Made a mess of being a Landlord

silvercar

You have two options:

either return the deposit and right off the damage and the missing rent or

protect the deposit quickly and then claim off it for the damage and the missing rent.

In either case you still have the option of pursuing the guarantor for the missing rent and damages, though whether you will get it will depend if the guarantor wants to avoid a CCJ or has a property. If you didn't check your guarantor properly then they may be useless to you.

In the same way that an eviction can only take place by order of the court then the 3 times deposit penalty can only be awarded by the court. The tenants asking you to pay them 3 x deposit is as worthless as you asking them to leave. No obligation unless backed up by a court.

Try the forums on landlordzone.co.uk/forums. There are people on there who have experience of the 3 x deposit court cases. It only occasionally succeeds.

980233

potzer wrote: »

and put my premiums up? this is why I had a guarantor and (ok it wasn't protected but....) a deposit.

so for one mistake, I'm possibly looking at losing out on £2500 in lost income/owed monies and £3150 for non-protection of deposit... and then I'm expected to claim on my insurance for these toerags for not looking after the property?

There doens't seem to be much in the line of justice or fairness.

You sir are a clown of the highest order for failing to see the foolishness in your last statement. You moan about justice and fairness when you acted illegally as a landlord and failed the basic action of protecting their deposit. Its there precisely to protect tenants from shysters like yourself.

As it stand the only justice that has been breached has been the tenants with you serving an invalid section 21 on them and illegally evicting them. You have zero chance of protecting the deposit now they have left and they realise they hold you by the short and curlies.

I really hope they take you all the way and get what they are entitled to and provide you with a short sharp dose of reality. Crying on here whilst basically being a slum landlord acting beyond the scope of the law.

No wonder they realise you can't touch them and they have a mini windfall coming their way.

A fool and his money are easily parted in this case.

Imp

silvercar wrote: »

In either case you still have the option of pursuing the guarantor for the missing rent and damages, though whether you will get it will depend if the guarantor wants to avoid a CCJ or has a property. If you didn't check your guarantor properly then they may be useless to you.

As long as the guarantor agreement was signed and witnessed as a deed, and they had full visibility of the tenancy agreement before signing the guarantee.

I'd get yourself over onto Landlordzone and ask what to do over there. They will tell you the same, only use few words doing so.

moromir

Whilst I cannot offer any advice on this particular situation, you have made a mistake, a bad one, but you have realised it and you are asking for advice on how to fix it so that gets marks in my book, its all to easy to get swept up in the emotion of whats happening and say things in the heat of the moment, I know it can be disheartening to see your ex-home damaged. Please ignore the scare mongering tactics of a certain new member, he seems to be carrying a very big chip on his shoulder.

N97 offers excellent advice, I'm not writing off new members completely but we have some excellent well informed members in this section of the board, and as a hint, they all have high post counts and 'thanks' counts.

I hope you are able to resolve your situation.

980233

moromir wrote: »

Whilst I cannot offer any advice on this particular situation, you have made a mistake, a bad one, but you have realised it and you are asking for advice on how to fix it so that gets marks in my book, its all to easy to get swept up in the emotion of whats happening and say things in the heat of the moment, I know it can be disheartening to see your ex-home damaged. Please ignore the scare mongering tactics of a certain new member, he seems to be carrying a very big chip on his shoulder.

N97 offers excellent advice, I'm not writing off new members completely but we have some excellent well informed members in this section of the board, and as a hint, they all have high post counts and 'thanks' counts.

I hope you are able to resolve your situation.

I have no chip on any shoulder and being new doesn't preclude me from making an opinion.
I was merely making a point in the similar fashion as the OP was talking about criminal damage, small claims courts and calling these illegally evicted tenants some non too pleasant names.
Having a small post count so far doesn't make me fail to see all the advice given about retrospective lodging of soon to be lost deposit is a wrong thing to advice considering they have been kicked out. Morally wrong and I await the legal side of that before passing comment on the validity. I see one scheme has already turned him away.

sequence

How much is the rent ? Just wondering where you're getting 2500 from!

BTW, you should give up on the monies, tenants have you here and it's all your fault.

Also you just be mitigating your losses a court won't accept you wasting time posting here when you should have new tenants already moved in
It takes at most a week to replace the floor shelves and kitchen so you have little excuse there.

Zelie

moromir wrote: »

Whilst I cannot offer any advice on this particular situation, you have made a mistake, a bad one, but you have realised it and you are asking for advice on how to fix it so that gets marks in my book, its all to easy to get swept up in the emotion of whats happening and say things in the heat of the moment, I know it can be disheartening to see your ex-home damaged. Please ignore the scare mongering tactics of a certain new member, he seems to be carrying a very big chip on his shoulder.

N97 offers excellent advice, I'm not writing off new members completely but we have some excellent well informed members in this section of the board, and as a hint, they all have high post counts and 'thanks' counts.

I hope you are able to resolve your situation.

It usually would in my book too but the OP seems to be more focused on finding a new way to wriggle out of his responsibilities than he is on complying with the law. Repeatedly trying to blame others for one's own mistakes is extremely juvenile behaviour and the OP would do well to get their head out of their backside and start reading up on how they should be complying with the law!

princeofpounds

N79 is the only person to have given you the proper advice here on the deposit.

Quick history - at first courts were unwilling to award 3x penalties when compliance was late. When it was quickly realised that was far too lenient on landlords and not in line with the law then most courts started to award the penalties. None of these were at a level high enough to set precedent.

Then a few months ago one case was appealed and a first precedent has been set. It's a bit technical, but basically it states that you can only be held to the penalty if you failed to fulfil the initial conditions of the tenancy deposit schemes themselves. Only one of the schemes, the DPS, actually made on-time compliance part of their internal conditions (mostly it was assumed this was a requirement under the law, which it turned out not to be) and they only did this after many months.

So currently most landlords will get away without the penalty if they comply late. Now this is known it is quite likely the schemes will adapt their requirements at some point - as has been pointed out one already has, so you don't want to pick that one.

There is a nice explanation of all the developments on nearlylegal.co.uk if you look up the 'tenancy deposit schemes' key phrase.

princeofpounds

Oh, and ignore pyueck and the Hugh Jarce sockpuppet(?). Serving an incorrect notice is nothing like illegal eviction and you will not get in trouble for it.

However, without a proper notice you can't even begin the process to get them out. Protect the deposit, re-issue the S21 and also S8 if possible.

Make sure you have your dates etc. correct on the notices. Visit landlordzone for a guide to the process.

princeofpounds

http://nearlylegal.co.uk/blog/2010/02/two-weeks-three-months-whatever-tds-in-the-high-court/

link to a discussion of the draycott case.