One of our tenants never moved in and now owes 9 months rent

tbs624

williham wrote: »

We all paid £300, they were scheme registered but we haven't received any information.

Do you have a deposit certificate or deposit ID number? If not, how do you know that it has been registered? Check here and insist that the LL/LA gives you the relevant info, as required to by law.

williham wrote: »

What's a HMO :P

House In Mulitple Occupation. Go onto your local council website and search for HMOs - it will tell you the broad definition of an HMO and whether your Council has additional/discretionary licensing rules in place in addition to the mandatory ones.

Have you or the LA/LL tried contacting this girl via her parent's address? The reason I mentioned about facebook etc is that some people leave very useful info on their pages.

williham

I've just contacted them and they've waived 6 of the 7 late payment fees so that's ok. Also got the deposit id which i've been meaning to get for a while.

Out of interest, how does the money get returned to the tennants with the DPS? My girlfriend is the lead tennant so she will be the one that logs on to confirm the payments. Will we be able to keep her deposit?

Also, they said they have sent a letter to all the addresses they have for her asking her to pay.

Geenie

williham wrote: »

I've just contacted them and they've waived 6 of the 7 late payment fees so that's ok. Also got the deposit id which i've been meaning to get for a while.

Out of interest, how does the money get returned to the tennants with the DPS? My girlfriend is the lead tennant so she will be the one that logs on to confirm the payments. Will we be able to keep her deposit?

Also, they said they have sent a letter to all the addresses they have for her asking her to pay.

When your girlfriend logs on to claim her deposit back, the LL will also be contacted to respond to the claim and if they want to dispute anything. Until both parties are in agreement about what is owed or not, nothing will be returned. It will go to an adjudicator who decides, or a court as a last resort.

sunnysea83

tbs624 wrote: »

Do you have a deposit certificate or deposit ID number? If not, how do you know that it has been registered? Check here and insist that the LL/LA gives you the relevant info, as required to by law.

House In Mulitple Occupation. Go onto your local council website and search for HMOs - it will tell you the broad definition of an HMO and whether your Council has additional/discretionary licensing rules in place in addition to the mandatory ones.

Have you or the LA/LL tried contacting this girl via her parent's address? The reason I mentioned about facebook etc is that some people leave very useful info on their pages.

for a HMO I believe there has to be 3 or more floors

williham

We have three floors if the attic counts.

For the deposits - after we are in agreement with the letting agency, how does it get returned to the different tennants. Can we return none atall to one person and more to others?

Beardmidget

I suppose that depends on how it was paid to the lettings agents!

They would, I'm sure, be compliant with a friendly suggestion that they might like to return deposits to everyone else but this girl.

If it all got paid across to one person and you didn't pay her back- would she sue you for it?? If she tried to, you'd be laughing as you could then launch a countersuit connected with the details of her claim.

tbs624

Williham - did you check with your council website re the HMO licensing rules in your specific area?

It's more complex than simply "3 floors" : as I mentioned before, there are HMOs that do not need to be licensed because they fall under discretionary licensing rules, there are those that are subject to mandatory licensing and some councils have additional licensing for specific area (applies in parts of Manchester, for example).

HMOs are subject to a whole raft of very speicfic regs designed to help ensure the potential safety of unrelated groups of people living together.

The key reason it could be worth your while properly checking this one through is that if this property *should* have been registered as an HMO, and has not been, then you could all receive your rent back under a Rent Repayment Order.

whitewing

Williham,

Have you tried seeking advice from your Student Union or whoever it is responsible for student welfare? There must be someone from the Uni who should be able to give you some free guidance. You can't be expected to know everything when you're living away from home for the first time.

williham

tbs624 wrote: »

Williham - did you check with your council website re the HMO licensing rules in your specific area?

It's more complex than simply "3 floors" : as I mentioned before, there are HMOs that do not need to be licensed because they fall under discretionary licensing rules, there are those that are subject to mandatory licensing and some councils have additional licensing for specific area (applies in parts of Manchester, for example).

HMOs are subject to a whole raft of very speicfic regs designed to help ensure the potential safety of unrelated groups of people living together.

The key reason it could be worth your while properly checking this one through is that if this property *should* have been registered as an HMO, and has not been, then you could all receive your rent back under a Rent Repayment Order.

There's a license from the council downstairs so I think it probably is registered, but I'll look in to it.

williham

whitewing wrote: »

Williham,

Have you tried seeking advice from your Student Union or whoever it is responsible for student welfare? There must be someone from the Uni who should be able to give you some free guidance. You can't be expected to know everything when you're living away from home for the first time.

Yes, we're meeting on Tuesday, they said if they can't help then they have solicitors that give free advice.