BTL or lease without the banks knowlege?

franklee

clutton wrote: »

Moneypenny says ""Do you check that landlords have Consent to Let when you rent houses out? Do you check the landlord hasn't had a reposession order served on the property before you rent it out?"

as you know i am both a LL and a tenant (from a year ago). When i chose to become a tenant i did not ask any of the prospective landlords if they have permission to let -

Why ? - i work on the basis that bad landlords are such a small minority of total landlords that i choose to trust individual people i associate with...

i dont choose to go through life believing that everyone i meet is out to shaft me....

Yes there are bad landlords, accountants, butchers - thats how our society has become...

I don't think this issue is necessarily down to bad landlords, I think it comes down to two factors:

1. Landlords who do not realise the impact lack of consent to let has for the tenant. Mainly talking about newbie landlords here although some of the older hands don't realise either as we have seen from this thread.

2. Accidental landlords who are in debt, or soon to be in debt, who are naive and underestimate the costs of being a landlord.

So I'm not saying they set out to shaft the tenant, more that they set out thinking it will be OK as they can handle the mortgage debt and then something goes wrong they didn't anticipate, voids, previous bad tenants, loss of job etc. and they fall behind with the mortgage payments.

I think we do both agree a landlord should have circa six months rent as contingency. I wonder if the accidental landlords, especially those who cannot afford to get consent to let have that? I doubt it or then they could afford the relatively small costs consent to let brings.

When a landlord references a tenant it's all about managing the risk and choosing the tenant likely to be a good one and not cause problems. It's not that the landlord thinks every tenant is out to shaft them, it's just the landlord knows what can go wrong and wants to avoid it. When asking about consent to let as a tenant I'm simply doing the same, managing the risks I'm taking, trying to avoid problems. After all I'm handing over about 9K per year and want a hassle free roof over my head.

Idonex

A consent to let from the Halifax is the same as their BTL anyway, minus the LTV requirements. They'll make you switch to a new fixed mortgage (for 2years they told us) , charge you a fee ( was around £1250 ) and move you to the higher rate. It was 5.84% 6 months ago but I think it's about 6.24% at the moment. Other lenders have different requirements. If you're on 1% plus base now then their CTL will hurt.

MissMoneypenny

clutton wrote: »

Moneypenny says

MissMoneypenny wrote: »

Do you check that landlords have Consent to Let when you rent houses out? Do you check the landlord hasn't had a reposession order served on the property before you rent it out? Or do you just let the tenant and their family, take the gamble that a landlord is not behind with his mortgage payments?

clutton wrote: »

as you know i am both a LL and a tenant (from a year ago).

And I assume, a letting agent? You asked me before if one of your LLs had to reveal his address to his tenant.

clutton wrote: »

When i chose to become a tenant i did not ask any of the prospective landlords if they have permission to let -

Why ? - i work on the basis that bad landlords are such a small minority of total landlords that i choose to trust individual people i associate with...

i dont choose to go through life believing that everyone i meet is out to shaft me....

Yes there are bad landlords, accountants, butchers - thats how our society has become...

So I'll take that as a "no" to my original questions?

CloudCuckooLand

Why worry that your Lender might put up the rate - you will pass it onto the tenant, anyway.

BTL is a sure-fire money-making machine, after all.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

I'd be most worried that, in the event of my perfect tenant accidentally torching the entire place, that, not only did my insurance turn out to be invalid, that the bank found out I was defrauding them of their higher BTL interest rates...

Just doesn't seem worth the risk to me.

benjo

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

I'd be most worried that, in the event of my perfect tenant accidentally torching the entire place, that, not only did my insurance turn out to be invalid, that the bank found out I was defrauding them of their higher BTL interest rates...

Just doesn't seem worth the risk to me.

Couldnt agree more jojo, accidents happen, you pay insurance to cover those accidents only to find out you are not really insured!

chappers

As I said before if you let your property you get the right sort of insurance.
resident owner insurance would probably be invalid if your tenants torched the place but proper BTL/LL insurance wouldn't.

I refer you to the catch phrase of our friendly meerkat

nollag2006

Hi mountaingirl - what did you decide to do in the end?

I don't think the consent issue should be a blocker.

There are some useful comments here about obtaining landlords property insurance, and informing the tax man though