Vendor’s tenants refusing to leave

[Plancina]

Just posting for a rant/wild hope of any advice. We have been in process of buying a really lovely house that we totally fell in love with and have laid over £1000 for survey fees, solicitor fees and a survey. It was marketed as no chain but has a private tenant in it who was supposed to move out on the 5th July. The tenant is now refusing to leave - they own their own home but it is having work done on it and they aren’t willing to move into alternative rental accommodation until their home is finished. They are ignoring all requests from their landlord to leave and insisting they will stay there until their house is ready, they won’t give a timeline for this.
Our lease is up in two months and we’d have to commit to a 6 month lease at least to stay here. We are so upset and annoyed - can’t believe how selfish these people are being. The vendor is also annoyed as they don’t want to lose the sale and they had promised their son a portion of the proceeds to buy his first home and now he is going to lose that house also.
Our solicitor says it could take a year to evict them.

As much as I appreciate that tenants need more rights, this aspect sickens me (and I've been a tenant). If a S21 has been legally served, presumably a court will always rule in favour of the LL (and if not why not?).

Why does so much time and money have to he expended by the LL? Why can't it just be instantly rubber stamped? Why doesn't the S21 have teeth?

There is not a covid ban on evictions. Section 21 can still be issued but it has to be for 3 months instead of the usual 2. The courts aren't opening for evictions until at least the end of August and the backlog is going to be very very big. So yep at least 6-12 months for the initial hearing.

Personally unless you want to rent longer , I would pull out and start looking elsewhere.

[quote Plancina]@Pobblebonk I’m aware they aren’t breaking the law but I think they’re being very selfish. I’ve rented for 15 years and never once outstayed a tenancy.[/quote]
So what? You don't want to move twice, but you are condemning them as selfish for not wanting to move twice. It's not their fault that their landlord decided to sell without waiting for them to leave.

I do wish people would read up on tenants rights, rather than just saying they are selfish or they should move out.
england.shelter.org.uk/housing_advice/eviction/section_21_eviction/staying_after_a_section_21_notice
Read Shelters housing law to understand the law for tenants. You cannot just evict someone because the tenancy is up, they go onto an automatic rolling contract, you cannot change locks to get someone out.
Tenants who are paying rent have a right to quiet enjoyment or their home.
Unfortunately councils tell tenants not to move out otherwise they class this as making themselves intentionally homeless and will not help. This doesn't help tenants or landlords, but tenants have no choice if they have nowhere else to go.

I don't blame these tenants for not wanting to move, they aren't selfish, they just don't want to go to make it easier for everyone. Their landlord should have sorted this sooner so that this didn't happen. He is the one at fault, not the tenants.

Legal matters aside.

I’d suggest the letting agent strongly advises them to move into one of the other properties. Otherwise when the case is heard in court they’d be looking for another rental quickly and the reference they give will say court eviction as reason. Not good.

I couldn’t live with the worry and stress of it - much rather the short term stress of a move

you condemn them for selfishness, and so I would expect that your reasons for behaving differently would be that you aim to be selfless/ altruistic.
However it appears that your reasons are to do with how much stress you feel able to tolerate?
You are not more moral than they are, you are just more thin skinned!

Shelter talk such shit. They tell tenants to stay, in breach of their lease, until they’re evicted. It might be legal but it’s incredibly stupid, as it means that tenant is blacklisted from the private housing sector, and good luck to them trying to find council accommodation - the waiting list is years long.

The tenants here are taking the piss because they can - they’re moving into their own house, not into another rental. They’re legally right, but they’re cheeky fuckers.

Your solicitor isn’t in the wrong - the section 21 had been served when you instructed them. It’s not their fault the tenants have chosen to ignore it. Did the solicitor explain to you what could happen if they didn’t move out? If they didn’t then you might have a claim for compensation. I don’t rate your chances as it would have to be a very incompetent lawyer to have failed to make the risks clear.

Their landlord has been an idiot for marketing without vacant possession but perhaps she or he needed the money urgently. Lots of landlords use property instead of ISAs as their pensions but we don’t accuse people who save into ISAs of daylight robbery and cheeky fuckery even though those ISAs might be funding modern slavery or nuclear weapons.

Walk away from this house. Too many idiots, too much stress.

I do wish people would read up on tenants rights, rather than just saying they are selfish or they should move out.

I think most of us are aware of their rights.We just think they are very unfair, there really needs to be a change in the law.

Of course they are being selfish, no other word for it.

