Rent Arrears and eviction Help!

preable

Hi

To cut a long story short housing benift have not paid me for 3 months and now the landlord want there money or they will evict me.

I have a shorthold Tenancy agreement which is 6 months and i have lived in the flat for 4 months.

What rights do i have regarding eviction ect. Can they just throw me out or is there a notice they have to serve.

Please help

thanks

princeofpounds

As you are on an AST, the landlord can only evict you with a court order. This can be obtained either through

- a section 21 (2 months notice and outside your 6 month fixed term, but you might even have been served one of these on day one - do check)
- a section 8 (rent is two months overdue)

After the notice is served the landlord can apply to the court. This will take several weeks. You can then turn up and make a defence. If you lose then the order will be granted and you will have several more weeks before the bailiffs turn up.

So you are looking at 2-4 months before you will be on the street depending on exactly where you are in the process.

You can't defend against a section 21 (it is their right to end the tenancy) but you can against a section 8 (if you are not too far overdue, have a very good excuse and a plan to get back on track the judge might give you a chance - or you can just get under 2 months overdue before the court date).

All your questions can be answered be the charity Shelter, who will give you free advice. Call them and/or visit their website.

teeni

THey have to serve you withnotice or itwill br an unlawful eviction, which one will depend on whether they want to use rent arrears as the reason for eviction or just give 2 months notice. look at the shelter website for more infoor ring shelter line

princeofpounds

Oh, and if you haven't made yourself intentionally homeless then the council will have an obligation to help rehouse you (does not mean council house, could mean hostel).

BitterAndTwisted

Please try not to focus on the landlord and the arrears but to focus entirely on why your local authority are risking you being evicted for not sorting your housing benefit. If you have to, take time off work (if you're working) and get down to their offices and get this sorted asap

G_M

But bear in mind none of this is your landlord's fault! He's relying on your rent and he's entitled to it.

I sympathise with your predicament, losing your HB, but why should it be your LL who bears the loss?

What have you done in the last 3 months? Are you 3 months in arrears? You must have know this was going to happen. Have you discussed it with your LL or just hidden your head in the sand and hoped your LL would do nothing?

preable

Well at first i didnt know anything untill me money didnt go into my account so i rang them the day after and tryed to get things sorted out but they say there investigating me for some reason. (I have done nothing wrong)

I have tryed to talk to my landlord but they say i have untill today to pay then he walked off. So i dont know what will happen tonight.

What should i say to him that he needs to give me a section 8??

I just dont know whats going to happen. He comes round evreynight around 5pm then comes back at 8pm.

PasturesNew

princeofpounds wrote: »

Oh, and if you haven't made yourself intentionally homeless then the council will have an obligation to help rehouse you (does not mean council house, could mean hostel).

If you are single, then this has tended to mean that they'll give you a list of B&Bs. A recent "mystery shopping" study was done by Crisis with single people being sent to the council to ask for help and they were dismissed without even a list in most instances. Councils have never been interested in single people who don't have somewhere to stay and in most cases in the study they didn't even ASK the person if they were vulnerable, just sent them packing. Here's one link about it: http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/story.aspx?storycode=6507894

In many instances the mystery shoppers, posing as homeless people, were given incorrect advice or not even allowed to see a housing officer.

BitterAndTwisted

Don't tell your landlord about either the S21 or S8. If he doesn't know about them then he can't serve them, can he?

Get down to the housing office and see if you can force them to open up this investigation and allow you to answer any allegations. If you haven't done anything then it should be quite simple to resolve. Sitting around waiting while your landlord harasses you won't get the ruddy rent paid

preable

Im going to the housing office tommrow to try and get this mess sorted out.

What can i say if he comes and says move out now ect. Because thats what i think he is going to say soon.

He cant legaly throw me out can he?

preable

Just had a phone call and he is on his way over