Evictions ban extension ‘could damage the rental market’

Landlords and agents have warned an extension to the evictions ban could dent confidence in the rental market and encourage tenants to stop paying rent even if they can afford it.

Last week the Government announced a two month extension to its ban on rental evictions in England and Wales to 23rd August.

It takes the moratorium on evictions to a total of five months.

But the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) questioned the move, highlighting that members are already working with tenants who are facing difficulty.

Ben Beadle, chief executive of the NRLA, said:

“This decision means that some landlords will now be facing five months without receiving any rent as they can take no action against tenants who were not paying before the lockdown started.

“It also means more misery for tenants and neighbours suffering at the hands of anti-social tenants and will also cause exceptional hardship for a number of landlords, including many who depend on their rental income to live, for which there is no assistance.

“We have every sympathy with tenants who face genuine difficulties because of a loss of income due to the coronavirus crisis.

“Nearly all landlords are working with tenants who are struggling to keep them in their home.”

Beadle called on the Government to set out its plans for the market at the end of this one-time extension.

He added:

“A failure to do so will cause serious damage to the private rented sector as a whole.  It will ultimately be tenants who suffer as they will find it increasingly difficult to find affordable housing if landlords do not have the confidence that they will get their properties back swiftly in legitimate circumstances.”

Staffordshire agent L&A Lettings, questioned whether the extension would encourage bad tenants.

The agent said in a tweet:

“No decent landlord wants to evict a good tenant.

“Any decent landlord will work with a tenant who has lost their source of income.

“However, what does a landlord do when a tenant, knowing they can’t be removed, just doesn’t pay?

“The Government is showing a complete lack of understanding.”

Mary-Anne Bowring, founder of automated lettings platform, PlanetRent, added:

“With all of the uncertainty going on at the moment, tenants deserve to be protected by the Government from evictions that could be through no fault of their own, and could well be down to financial hardship brought on by being furloughed or losing their job altogether, but this needs to be balanced by proving that their income has gone down.

“The worry is that many landlords are retired, according to the English Private Landlord Survey as many as 33% are.

“These landlords may well not have a mortgage to claim a repayment holiday on, rely on property income and without rent or furlough monies may struggle to survive.”

She suggested the Government may need to consider other ways of financially supporting households post-crisis such as through higher housing benefit payments.

Bowring said:

“Tenants and landlords should be working together in what is a difficult time for everybody, and should not use the eviction ban as an excuse to mistreat the property they live in or withhold rent if they are not in a genuinely financially difficult situation.”

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9 Comments

  1. PossessionFriendUK39

    Its nothing less than Govt deferring their obligation for Social security onto Private landlords,  or put another way, Sequestration of private property.

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    1. spyguy62

      Ah the nasty possessionfriend is posting here now. I’ve made a complaint to the your local Dartford police about your comments over on letting agent today.  

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      1. Eyereaderturnedposter12

        spyguy62,

        What did OP post on Letting Agent Today that would merit a police report?

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  2. Eyereaderturnedposter12

    Ironically (and yes, hindsight is a wonderful thing), IMHO (and in my firm’s experience over the period from late March, to date) this extension is entirely unnecessary, for the following reasons…

    -The vast majority (in our case 97%) of Tenants have indeed, kept up with their rent.

    -Those that haven’t been able to, with good reason…have found their Landlords more than understanding and willing to offer concessions.

    In my view, the vast majority of Tenants benefiting from this unnecessary extension…are largely those that could be reasonably described as ‘chancers’/’opportunists’.

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    1. PossessionFriendUK39

      Exactly,  and its these very small minority that the  Govt are protecting, whilst leaving women facing Domestic violence and communities suffering from ASB, to the mercy of the Real Rogue tenants.

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    2. debbiedoesalot

      Absolutely right. A tenant in a block of flats we have just taken over stopped paying rent last December. We found out that he is creating an income from subletting the flat himself. Now, thanks to the Governments sledgehammer approach the landlord won’t be able to evict him for God knows how long. It’s going to cost him a fortune in lost rent, a complete nightmare for him.

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      1. Will2

        I hope you or your landlord go after this person and make them Bankrupt to stuff up their life.

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  3. Woodentop

     
    The Secretary of State, Robert Jenrick, told the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee in May 2020 that a decision on an extension would be made 12th June 2020 on the current ban on evictions, when the three-month moratorium, as set out in the Coronavirus Act is about to end.

     

    The select committee has recommended that the option to renew the moratorium for an additional six months as laid out in the Coronavirus Act is implemented and to include all notices issued for possession in 2020. The government is not obliged to listen to the select committee, but …..

     

    They have asked for all notices issued in 2020 will no longer be valid and possession proceedings will not be possible before 2nd January 2021. What is not clear, if they follow this path is, will statutory notice period have to be re-issued from 1st January 2021 if previous issued are no longer valid (null and void)?

     

    Considering on an annual basis something like over 40,000 possession orders are issued in normal times, this figure is going to hike with Coronavirus issues including the outstanding possession order claims from 2019.

     

    How on earth is the system going to cope with the mass applications in January 2021?

    Length of time to process will mean that some landlords could see no rent for 15 plus months (no rent = no buy-to-let or agents’ payments and financial distress for landlords who rely on its income e.g. pensioners/nursing care)

    “Tenant from Hell” will see this as an open book to get a free home and stop paying rent, and as these are the ones you can never chase for the arrears and only leave when you can eventually get a bailiff …… melt down.

    In the meantime, the Government is to rush the Housing Reform Bill outlawing Section 21 and reform procedures for Sec 8.
     
    Should the select committee’s recommendation go ahead, it would nuke the housing market. Many agents and landlords would fall into hardship and sour the industry to the extent that eventually many will sell up and many more will be discouraged from coming into the market.

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    1. PossessionFriendUK39

      67,000 evictions in 2019

      78% of which were by Social Housing  ( who accommodate less than the PRS   !

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