Letting agents have been blamed for the lack of cat-friendly rental homes.
Cats Protection said that only 42% of private rental accommodation allows cats.
Speaking for the charity, Jacqui Cuff said: “We hear from renters who tell us most adverts state ‘no pets’.
“Often, the reason for not allowing cats is simply habit, with a third of landlords who don’t accept cats saying they didn’t proactively choose to ban cats, but instead followed a standard template or advice from a letting agent.”
The charity has now launched a new campaign, offering guidance to letting agents and tenants to help tenants own a cat. The guidance says that properties should be advertised as “pets considered”, so that decisions can be made on a case by case basis after the prospective feline tenant has been met.
A downloadable example clause says that tenancy conditions can require cats to be neutered, vaccinated and micro-chipped.
The charity says that private tenants who are allowed to own cats often stay in the property longer, look after it better and feel happier.
Cuff said: “The reality is that cats very rarely cause problems for landlords. In actual fact, many cat owners tell us that having a cat is what makes their house a home and helps them put down roots and value the home they’re living in.”
Broadcaster Andrew Collins said: “Cats are more than just much-loved pets – they’re part of the family and the heart of the home. For me, a home without a cat isn’t a home at all.
“They’ve got an important role to play in the lives of many people – from helping children understand about caring for others, to providing a lifeline to pensioners who may otherwise feel isolated and lonely.
“It’s heart-breaking that so many renters are not able to own a cat, but this needn’t be the case.
“Cats Protection’s campaign is a major step forward in modernising how cat ownership is viewed in a rental market that many people now rely on.
“By helping landlords see the benefits of happy, settled tenants, we can help more tenants experience the joy of sharing their lives with a feline friend.”
The campaign has an excruciating name – but surely does have a point. (EYE and our hapless dog are currently in the benign-ish ownership of two cats, both ex-strays.)
The campaign is launched today at www.cats.org.uk/purrfectlandlords
Wow 42% who accepted cats is a lot ! Try telling a landlord who has had a property back stinking and damaged by cats or dogs, needing decorated and carpeted again
this will only get worse with the cap on damage deposits to come, the option for landlords to raise the bond to cover excessive pet damage and cleaning is removed therefore so are the properties available to pets
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Couldn’t agree more!
I’m trying to prove a deposit dispute with one currently – how do you evidence odour? My viewings girl had to go and have a sit down outside because the smell was making her feel faint. We’re at the ridiculous stage now where the past tenant is denying it was his pets that caused the problem and is (genuinely) demanding DNA tests.
It’s all very well taking an extra £200 pet deposit, but when the carpets and laminate flooring are saturated with pet pee, £200 doesn’t go very far!
This was a previously animal-friendly landlord, but he’s been cured of that. Same old story – the few have spoilt it for the many good and responsible pet owning prospective tenants
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Get new carpets fitted and get the property deodorised, ask the supplier to provide an initial quote and receipt stating removal of animal odour, that should be sufficient evidence for the deposit scheme
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Up the rent by £50 per month for every pet and take the max deposit allowed, insist on a limitited amount of pets, ie. x 2 and complete regular inspections, at the tenants expense. Post fee ban just ban pets, it won’t matter soon as more landlords sell up and demand will outweigh supply you can pick and chose! Well done Westminster!
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Meanwhile the RSPB are grateful to any landlord that doesn’t accept the little sods
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Just having to restore a rented property for a client where the cats were allowed to urinate on the carpets towards the end of the tenancy – will cost at least £1000 to replace carpets etc. Once burnt landlords rarely want to accept again.
It is a nice idea but the reality and theory are very different (and I have 2 cats).
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The problem of standard form tenancy agreements – which contain too many tenant obligations already – and which are not shown to the landlords to ask ‘shall we remove the clause about pets?’
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Remove claws from pets might be more useful 🙂
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Not many people know that most of the tenancy agreements used by agents come from a single source.
One of the members of staff in the office where the agreements originates hates cats.
Paul’s dog is often left in the office alone- makes you think doesn’t it?
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What or whom are you referring to here Robert?
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As a cat owner myself and as someone who has my mothers dog as the office dog I am not adverse to pets, I am adverse to irresponsible Owners!
I have seen a full stairs rails destroyed by a bored dog, replaced all carpets and laminate flooring in a property thanks to cat pee before now, had a property so teaming with fleas so badly it looked like the whole carpet was moving (I had to fumigate my car and strip off on my patio so as not to take them into my home and avoid giving them to my cats).
It is a risk and with the deposit cap not taking this into account moving forward I suspect we will need to look at loading rents to get our landlords to take pets moving forward which is far less cheap than a £300 additional refundable deposit sadly.
