reason. I wonder if you can just state that you give your existing tenants final refusal (if that's true) and they've said no to this person.

I know you mean well OP, but this is what is so disgusting about the housing situation in the UK right now. You own TWO properties (well, presumably three since you must live somewhere too) and you have the power to turn away people who need those homes for themselves. People who already struggle to work, live, socialise, function "normally". And now this person may have nowhere to live - again.

It's absolutely despicable, really. (To be clear, you are not despicable, the situation that we're all in is).

I really struggle to think of any good reason why one person should morally be able to own three homes, when others are struggling to even be able to rent them.

So sad.

I understand why you blocked the prospective tenant, but I really can't understand why you would not respond to the support worker.

A bit of compassion won't kill you. All they are trying to do is help that person fit into society, they need to know what the blockers are. Saying that it's not a good fit because you have received 50 calls and texts from them is a valid reason, just tell them that so they can do better next time.

As it’s a shared house, it’s entirely reasonable to say that one of the other existing tenants vetoed this prospective tenant as they didn’t feel comfortable sharing their living space with them.

Actually the OP is carrying out a valid service by accommodating people in HMOs. So these are single people who would be unable to find accommodation in the social sector because 1. No housing duty arises and 2. Single rooms are very hard to come by.

Well done Op for hanging on in an hostile environment. A lot have given up due to the legal and political decisions taken by the last government.

Because she's responded to them multiple times already, and now they're harassing her.
Do you think op MUST constantly do what she's told from someone's support worker?

What a drama - it’s a house share, not a lease on a self contained property, it should be a given that you need to choose the ‘best fit’ with existing tenants.

I have a ND daughter on PIP (3/4 of this family are ASD/ADHD) and she is a pacer who does not sleep so crashes about the kitchen and paces on the top floor in the small hours. It has impacted my mental health (I am one of the ASD/ADHD family members, so no ‘discrimination’ here) and meant for years I’ve had to muscle through on 4 hours sleep a night. One of the things we row about most is the fact that IF she ever moved out, she would be evicted by a landlord or in dispute with neighbours over her nocturnal pacing/insomnia. So, she is expected to live at home for years yet.

The housing support officer rally needs to find your applicant an assisted living place…ideally on a ground floor!

Don’t feel guilty - you have to weigh the needs of your existing tenants against those of any prospective ones.

This person's support worker is really letting them down. I say that as someone who has autism.

You did absolutely the right thing.

It does sound like this person wouldn’t be able to live in a shared house.

I wonder though, you don’t know they are neurodivergent, so when would personality become a disability if there’s no diagnosis. Which many adults may not have?

So if OP didn't own these properties, where would her tenants live given that they can't afford to buy them? If you're envisaging, say, the council or an HA owning them, what difference does that make to the tenants?

I would also say this person would be better off living somewhere self-contained. It can be stressful living with a random group of other people. I’d be wondering why the support worker wants to place them in a house share not a bedsit.

I wondered how long before someone came on to complain you own more than one home.