@Jumblebumblemess yes I think that’s what we will do - focus on empty, no chain houses as we have no chain and a cash deposit with mortgage in principle ready to go and hope we can find somewhere soon!
Obviously there is a chance their house is ready sooner but it’s a total unknown and I think will bring more stress and uncertainty than a new transaction.

Can you ask the vendor to pay for your 6 months rent? If they don't want to lose the sale (I get this is unlikely)

@crosseyedMary the reason it would stress me is that I would feel terrible disrupting other people’s lives, stopping two or more families getting the houses they want simply to avoid a move. I wouldn’t feel comfortable with that.

I think this comes down to a feeling that the comfort and convenience of property owners should come before that of tenants
I think we should try to uphold the right of everyone to a safe secure home and your beef OP is with the vendor, or perhaps yourself for trying to buy a place with a sitting tenant!

we were told by the agent that the landlord had refused to renew the lease and told the tenants to leave in July and that they had agreed to this

The agents will tell you any old flannel - I wouldn't even take it on trust that the Section 21's been issued unless they prove it - but overall the place should never have been marketed with vacant possession (or at least a realistic expectation of it, which he clearly hadn't got)

It beats me why your solicitor didn't warn you about this, but anyway I hope the other place you've seen is promising, because this one's obviously a waste of your time

@crosseyedMary they’ve been offered lots of safe and secure alternatives by the estate agents and to have their moving fees paid. They just don’t want to move until their own house is finished.

stopping two or more families getting the houses they want simply to avoid a move
but why should they inconvenience themselves because their landlord hasnt done things properly, he's at fault, why should they suffer?

@crosseyedMary how has the landlord not done things properly? He told
Them in January the house was up for sale and issued them with the correct and legal eviction notice with the correct notice period. They’ve refused to abide by it.

They sound an utter nightmare OP.

Walk away, the implication is that you could spend £1000s in legal fees dealing with them.

No house is worth that. Leave them for someone else to deal with.

@Plancina

I think we have no choice but to pull out and look at houses with no chain/vacant possession. So annoyed! I hope the selfish f*ckers see this and are ashamed of themselves.

Sorry, I didn't rtft, this happened to my brother and the vendors knocked the additional rent outlay off the purchase price.

The tenants are people who own another property they are renovating. Lots and lots of people could not afford to move out and run two properties in that way. As homeowners themselves you'd expect them to see where the seller is coming from. Yes, it would be more convenient for them to be able to move straight in to their lovely property but lots of aspects of home renovation can be tricky. The owner of their rental needs to sell. Not idea but not the end of the world. They are not being made homeless they could just go elsewhere. They're being dicks.

Let’s be honest, the tenants are not poor, they own their own home and are having it extensively renovated. They can also afford to rent another property to live in whilst all this is going on. The just can’t be bothered to move again. Incredibly selfish.

It wouldn’t enter my head to risk being taken to court by my landlord, which now they are doing, since he’s issued them with an eviction order which they are ignoring

If the LL really has issued the needed documents then I agree and I wouldn't do it either
But not everybody thinks that way; some consider only what they can get away with, rather than actual or moral responsibilities - and there's a whole raft of people only too willing to cheer them on

Personally I'd walk away; it's already a mess and it's unlikely to resolve any time soon

Sorry if someone else mentioned this already, but go on Air BnB and find a local listing for a house you could live in for a month or two. Air BnB hosts are desperate at the moment and will make a deal with you just to get some money to keep the property occupied on a month-to-month basis. Put your stuff in storage and get on with things. It will cost you a bit but certainly not £7000.

As a PP said, it’s actually incredibly concerning that an section 21 has no legal “teeth”. If landlords can’t recover an asset for whatever reason (including if they themselves need to return to live in a property that was their own home) then there are going to be fewer landlords about. I had to really scramble to find a tenancy in London in 2017 because so many landlords were selling in the aftermath of the tax changes (although these changes eventually worked in my favour because I was able to buy the flat I was renting).

A shrinking private rental sector is going to result in fewer homes for rent, poorer quality accommodation for tenants, and higher rents. I don’t see the social housing sector expanding, do you?

I rented for 17 odd years and had only two bad landlords - and they were bad because they were clueless, not evil.

The tenants are being very selfish by refusing to move out. It will cost thousands in court fees and take months to get them out of the property. You need to pull out of the purchase unless you are happy to risk waitIng for them to leave.

I’m sorry you’re having such a stressful time.