I'm seething....

minnymoney

I have moved into a flat and received LHA. The rent is £600 and I have arranged for my landlady to received the payments. Originally it was advertised as £550, but when I met her she put it up to £600 to cover her insurance she told me. I was desperate as I had been served notice for a damp property. I have an AST on this property ( which i bought at WHsmith)
My council has explained they make 13 payments a year instead of 12 and I have a shortfall which I pay from my benefits.
We figured how much I need to pay and this is what is happening to keep in line with their payments of a 4 week cycle. I understand that sometimes payments vary due to length of months and she will receive some payments early and some late. She receives £553 apprx every 4wks.
My landlady is not happy but there is not much I can do about this now she thinks I'm being difficult and thinks I'm not paying.
I did the numbers and if I pay her the shortfall to match £600 an lunar month instead of the councils 4 week cycle, I will over pay her by £600 a year and she will have to pay me back.
I can't make her understand that she is receiving her money. She is angry because I don't want to talk to her because she doesn't listen an overtalks me, but I have asked her repeatedly to put things in writing as I have done. She refuses to do so and keeps saying we are friends. I have said that friends and business must be kept separate and I need our agreements or requests in writing. She refuses.
She keeps calling and once even discussed this with my son a minor which I found inappropriate. She calls me inappropriate times which is not acceptable. If she wrote she would not need to call and it got to the point I can't even answer my phone in case it is her.
I had to get the tenancy agreement as she did not know what she was doing and my deposit is still not in a protected scheme as she doesn't know how to do it. I can't make her understand this is business. She thinks that verbal is fine but in my experience (police officer). it isn't as she has no evidence. I have documented everything.
I get the impression she just wants the £600 with out the responsibility of a tenant just to pay for her own money problems...I feel like the landlady! Why she doesn't have legal support I don't know.
I'm going to the CAB about a DRO due to debts from illness and studying and really trying to keep myself on the straight and narrow as money it tight on benefits and single mum.
This worries me as I have only been here since mid July and all I have had from her is aggravation and her projecting her anxiety on to me.
I fear she will evicted me and I want to know where I stand with this. As far as I'm concerned I'm paying what I should be and the numbers work out, am I wrong? Is the council wrong?
Any advice would be so happily to take...
I don't want to be homeless twice in one year!

pinkshoes

Could the council not pay you the money, and you pay her £600 every calendar month?

BitterAndTwisted

Don't talk to her just send her a letter detailing how the council pay four-weekly instead of calender monthly and how you propose to pay the £47 shortfall every four weeks.

The only light on the horizon about her not putting your deposit in one of the approved schemes is that as long as she hasn't done it any Section 21 Notice she may choose to serve in the future will be invalid until she's lodged it.

minnymoney

I did at first, she wanted regular payments so I arranged this due to my depression and her distress. It is a funny system. Tenants get paid every two weeks (26 payments a year) landlords every 4 weeks (13 a year) but my benefits never matched the 2 weeks so I would always be late or short to give her.
This way it is easy to pay her the same amount on the due date. She is not short just needs to see that dates and payments can overlap in one month to the next. She still gets £600 in a lunar month it just appears odd to her...but she won't listen or talk to housing revenue office about it who were more than happy to explain this to her.
Thank you for your idea tho...

Jowo_2

If the rent is £600 per calendar month, and you pay £600 per calendar month, how can you possibly overpay by £600?! Does the AST stipulate that the rent is £600 every 4 weeks, for example, rather than a month? Or do you mean that you are currently ahead in payments so that if you start to follow the rent cycle now, there is already an excess that gets carried forward which the landlord does not understand? Or do you mean that she doesn't understand that monthly rent and 4 weekly income is out of synch and doesn't know how to marry them up.

How about producing a spreadsheet that details the payments made and payments due in two columns to make it clear to the landlord what's happening? Keep a copy in case of a future dispute. Ultimately, if the rent is £600 per month (£138.46 per week) and LHA of £553 paid every 4 weeks works out at approximately the same sum (£138.35 per week). So make it clear how many weeks have been paid and then switch over to paying £600 per month rent to prevent confusion, timing this so you don't overlap previously paid rent.

It is up to the tenant to pay the full rent when it is due, regardless of how/when they receive their income to pay it. Rent is often due monthly in advance whereas LHA is often paid 4 weekly in arrears, but that's the tenants problem.

BitterAndTwisted

Don't use the term "lunar month" (4 weekly) when you mean calender month or you'll only confuse her further.

I'd just do an excel spreadsheet showing £600 a month x 12 = £7200 per annum and £138.46 a week so she can see that if she gets £553.85 every four weeks from the council into her bank account that means you need to pay either £47 every four weeks or £11.75 a week to make up the shortfall.

Maths obviously isn't her strong suit and unfortunately when people aren't very bright they sometimes have a tendency to think other people are trying to pull a fast one on them so I wish you the best of luck.

minnymoney

Bitter and twisted...thank you but... The council have told me that I need to pay £19.19 a week to follow the 4 week cycle. I told them that I was going to pay £123 shortfall but they corrected me! I would eventually be paying her an extra months rent and putting myself in serious hardship to do so. The benefits office use a weekly calculation as you may know, but most people think in months and until the housing officer explained how it works in weeks, I realized how many landlords are making a profit.

minnymoney

thank you Bitter and Twisted...that makes sense...and yes that is a good idea...I will do this.

She is not listening and making it harder for herself. I think she wants to see the 600 in one lump and that is just not going to happen.

thank you so much...x

vaporate

She sounds like a right stronzo to me.

clutton_2

every piece of advice here is helpful. but as a LL i can understand her difficulty - the simplest way is for YOU to pay her once a month on gthe day specified in the agreement

it may be more convenient for YOU to pay every 2 weeks, or whatever, but in all probability your rent is due every month on x date... and that is how you should learn to budget...

i also realise this is a difficult time for you to make adjustments, but at the end of the day you are not fulfilling your Tenancy Agreement terms

the simplest way to stop her ranting is to do it properly..


saying ""I think she wants to see the 600 in one lump and that is just not going to happen."

is not helpful... the council insist on talking in weeks, whereas legally your contract is in calendar months and a LL has every right to expect you to work it out and budget properly..


THIS topic is why many many many landlrods will not take benefit tenants... the refusal of such tenants to accept personal responsibility for their own finances......


can you get a small loan from someone to help you get up to date and then start afresh next month ?

i do understand how difficult this is - i have many tenants on benefits and some can do this and some cant


but you cannot complain that your LL is complainin g as you are not paying properly

you CAN complain that she is harrassing you about it

i suggest you go to your local council and talk to the Private SEctor rental officer - take your rent accounts and benefits payments schedule from the council and your AST and ask them to write to her for you..... If it is in writing she may have a better chance of understanding it.....

whether she is a stronzo or not (whatever that is) OP is not paying her rent as agreed.......

julie03

i think you need to write this down simply so its easy for her to understand, we are on part HB and we pay every 4 weeks and our landlord understands it all..

i think a comparison spreadsheet with totals at the bottom, two columns one saying how you should pay with the yearly amount and another column with your revised payments and show in really big numbers that at the bottom the two columns are the same.

she sounds like a terrible amateur so make sure you get your deposit protected