The National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) has accused Shelter of adopting an “anti-landlord” and “a disappointingly one-sided” position over Section 21 eviction claims.
The NRLA has once again criticised Shelter for scaremongering, after the homeless charity issued a press release last week claiming that Section 21 evictions are the second biggest cause of homelessness.
Almost 237,000 private renters in England have been served a Section 21 eviction notice in the past three years, a YouGov poll has suggested.
The government has already committed to ban the practice “as soon as possible”, but Shelter says people cannot wait, describing the situation as “appalling”.
Shelter CEO, Polly Neate, said: “Millions of private renters are living in limbo – never truly able to settle – in case their landlord kicks them out on a whim.”
Shelter is asking the government to use the Queen’s speech this month to honour its pledge to deliver a Renters Reform bill – including banning Section 21 so-called ‘no fault’ evictions.
But in an open letter to Shelter, Ben Beadle, chief executive of the NRLA, pointed to the fact that the vast majority of tenancies are ended by tenants rather than landlords, while pointing out that landlords often use Section 21 notices because the alternative Section 8 route “is not working as it should”.
You can read the open letter the NRLA has sent to Shelter here: https://www.nrla.org.uk/download?document=1445.
Section 21s are not evictions they are the notices of end of an agreed short term occupation, a reminder, a clarification the tenant knew the property they were occupying was not a long term home.
Instead of lobbying for changes to a system that works for 97.25% of all PRS tenancies without arrears or dispute, Shelter could put their legal minds to figuring out a system that helps persistent section 8 tenants find long term homes.
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Spot on! But of course Shelter don’t really have an interest in doing anything other than securing their own existence. £72m in revenue but no houses built, no deposits placed for struggling would-be tenants, no help with arrears and not even a hint of acting as guarantor for anyone that needs one.
And anyway, saying S21 is a cause of homelessness is like saying a P45 is a cause of unemployment. Neither of those statements are true as they are simply a process that results from something else.
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As a Scottish agent looking in from the outside I think you just have to prepare for the the inevitable, Section 21 is going.
In Scotland the same fact based arguments were made regarding our Section 33 notice, but these were completely ignored by the politicians who (surprise suprise!) took the populist route.
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Yes agreed and the irony is that it doesn’t affect the majority of tenants.
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The abolition of Sec 21 WILL affect a lot of tenants particularly those at the Benefit end of tenancies,( majority of whom will be genuine and Tenancy agreement-compliant )
Without an effective means of dealing with the minority of Rogue Tenants, [ of which Tenant support groups like Shelter don’t accept exist, and even if they did – they help them ] there will be what the Govt have now realised and termed colloquially as ” Unintended consequences “
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What happens at the end of a fixed term tenancy in Scotland Scottish Mist? What happens if an AST rolls over to periodic and there is a reasonable/ usual grounds to end a tenancy?
Surely there isn’t a charter that allows all tenants to remain in a property in perpetuity.
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Polly Bleat, said: “Millions of private renters are living in limbo – never truly able to settle – in case their landlord kicks them out on a whim.” If she genuinely believes that a landlord would give their tenant NOTICE to quit on a whim, she needs help. It is not something any landlord does on a whim. She really needs to learn that a Section 21 is a NOTICE TO QUIT, it is not an eviction notice. The woman is deluded. Glad to see someone woke Ben Beadle though.
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You are right that no landlord would evict “on a whim” but it is too often the case that a tenant can be asked to leave through no fault of their own. It’s that factor that causes the uneasiness in tenants heads. You can be a perfect tenant with intentions to live somewhere for the rest of your life and due to someone elses decision you could be asked to move house with all the hassle that brings.
I stand by my pledge to never ever issue any of my tenants a Section 21 notice. I want them to have the security that they can live there as long as they wish.
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If they want that level of security, then they need to buy their own home. No sensible landlord can pledge never to issue a Section 21 – circumstances change.
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@AcornRnuts, – Yes – but where the hell have the NRLA been all these years ( and I wonder what ‘ woke them up ‘ ?
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Well Propertymark could always open membership to landords. That would wake up Ben.
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They have on a number of occasions spoken up for landlords – so that might well be the awakening that caused this ?
I reckon if they opened membership to landlords – they’d get a bigger membership than NRLA !!!
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That was the point I was tryng to make. I suspect that were they to do so, the NRLA would disappear quite quickly. Especially if they agreed to transfer NRLA members.
I would be worried if I was Ben.
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Never ever for decades found a landlord kick out a tenant for no fault.
And why can a property owner who has leased their property short term, not ask for it back one day, for whatever reason? Tenant are always aware that the tenancy is not permanent.
The only people I see Shelter helping are the tenant no landlords wants and many of them are kicked out from social housing!
Banning ‘Sec 21’ has not stopped the eviction process, only delayed the inevitable and often at considerable cost to the landlord who then leaves the market and we all know whats happening with shortage of stock.
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@Woodentop – Exactly, All landlords want is a teant who pays rent and looks after the property. !
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