Coronavirus

Yeah fair point that. I've also worked for a Housing Association and I know how many people can fall behind on their rent. When I was doing that sort of work, evictions really only tended to happen when people had smashed the house up. I don't remember anybody getting evicted for falling behind on their rent, even though loads were.

It sounds like you do similar work to what I did, which was supporting the most vulnerable tenants. And that often goes hand in hand with drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, mental health problems etc. So often rent arrears are a symptom of a bigger problem.

The problem with evictions though, is that you then run a massive risk of making that person homeless, and the local council then have a statutory duty to house them again. So it's a bit of a self defeating circle.

 

Yet when i rake my wife for hers i won't get one as i'm 2 years younger and in the next cohort down .
PS if it was the AstroZeneca one it wouldn't be wasted as they can just stick it back in fridge .

 

What used to piss me off with private landlords was the way some of them would rinse the council for providing emergency homeless accommodation. The council had a statutory duty to house anybody who was street homeless and down here (like many coastal towns) there are old and dilapidated guesthouses that get used to house the homeless.

These old ****holes were owned by people who couldn't be bothered to keep up with the standards required to rent them out to tourists and holiday makers, so they'd use them to milk the council instead. I remember supporting this bloke in one once, he had a bad Heroin problem and was in and out of social housing / prison. They put him up in this ****ty old Motel. One room, a microwave and a shower room. Cold, damp, covered in mold. They were supposed to provide him with a hot breakfast and they would often just lob one of those mini cereal packs in his room. Absolute shambles.

Went to a multi disciplinary meeting about him with the Council, Police, Probation, Drug & Alcohol team and remember seeing the rental charges the council were paying which was around £1500 per week. The **** who owned this place had around 12 Homeless people on his books.

 

As a private landlord myself that’s a massive generalisation. Also the change in the rules re: COVID still give tenants 6 month arrears leeway, which imo is enough.

 

It's not a generalisation, as I specifically said tenants of many private landlords, rather than all.

The private rental sector accounts for a growing proportion of housing in this country, and the sector is barely regulated at all in comparison with most countries. We're practically the only country in the world where rent control is non existent.

 

Many suggested the majority to me, but anyway.

I largely agree about rent controls but in some areas it could reduce the amount of housing stock coming onto the rental market, which is a bit of a double edged sword. Forced ‘no reason’ section 21 evictions should defo be outlawed though, which May pledged to do 2 years back, but it still hasn’t transpired.

 

Know nothing about rentals. But a mile down the road from me a new build estate went up. A percentage have to be help to buy, also others are 'affordable' for renting/people only employed. then there are loads that are in rental market. these are being rented out for more than the mortgage costs on help to buy. Why are developers/local government allowing this to happen. They will have been cash buy/but to let mortgage. But they are smaller 2-3 bed semi's and are now out of reach for most.

 

My younger daughter recently bought her first house on the help to buy scheme, and she told me that not renting it out was a stipulation in the contract. However, I’ve no idea who would be policing this, if at all.

What I can say, is that the criteria she had to meet in order to get one was stringent and the process quite lengthy. Whether that’s standard or just the developer she bought from I’ve no idea tbh.

 

The housing situation where I live is ridiculous. Replicated across lots of 'desirable' places to live, folk from the cities have bought up second homes and pushed up the housing market so that it is skewed beyond recognition. Coupled with being in a low wage area, it means the property price to earnings ratio ranges is around 10 times the average wage. Of course some of these properties are rented out as private lets, but loads of them are either second homes or holiday lets. So for young people trying to get a foot on the ladder it's virtually impossible for them to buy houses in places like St Ives, Padstow, Falmouth etc.

I was lucky enough to buy my house in 2001, just before prices went through the roof down here. And it was only then because I'd been working remotely from London, still on a London wage that I could afford to do it. Plus it was a total fixer upper, spent about 8 years doing up this wreck

 

Housing in London is in absolute crisis and has been for some time.

Runaway house price inflation and a chronic shortage of social housing means that for many people, the private rental market is their only option. Government policy hasn’t really kept pace with this changing demographic, but everyone seems to agree tgat the solution should be a massive program of affordable homes, maybe a mixture of shared ownership and social housing for rent. Everyone agrees, but nothing’s really getting done, or only slowly.

The definition of affordable housing in London, when a certain B Johnson was Mayor, was 80% of market value btw, which was way out of many people’s reach. It didn’t matter though, as he was known to be a soft touch for developers when it came to writing off their obligations to make a proportion of new builds affordable.

The real criminal behind all this was Margaret Thatch, not for introducing right to buy, but for refusing to allow councils to replace the homes they sold. This is a crisis that’s been a long time festering away.

 

I did help to buy. Didn’t seem very stringent at all tbh.

 

sorry, not the help to buy our affordable ones(rental) the smaller 2-3 bed that are general sale. We looked at one of the detached 4 bed/double garage as money would make moving would be nice and leave me almost mortgage free.

we were told a lot were being snapped up for rental, not the help to buy ones. It’s because the location is not far from M1 and just south Sheff. So a desired location, but now are all rental, why not make 80% that are help to buy to help young uns

 

blame Rick stein.

 

I’ve been watching the BBC series (I think it’s BBC) about fishing communities in Cornwall. It’s quite shocking that entire villages consist entirely of holiday lets and 2nd homes. And the fishermen, if they’re lucky, live in new build schemes miles from these idyllic looking ports they work out of.

 

Most of the silly ****s voted for Brexit too

 

I blame the surfer dudes that moved in from London with their monster trucks, while preaching to everyone to save the environment while at the same time importing their vegan diet from Europe

 

Kills these towns in the winter too when all the Tourists and second home owners have gone home.

St Ives is a ****ing ghost town from Nov to March. Which has its upside as the waves are empty

 

Muthafuckaz

 

Other way round for me, the only evictions we seem to do are rent. It seems that the company has no desire to pursue action for other breaches which can be frustrating when you have neighbours constantly complaining....
I think often the local authority could help by making it easier for people to downsize. If someone is struggling with affordability, there is often a reason such as bedroom tax or non dependant deductions causing it (where they are on benefits). Help people into cheaper rentals and they may sustain it!
@Tobes , I have long since wanted to by more property and rent myself, not like a landlord with a whole ‘portfolio’ but one or two. It’s really put me off seeing how my job has gone during the pandemic. I always thought my job would have put me in a great position to be a private landlord (and a good one) but seeing how powerless I have felt at work I would hate to have that feeling with my personal finances taking the hit....it has really put me off anyway. How’s it been for you?