DSS tenants. Yes or No?

superscotsman

deemy2004 wrote:

DO NOT RENT OUT TO DSS TENANTS !

In my limited experience of renting out to DSS Tenants - Dirty, distructive, vandalising scum !

Well, I was brought up on a council estate, and I have worked for the DSS - or DHSS, as they were then. So I reckon that I am qualified to speak on the subject.

What Deemy says above is not politically correct; it's cruel, unkind, and if I were a landlord I wouldn't rent my property out to them either.

nmiah786

deary65 wrote:

If i sent you a letter asking you for money, would you give it to me! I don't think so.
Why, because you have no relationship with me,And its the same with the housing authority.
However,The best people to ask are the housing authorities themselves.The courts,I know, hold the law of contract to be almost sacrosanct,i.e nothing less than act of parliament "per se"can be employed to disturb it.Therefor ask them upon which legal authority they base thier demands. In other words what is your legal relationship with them. IT must be in writing or via act of parliament.

They do have a "relationship" with me....they are the one sending me the cheque every four weeks!!!!

You still havent given me anything with regards to what I asked you....rather some vague anecdote(sp?)!!!!

[Deleted User]

The recovery of overpaid HB both to a landlord or tenant comes under Section 75 of the Social Security Administration Act 1997.

It IS recoverable.

intel

Hey Im on the dole at the Mo and Ive re-decorated repaired fixtures and fittings
out of my own pocket, after landlords consent..

Its all 50/50 some good some bad.....

And deemy C'mon not all are bad.

It all comes down to what kind of ppl you are renting to, book and cover.

nmiah786

Deleted_User wrote:

The recovery of overpaid HB both to a landlord or tenant comes under Section 75 of the Social Security Administration Act 1997.

It IS recoverable.

thank you for putting things straight.....

Hope deary65 reads this!!!

Halaku

I'd just like to add that not all DSS tenants are bad. Sure some are troublemakers, but you can separate the wheat from the chaff as soon as you see them. Key things you need to be careful about is the time it takes for a DSS application to be processed (around 2-3 months), and the fact that they may run off with the cheque as soon as they get it. They can easily call and change the address the money is delivered to to themselves. So if they are applying, make sure they are paying while their application is being processed.

I'm not sure if this is PC, but immigrants also tend to be less of a hassle. Maybe its because they feel they have more to lose by ripping you off.

sooz

i would never rent to dss tenants again, and i am very apologetic when they phone in response to my ads. it is not because of the tenants. all bar one of the dss tenants i have had have been good, tidy and honest,

however, it is the councils who are scum.

the councils pay in arrears no advance
you never get a deposit off them - [although some councils are now trying to give money for deposits too.]
chack with your local council to see what the maximum they will pay for a flat/house that size in your borough - if it is a borough with cheap and expensive areas, they usually only pay the maximum for the cheap area [spoke to a councillor for one london borough recently who said the max they would offer for a 2 bed flat was 800 per month - market rate at other end of same borough is 1600!]
if your tenant wants to get a council flat, can't just give them notice. they are advised by the council to get themselves evicted, in order to move up the housing list...so you end up having to pay court costs and lost rent until they are evicted.

deary65

Deleted_User wrote:

The recovery of overpaid HB both to a landlord or tenant comes under Section 75 of the Social Security Administration Act 1997.

It IS recoverable.

I’m familiar with this act,it is a statutory modification of the common law offence of conspiracy to defraud,which is an entirely different matter.I have been discussing the recovery of money from someone with whom you have no contractual relationship..And the landlord has no contractual relationship with the benefit office whatsoever.

[Deleted User]

Are you saying that an overpayment ofHB to a landlord is NOT recoverable?

anguk

deemy2004 wrote:

DO NOT RENT OUT TO DSS TENANTS !

In my limited experience of renting out to DSS Tenants - Dirty, distructive, vandalising scum !

We've privately rented for the last 3 years and we're not dirty, destructive vandalising scum!

Our housing benefit is paid directly to our landlord, we pay the shortfall in advance every four weeks and we paid our own deposit.

I think we've been very good tenants and so does our landlord, we started out on a 6 month contract but now it just rolls on. We've done the garden, re-decorated, kept inside and out neat & tidy and do all minor repairs ourselves saving the landlord money and time.

You will get bad DSS tenants but we're not all like that and it's unfair to assume we are.