Being a landlord can feel like a constant battle

In my area, most of the small properties that come onto the market are snapped up by greedy landlords with offers well below the asking price, the advantage in today’s market being – no chain! Young people are unable to compete and have to either move away to a cheaper area or pay unregulated and extortionate rentals, often never able to save enough to put down a deposit on their own home. Tenants are unlikely to respect or treat a property as if it were their own, gardens are left to grow wild and neighbouring home owners often have to put up with noisy and unsociable behaviour. Private landlords often have no knowledge of their legal responsibility to maintain the exterior of the property and homes can become neglected and dilapidated.

I welcome the new regulations imposed upon the rental market in the hope it will free up more homes for first time buyers. More social housing needs to be built for people who need to rent which are more likely to be better maintained by local councils who have their own team of people to carry out repairs as and when needed.

I’m sorry but I find it totally unacceptable that taxpayers money should subsidise private landlords bank accounts when council owned property can be rented at a lower cost to the taxpayer. Who are the main beneficiaries here, the local council or the private landlord or both?

I have absolutely no qualms about people who find themselves in need of housing benefit receiving this, but private landlords benefiting from taxpayers hard earned cash? My conscience would not allow me to sleep at night if I were to engage in such unethical practice. Landlords who venture into such procedures are in a win win situation whereby they are almost guaranteed regular governmental generated income funded by the taxpayer.

I would like to see more council houses built for people in genuine need with a view to cutting out the private middleman profiteers who, at the end of the day, only add to the ever increasing price of rented accommodation.

If people want to make a living by renovating property and selling it on, good luck to them, but please don’t expect the taxpayer to subsidise any rental income accrued from their endeavours.

Emma,
May I ask what you are renting for £340 per month. Cannot see where your making money when you are responsible for repairs ,void periods etc. All you need is a boiler to go down and that’s your profit gone for months. Clearly yourL.H.A. rates must be very low.

Emma, council owned property in this part of the country is termed social housing. For more info re this, please log onto england.shelter.org.uk – Shelter – What is Social Housing? It is now a legal requirement at planning stage for all developers to commit to building a percentage of social housing on any potential new developments.

Regarding landlords responsibilities, Section 11 of the Landlord & Tenants Act 1985 states: The Landlord is responsible for keeping in repair:
“The structures and exterior of your home, for example, the walls, roof, foundations, drains, guttering and external pipes, windows and external doors. These repair reponsibilities can’t be cancelled out by anything your Tenancy Agreement says. Also your landlord isn’t allowed to pass on the cost of any repair work to you which is their responsibility.”

Tenancy Agreements can include such things as, no pets or smokers and
instructions to keep gardens tidy by cutting grass and to refrain from any behaviour that is likely to cause distress or annoyance to the neighbourhood. If all polite attempts to resolve any problems caused by uncompliant tenants go unheeded, it is then up to the neighbour to contact the landlord asking that he/she speaks to the offending tenant in order to resolve the situation.

Your above report states a return of between £340 and £540 pcm which could make quite a sizeable contribution to someone’s mortgage repayment if only they were able to save enough to put down as a deposit on their own place. Most landlords are able to utilise the collateral on their existing homes to secure a deposit to put on a property and then, very conveniently, its the tenant who pays the mortgage for them, or in some cases the taxpayer!

When this kind of debate comes up, the anti-landlord sentiments often come personal experience and/or a perception that all landlords are making excessive profits for the time and capital risks they take. This distracts criticism from the route causes of problems within the housing sector.

Having said that I think all those so far agree that more social housing should be made available and more low cost house should be built. Although this would need funding via taxation in some way and a planning system that favours this kind of housing being built next to existing owner occupiers.

I would suggest that folks have a read of EHS_Headline_report_2014-15.pdf for some hard facts. After you’ve had a read, think about who benefits most from increasing house prices and who pays more in tax, private landlords or owner occupiers. Which sector makes best use of housing by high occupancy rates. Which sector is making the best use of and improvements is existing, old housing stock. Please take London and the SE as exceptions.

There is so much I could point out but I would rather you looked at the data yourselves. Yes the Private Rented Sector can improve more than it already has, there are some rogues and bad landlords that give the rest of us a bad name. However the data does suggest the vast majority provide a good service at a reasonable cost to tenants and taxpayers.

Emma is making a small income (not profiteering) but remember that local authorities and housing associations also employ people including chief execs. It is her private capital she is risking with the hope of a gain in the future (which would be liable for CGT) . Her article points out that if banks and or the government are willing to attack small landlords with the vocal backing of “Landlord Bashers”, the consequence to millions of tenants have not been properly considered.