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Original poster

Is anyone else angry that landlords very often say 'NO CHILDREN' when advertising?

178 replies

darcymum · 02/12/2009 13:42

Somebody I know is looking for a place to live at the moment and is finding it impossible because no landlords want to take a tenant with children.

I was telling another friend this and she said she was evicted when she was pregnant because the landlord didn't want children.

I was so mad about this I started a petition-

petitions.number10.gov.uk/Childlands/

I know children may not be the most careful tenants in the world but they have to live somewhere.

What do others think?

OP posts:
Original poster
darcymum · 03/12/2009 11:29

Does anyone else know if the law stopping landlords saying 'no children' works well in America?

OP posts:
expatinscotland · 03/12/2009 11:41

it's not a federal law, darcy. most laws regarding property rental there are governed by the state and, to some extent, the city via ordinances.

so it varies greatly.

but the whole attitude towards housing is different there in a lot of places so it's not really a good comparison.

it is, however, not as common for ordinary people to buy property expressly to let it out. again, this is because of tax complications also because lending there for second and/or multiple homes is, on the whole, much stricter than it has been here.

the reason why a lot more people are getting foreclosed on is because when you run into trouble paying there you don't get help from the government the way you do here (in the form of housing benefit paying the interest on your mortgage, for example).

and the sub-prime loans, whilst they were loans made to people with less than stellar credit, were largely on principal domains, not homes bought to let.

expatinscotland · 03/12/2009 11:42

also, because tenancies are more secure there on the whole, there isn't such pressure on people to buy their own home.

it's VERY unusual to hear of 18 or 21 year olds expecting to be able to purchase a residence, for example.

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 11:54

Let the market sort this issue/problem out there aren't the thousands of young professionals required to fill the thousands of empty flats in Leeds city centre for example, when the landlords do their sums and work out families = rent, no families = big hole in finances then the problem will be solved.
Although I would rather they all went bankrupt and the flats/houses become for sale again

toja555 · 03/12/2009 12:02

I have been a tenant and landlord myself. I found that my tenant, a family with 2 small children, was way better than a single student or professional. Families don?t tend to do parties and trash the place deliberately, or no more than singletons. I also was a tenant with a 1 year old, and proud to say that I left the place cleaner than I found.
I would not want pets, though?

NickeeS · 03/12/2009 12:05

MillyMollyMoo You obviously did not read my previous post. Property IS a safer bet than the stockmarket as long as you look at it as a long term investment. OK so the flat I bought in 1988 is not worth what it was two years ago but it is still worth more than what I paid for it, I have no intention of selling so my investment is "safe". As for buy to let landlords pushing up house price that is tosh, supply and demand has pushed prices up, we can't build enough houses in this country for the amount of people wishing to buy.

I stand by my right to put my money into whatever I like, this is a free country...maybe you would like this to be a communist state then we would all be equal, living in depressive grey concrete buildings...my last word on the subject......

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 12:07

You can put your money where you like, forgive me if I also hope they tax you until you bleed because you are shafting my children and their children
You'll never win, just as the pensions and stock market are fixed so is the property market, enjoy the ride down.

NickeeS · 03/12/2009 14:03

MillyMollyMoo pmsl how am I sharting you. With an attitude like that I hope you and your children and you childrens children end up living in cardboard boxes !

NickeeS · 03/12/2009 14:05

sharting shafting

paisleyleaf · 03/12/2009 14:14

win?

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 14:15

I am glad you find it so funny, but then as I am not gambling with my financial future I doubt I'll be in a cardboard box before you

dizietsma · 03/12/2009 14:24

OP, you're in the wrong place. This forum is mostly full of landlords, not tenants. They only care about their money, not social justice. They get all inflamed about their terrible trials suffering outrages from tenants.

Ah Marx, you were so right.

expatinscotland · 03/12/2009 14:28

Both of you are being hateful and should really be ashamed of yourselves.

I've been through bankrupcy before it was awful. I'd never wish that on anyone.

I've also been through the homelessness and, well, it was even worse. I'd never wish that on anyone, either, much less a child.

This was a reasonable discussion until people started getting so personal.

