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franklee

clutton wrote: »

franklee says

""I am a good tenant yet having a possession hearing go against me ""

if you are a good tenant then you will not have to go to court because no application will be made to get you out..

Correct if the landlord has served a S21 giving a proper two months notice as I will move in that time. But as you know a landlord who uses the "Sword of Damocles" (SoD) method of serving the S21 (that is to serve the S21 and then tell the tenant some variation of "don't worry this notice is just routine") is acting to deprive the tenant of their two months notice. If the tenant is served an S21 and then told by the agent or landlord it's OK to ignore it then the tenant won't move out in the last two months the S21 gives. Therefore the landlord/agent can action the S21 without further notice at any date after the notice period when they choose so the tenant would face court action.

Now you say a landlord would not action the SoD S21 against a "good" tenant but the S21 is not limited by a tenant's behaviour. Therefore it can be used against a tenant who is asking for repairs a LL does not wish to do, a tenant who refuses a rent increase, one who objects to LL visits without notice, one who is in the way of a landlord who wished to sell up or in fact anything you care to name as the S21 doesn't require a tenant to be at fault.

Really you know full well the SoD S21 is meant to speed up getting the property back by getting the LL's two months notice out of the way as early as possible as routine whist encouraging the tenant to remain. This leaves the LL free to action the S21 at a later date without the inconvenience of waiting two months once the LL chooses he wants the tenant to go. You know the S21 notice doesn't need the tenant to be at fault. Put those two together and ANY tenant needs to wary of the Sword of Damocles S21 as the S21 could be actioned at at any time after the notice period is up regardless of if the tenant is at fault or not, regardless if of the landlord hinted the tenant could stay on.

As you posted before one of your tenants was surprised at just how quickly you could get her out not having realised that she had already had her notice.

There is nothing wrong with the S21 if the LL serves it when he has decided he really wants his property back. However to serve it to all tenants just in case while telling them it's OK it's just for insurance, routine, a precaution or similar is using loopholes in the law to deny those tenants, good, bad or ugly, their two months notice. Really we both know that full well so why hide it?

madeupname1

franklee wrote: »

Now you say a landlord would not action the SoD S21 against a "good" tenant but the S21 is not limited by a tenant's behaviour. Therefore it can be used against a tenant who is asking for repairs a LL does not wish to do, a tenant who refuses a rent increase, one who objects to LL visits without notice, one who is in the way of a landlord who wished to sell up or in fact anything you care to name as the S21 doesn't require a tenant to be at fault.

If the tenancy agreement is come to an end, why should the LL be required to allow the tenants to stay if they cant agree terms on pretty fundamental things like rent? Why should he not be allowed to seek vacated premises in order to sell his house (given that alot of tenants will refuse to allow viewings whilst they are still in occupation). Your LL may well be unreasonable - visits without notice are out of order - but s21 is the only way a LLs have to get their property back without having to prove a breach from the T and can only be exercised when the tenancy agreement has come to an end.

RobertoMoir

madeupname1 wrote: »

If the tenancy agreement is come to an end, why should the LL be required to allow the tenants to stay if they cant agree terms on pretty fundamental things like rent? Why should he not be allowed to seek vacated premises in order to sell his house (given that alot of tenants will refuse to allow viewings whilst they are still in occupation). Your LL may well be unreasonable - visits without notice are out of order - but s21 is the only way a LLs have to get their property back without having to prove a breach from the T and can only be exercised when the tenancy agreement has come to an end.

So what do you propose that is fair to both parties? Serving a S21 at the start of a tenancy puts, imho, a strain on the tenant that is unfair. Not allowing the LL to serve one easily when one is genuinely needed is obviously unfair to the LL.

franklee

madeupname1 wrote: »

If the tenancy agreement is come to an end, why should the LL be required to allow the tenants to stay if they cant agree terms on pretty fundamental things like rent? Why should he not be allowed to seek vacated premises in order to sell his house (given that alot of tenants will refuse to allow viewings whilst they are still in occupation). Your LL may well be unreasonable - visits without notice are out of order - but s21 is the only way a LLs have to get their property back without having to prove a breach from the T and can only be exercised when the tenancy agreement has come to an end.

If the landlord wants the tenant to go for any reason then of course he can and should be able to serve a S21 giving two months notice. I've no problem with that as it's a fundamental of an AST.

What I object to is the SoD method of on the one hand serving the S21 asking for possession at the end of the fixed term whilst on the other hand telling the tenant he can stay. That way the tenant doesn't use the notice period to arrange moving. Then if there is a disagreement later on or the landlord just wants the tenant to leave he can start court action immediately any time after the fixed terms ends without having to give the tenant any notice at all.

If the tenancy goes periodic the LL can action the S21 months after the S21 notice period was over. Most tenants believe they have a right to be given two months notice, but they don't if the landlord uses the SoD!