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I own six hairless Sphynx cats and they are extremely well behaved, they would never damage anything but I wouldn’t rent a house unless my furless friends could come with me. Landlords who don’t accept pets are shooting themselves in the foot!
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I have a cat and its damaged my home – That’s my responsibility. – choice. The government have shot tenants in the foot, Not landlords shooting themselves.
To say there is potential for extra damage – dilapidation by animals is stating the obvious.
Government interference in business – capping Deposits has ‘cooked the tenants goose’ – ( not that geese would be appropriate household pets ! )
Tenants need to look at factors that have impacted rent increases and Learn from ;
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A harmless cat ruins one couch and you blame Westminter…. GROW UP
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Lil
If a landlord has a choice between someone with children and someone without they will probably (not always) go with the tenants without.
If a landlord has a choice between someone needing benefits to pay the rent and someone without they will probably (not always) go with the tenants who do not require benefits.
If a landlord has a choice between someone with animals and someone without they will probably (not always) go with the tenants who do not have animals.
In the majority of supply and demand equations to bring back the equilibrium the price goes up, i.e. those with pets, children and/or benefits will need to pay more to that landlord in order to make their proposition more attractive than those without.
it’s called market forces – and yes, it is Westminster’s fault for not recognising /accepting that’s what happens when the supply /demand is out of balance.
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Well to me thats just unfair, maybe it is time to get rid of markets all together and replace them with a fairer and more equitable system of centralised control.
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I’ve got a property where the Tenant has just left after allowing the cats to defecate and urinate on the carpets, the tom-cat allowed to mark everything, the bannisters used as scratching posts by the cats and chew toys by the dogs. The Landlord had refurbished it before they moved in, and moved them to a different property he has just refurbished as a family member needed the original property. He is not happy after seeing the state of it. It was unmanaged so we did no inspections. He has now asked us to do inspections on his properties!
I have a cat, and I have family members who have both cats and dogs. There is no excuse for allowing your pet to trash the house. I can’t wait til we are confident enough to install the cat flap which will mean the kitten can go and cr@p outside, I hate having a litter tray in the house!
That being said, I do advise many of my Landlords to put pets considered. Although the lady who called up wanting to rent a huge house so she can foster eleventy billion dogs who would be allowed free reign of the house… well, her contact details may have gotten lost…
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“The reality is that cats very rarely cause problems for Landlords”, states Jacquii Cuff of Cats Protection.
1) The Health & Safety issues alone – to my health, due to the serious deep-clean required – and the time involved (I certainly wouldn’t have those tenants as my Doctor!),
2) the long-lasting stench, which prevents re-letting, hence loss of income,
3) sofa corners scratched bare and urine patches (covered by tenant with a cushion at check-out) – meaning the replacement cost of an otherwise really good sofa,
4) urine patches on lower walls, curtains all scratched, plus faeces from smaller pets?? on them, hence replacement costs,
5) flea powder still lying over the floor,
6) cat food containers and allsorts of “toys” found under kitchen base units where tenant had removed plinths to allow them to play,
7) urine stains over the kitchen windows where some of the cats sat while their owners were at work all day …… I could go on.
Even if Adjudicator had given me the whole deposit back , it DIDN’T go anywhere to meeting total losses!
To comment factually, Jacqui should firstly venture in to properties where landlords HAVE (in my case, against my better judgement) allowed cats. Never again! I should’ve got rid of them early on, when they introduced smaller caged animals without my knowledge! Tenants will readily lie through their teeth to get a property; they agreed to the AST condition that they wouldn’t keep pets – they didn’t at previous property, so all the referencing in the world wouldn’t help here!
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I couldn’t agree more and would love to know where she gets her ‘facts’ from unless she has included homeowners in her research.
I have 2 cats and I used to do home visits for the RSPCA and unless cats are from the same litter then I don’t care what anyone says multi-cat households can be a nightmare. Unlike dogs the majority of cats simply don’t like each other and this is the main reason for some cats ‘spraying’ indoors. My very elderly cat and my very young cat are kept separately and I can honestly say that I have no problems whatsoever. My cats are trained to use a scratching post (just leaving one there doesn’t train them) and my cats don’t scratch carpets.
I am a self confessed hypocrite in that I prefer not to accept cats even in my own rental property and it has nothing to do with the cats and everything to do with tenant behaviour. If anyone has ever had to deal with a rental property with a flea infestation they’ll know just how impossible they can be to get rid of.
My landlords have had more problems with cats than I care to remember.
Jacqui is wrong and I made charitable donations to Cats Protection League last year and so I think I might just contact her to put her straight.
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