What a shame.

fluffles · 03/12/2009 14:38

i rented properties for ten years and had good, awful, great and ok landlord and managment agencies.

then i bought a wee flat, but then i met my fiance and two years later moved to his house (much bigger than mine). i can't get out of my mortgage deal until 2010 (£4k penalty) so rather than wait to move in with DF or leave the flat empty i am renting my flat out.

no big property tycoon, no evil capitalist get-rich-quick scheme, not even a pension plan... just an ordinary person who wants to rent to other ordinary people (as i was for ten years) for a couple of years.

why the vitriol??

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 14:43

So fluffles you sort of see yourself as doing a public service then as a pposed to getting your mortgage paid for you by some sould who might quite like the security of buying a little flat for themselves rather than pay rent all their lives ?

There are good, bad and ugly landlords of course there are and we had to threaten the police to one guy who wanted his handy man to fix my brothers girlfriends boiler rather than spend £100 on a corgi registered fitter, but the fact is buy to let is a business and whichever party starts making LL's pay business rates will get my vote.

expatinscotland · 03/12/2009 14:43

only one or two have been vitriolic.

the rest of us have been pointing out the cultural mentality, societal paradigms, etc.

someone came in with posts about how a tenant didn't pay them and the whole thread turned into a fracas of personal digs.

fluffles · 03/12/2009 14:48

Milly, i don't understand? Do you think that by holding on to my flat until 2010 i'm actually depriving someone who might want to buy it?

I just looked online and 89 1-bed properties are for sale in the postcode of my flat, from £80k to half a mill. I don't think that i'm stopping anybody from finding a flat.

As i said, i rented privately for ten years before i wanted to or was able to buy, i was glad then for private landlords and so have no moral problem in being one briefly.

dizietsma · 03/12/2009 14:49

Yeah, but it's about the money, isn't it fluffles? You own the house and expect people living in it to treat it how "ordinary" people would, which is an incredibly subjective judgement call- what is ordinary?. For you, this is about getting your bills paid, for the people living there it's their home. You don't want to lose your £4K, they want to live somewhere they can call home. You always have the upper hand, because you are a capital owning member of the bourgeousie (you own a house), and can turf out your prole tenants to suit your capitalistic goals.

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 14:55

Fluffles it's nothing personal, the issue is that you will gain massively financially (and usually tax free) in the fact that you have had somebody else pay your mortgage for you for a period of time and the fact that you have been a "victim" of this situation doesn't make it any more acceptable that you should do it to somebody else.

fluffles · 03/12/2009 14:59

Do you think we should go the whole hog then and outlaw private ownership of homes?

Have you read about what happens in cuba? In cuba if your needs change (e.g have a child, or divorce) you have to find someone to 'swap' homes with. But often that's not possible so people live for years with ex-spouses etc.

AND.. then a capitalist market in 'fixers' springs up to find you someone to 'swap' with and you pay the fixer huge sums of money to fix you a swap.

Not exactly a utopian success i'd say.

So when i bought that little flat i became bourgeousie? How permanent is this badge i am now wearing? Do i hand it in at the door when i sell the flat? I feel a bit of a fraud wearing it to be honest when i don't actually own the flat, the bank ownes the flat, i don't even have the power to sell it unless i pay the bank £4k fees.

fluffles · 03/12/2009 15:00

Milly - how do i gain tax free? I am sure i'll have to pay capital gains tax will i not?

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 15:03

Well good on you if you do pay the CGT but I'm sure somebody will come along and tell you how to get out of it, it's fairly simple and straight forward.

I wouldn't outlaw private rentals at all, but I would limit them and I would inist that if you are a professional landlord, like say the Wilsons of Kent (maths teachers who basically bought up most of the first time buyer properties in the area), then you are taxed as a business.

cat64 · 03/12/2009 15:14

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

MillyMollyMoo · 03/12/2009 15:20

I can sleep a lot better at night having ruined a thread in your opinion than priced out a whole generation from the security of having somewhere to raise their families

hatwoman · 03/12/2009 15:31

I think people are blaming the wrong people - someone said it wasn't landlords' responsibility to ensure the right to housing. they are right. but it is the government's. and if it is the case that landlords chosing not to rent to young children is resulting in adults and children not having decent housing/shelter then it's the govt's job to do something about that. assuming we are ruling out a communist style ban on owning and renting out property then surely the govt's job has to be the provision of sufficient, decent, affordable, secure housing for those who, for whatever reason, cannot access such housing by other means. I know it was a long tiume ago but, to an extent, I blame Maggie.