If a new fixed term is agreed then the old S21 is void but the SoD LL just then serves another one. This leaves a tenant needing to be ready to move every six months/year just in case there will be no new fixed term offered. If the landlord served the S21 only when he wanted possession the tenant would not have that uncertainty as he would know the S21 was meant and know when to start getting ready to move. That's what the notice period is meant to be for after all.

franklee

RobertoMoir wrote: »

So what do you propose that is fair to both parties? Serving a S21 at the start of a tenancy puts, imho, a strain on the tenant that is unfair. Not allowing the LL to serve one easily when one is genuinely needed is obviously unfair to the LL.

IMO If the landlord acts in any way to give the tenant permission to stay then the current S21 should become void and the landlord should need to serve a fresh one when he wants the tenant to go.

N79

An interesting discussion. Just my two pennies worth.

The elephant in the room is S21. If you abolish S21 then most of the problems go away (including those raised by our angry OP). The reality is that a number of poor and downright crooked LLs use S21 to avoid their obligations by getting rid of a "difficult" T. No amount of new quangoes or arbitration schemes will change that - they will just cost all Ts, even those with good LLs, extra money. The simple solution is to get rid of S21 altogether.

Replace it with a family occupancy lause (use the same wording as the mandatory possession grounds in the rent acts) but extended to allow a LL to give 6 (no typo - gives T plenty of notice) months notice to allow occupancy by the LL or their family. Keep the current S8 grounds for major repair works.

What knock on effects does this have?

1) Rent assessments. Change the rules on S13 referals to committee such that all referals for rent increase of less than say RPI + 2% are automatically rejected. This will let the market stop rents ratcheting up and will end the problem of LL's falling into the trap of ever decreasing rents.

2) Antisocial Ts. Split S8G14 into a mandatory and discretionary ground 14a would be discretionary and on a balance of probabilities and 14b mandatory. I could even just about cope with allowing councils and the police to issue notices in cases where the LL wont (although my principles shudder at the thought).

The other big issue is repairing obligations. We started off with T's having repairing obligations and no security and got much maligned Rachmann practices (who, not being a member of the establishment, was just the estabishments scapegoat for practices that the establishment were merely practising themselves - others were far more culpable and nasty than he was). Then we got security of tenure and LL repairing obligations and few LL's (what a surprise). Then we had LL repairing obligations and no security of tenure - nearly full circle.

What we never tried was a split of repairing obligations between LL and T. Minor repairs = T's responsiblity, structural and major repairs = LL's responsiblity. Believe it or not this sort of split is actually the European norm rather than England's 20th century flip flop knee jerk reaction changes ever decade or so. Obviously there are disputes on the boundary but imagine how many fewer threads here from Ts complaining that their LL wants to come in to do the boiler service or the contractors want to come at an inconvenient time etc. Now the T would be responsible for these minor maintainance tasks and could organise them themselves - just like a home owner. Ultimately this would lead to lower rents because LL's costs will be down and because we could have a bonfire of the red tape and rules that has driven up rental costs in the last few decades to deal with the problem of the fact that we took away a T's responsibility for their own wellbeing.

Yes these changes would end the amateur LL who lets their house for a few months because they cant sell but, quite frankly, I think that is a good thing for two reasons. The first is that it removes some of my competition. The second, and main reason, is that it removes LL's who have no intention of providing long term housing stock, thus again helping people who want to rent long term.

tbs624

franklee wrote: »

If the landlord wants the tenant to go for any reason then of course he can and should be able to serve a S21 giving two months notice. I've no problem with that as it's a fundamental of an AST.

What I object to is the SoD method of on the one hand serving the S21 asking for possession at the end of the fixed term whilst on the other hand telling the tenant he can stay. That way the tenant doesn't use the notice period to arrange moving. Then if there is a disagreement later on or the landlord just wants the tenant to leave he can start court action immediately any time after the fixed terms ends without having to give the tenant any notice at all. [/quote} I agree with your viewpoint but this thread shows why LLs try to protect themselves (have every sympathy with the OP in the thread, as problem is not of their own making , but then neither is it of his/her current LLs.)

madeupname1

RobertoMoir wrote: »

So what do you propose that is fair to both parties? Serving a S21 at the start of a tenancy puts, imho, a strain on the tenant that is unfair. Not allowing the LL to serve one easily when one is genuinely needed is obviously unfair to the LL.

Maybe a provision that, once a Section 21 notice is served it can't be revoked except with the express written agreement of both parties.

madeupname1

franklee wrote: »

IMO If the landlord acts in any way to give the tenant permission to stay then the current S21 should become void and the landlord should need to serve a fresh one when he wants the tenant to go.

The L and the T (probably the L) will then get into all sorts of both having to shor that he didn't act in such a way as to give the tenant the impression that the S21 would be void. I suggest that maybe a fair balance would be to provide that once a section 21 is given it can't be revoked except with the express written agreement with both parties.

<sebb>

If a tenant has a S21 hanging over you as "back-up" for the landlord, does that mean the tenant can just leave whenever they like without notice, and say they were just following the order of the S21?