Cannot afford the rent.

RobOwen_2

Hi all, im hoping that someone out there can give me advice...

I am dyspraxic and find it difficult to keep on top of things without having them written down or recieving reminders to pay a bill which i do immediately.
I have a landlord who gets his money from his rental agents who get their money of me, our landlord has no problem with me, infact he was round yesterday to go about fixing a broken lock.

Basicly, my last rent payment was in November, so i now owe Dec, Jan & Feb. During this time i had absolutely no corrospondance or phonecalls until 2 weeks ago, where the phone call was off the director of the company telling me to basicly "pay up NOW while im on the phone or i will take you to court"
This was out of the blue to me as i had presumed my partner had payed Dec + Jan, but as i said i've had NO letters at all from them. I said that i was dyspraxic and i would LOVE some letters or phonecalls from them before it gets to this stage, i also managed to stop her from taking court action by promising £900 when we got paid.
(Our rent incidently is £450)

Bad luck struck and i had to pay £210 in bank charges after a well known clothing company ****ed up our order. (It was neccessary due to work)

She called back today and asked why i hadnt called which is simply because "you said you would call on the date i gave you and i've still recieved no letters , but i can pay now". So she gleefully asked for my card details and for how much for, to which i said £650 due to unforseen costs.

She said "Oh that's fine, as long as you realise that i will be kicking you out"
"What, sorry?"
"Yes, you are behind in payments, so i'll be sending the court papers off today to get you removed. Anyways, how much are you paying today?"

That is what she actually said.

I hung up on her, turned my phone off, and i've been shocked and upset for around 8 hours now. Just scenarios in my head playing havoc with my mind, like how i cant afford to pay for taxis if i need to move anywhere else, im only on minimum wage doing 30 hours and that goes for my partner too. Can i get an extra job? Can we save anywhere else? Is there anyone that we can get away with not paying this month to cover just this months rent?

Can anyone help? Im desperate.

Oldernotwiser

Why did you assume your parner had paid the rent? If s/he was supposed to do so, why hasn't s/he done so and what has s/he done with the rent money?

anotherpaul_2

I'm assuming it was the agent you spoke to? If you're on good terms with the landlord, it might be worth talking to him and explaining. I'm pretty sure (and I'll probably get corrected for being wrong) that it's the landlord's decision whether to evict you, not the letting agents. Technically, the landlord pays the fees to the letting agent, not you.

He may be more understanding - or the letting agent may just have been making threats to get you to pay.

RobOwen_2

Oldernotwiser wrote: »

Why did you assume your parner had paid the rent? If s/he was supposed to do so, why hasn't s/he done so and what has s/he done with the rent money?

She paid off her overdue credit cards which she has now cut up, there was a mix-up in communication as we were going through a bad patch at the time.

RobOwen_2

anotherpaul wrote: »

I'm assuming it was the agent you spoke to? If you're on good terms with the landlord, it might be worth talking to him and explaining. I'm pretty sure (and I'll probably get corrected for being wrong) that it's the landlord's decision whether to evict you, not the letting agents. Technically, the landlord pays the fees to the letting agent, not you.

He may be more understanding - or the letting agent may just have been making threats to get you to pay.

It was the director/Manager of the branch that i spoke to, i believe the company to be members of the OEM so they are in breach of the OEM rules, specificly

"9a You must use reasonable endeavours to obtain prompt rental payments from tenants in line with their tenancy agreement.
9b You must have procedures in place to notify both client and tenant (and guarantor if relevant) in a timely manner, of rent that has become appreciably overdue – and take suitable steps to notify rental warranty insurers (if appropriate) as necessary."

As i was saying, no phone calls or corrospondance in 3 months.

What im worried about is if i talk to my landlord and he says to pack my things too.

Zelie

Re your memory problems. You sound like the type of person who needs to learn to be hyper-organised.

Get a diary, carry it everywhere. Write things down immediately they happen. Then get into the routine of looking at it every, single day at a particular time. Pay attention to what you have to do that day and also for the rest of the week. Don't be caught unawares by stuff.

You can also help yourself by inserting countdowns. So if you are due to have paid a bill on the 28th of the month then write it on the 28th and also write 'bill for x due in ONE week' on the 21st.

You CANNOT rely on people getting !!!!ed off and sending you reminders for things. It's not their job to chase you up for money you owe. That includes relying on your partner to pay for things - if something needs paying then decide between you who is responsible. If it's you then it goes in the diary. You MUST start sorting this problem or you're only going to get in the same mess again.

Good luck with the housing situation. If I were you I'd try to build bridges with the landlord but also look around for new accomodation just in case. If you can be accomodating to the landlord about leaving then they might give you a good reference for another place.

fimonkey

Zelie makes a good point! I am 'scatty'. I only survive by writing everything down and I work on the mantra that if I didn;t write it down then it didn't happen! (the way my brain works).

It doesn't help your current predicament so apologies for sounding sanctimonious, but I'm trying to say that keeping a small notepad with you for when you're out and about, then transfering daily to a diary and reading the diary is an easy technique. Hey if you're IT literate, a PDA may be the way to go!

Good luck

DawnW

OP, just a thought, are you eligible for any benefits or tax credits if you are disabled and on minimum wage? CAB will help you check if you contact them.

Zelie's idea of writing everything down is a good one - many of us have to do that in order to remember things (I certainly do). As for your present problem, why not ring Shelter and ask for advice? If you are making efforts to repay the rent owed, the LL may give you another chance but you will need to contact him with a definite plan of how you are going to do it. If you get on ok with him and you explain it was a mistake, and show that you are doing all you can to put it right, he might prefer that to the risk of getting new tenants, and the expense of all the credit checks etc. Remember that your rent and council tax are FAR more important than credit card bills!

If it does gets to court, the judge or magistrate (?) is likely to be lenient if you explain your disability, show you are making an effort etc. Shelter may support you in this.

clutton_2

a LL cannot take you to court if you owe less than 2 months rent - i suggest you pay as much as you can, and pay off some arrears next month.

N79

DawnW wrote: »

If it does gets to court, the judge or magistrate (?) is likely to be lenient if you explain your disability, show you are making an effort etc. Shelter may support you in this.

Unfortunately while the court may wish to be lenient (it would be a judge), if two months rent is unpaid at time of service and hearing then the court must award possession to the LL and evict the T. There is no discretion available to the courts.

N79

clutton wrote: »

a LL cannot take you to court if you owe less than 2 months rent - i suggest you pay as much as you can, and pay off some arrears next month.

What happened to taking a T to court under S8 G10 and G11 Clutton? (I know that in reality such a case is unlikely to result in a possession order.)