Advice needed - "Late" Rent charges

whambamboo

real1314 wrote:

blimey, another thread creating polar opinions and mis-advice.

firstly, I'd say that your rent wasn't in arrears on the day it was due, only if it wasn't paid by the end of that day.
However, once that day has ended, it is technically late, and lots of tenancy agreements carry a clause to charge for a letter being issued notifying a breach of tenancy, which is what this is.
The charge does have to be reasonable, and you cannot just issue letter after letter, leving more and more charges.

Interest can be charged from the first day that the payment is overdue too.

As for who's responsibility it is, it's the tenants. The landlord says "you must pay rent by the Xth of the month" your direct debit / standing order is set up with your bank, therefore it's up to you to ensure that your bank can ensure that the funds arrive by a set date (mine has this facility, perhaps you need to get your bank to check it?).

If my employer didn't pay me on my pay day, I wouldn't accept "we've sent it, but it's not got there yet". I'd expect interest and compo for any charges on my account / failed direct debits etc.

Ok, so some people don't like the fact that others are landlords. seems a bit petty to me.

Have you actually read this thread? In particular I posted a link to a 127 page OFT document which clearly says you *can't* charge for writing letters, and suggests as a fair late rent clause the imposition of interest close to the base rate and only then after 14 days.

This is a government document that would be pretty near conclusive evidence in court.

But still you persist with your bad analogy about employers paying salaries late. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME. A landlord is in law a businessman who needs to be prevented from exploiting potentially vulnerable tenants, not the other way round. The law is more concerned with the tenant than the rich landlord. With employment the employee is vulnerable - the employer is not.

Landlords need to stop thinking o BTL as income and start treating it as a business. Seeems the only one giving misadvice is you - ignoring clear OFT ruls and contining to repeat untruths

whambamboo

real1314 wrote:

blimey, another thread creating polar opinions and mis-advice.

firstly, I'd say that your rent wasn't in arrears on the day it was due, only if it wasn't paid by the end of that day.
However, once that day has ended, it is technically late, and lots of tenancy agreements carry a clause to charge for a letter being issued notifying a breach of tenancy, which is what this is.
The charge does have to be reasonable, and you cannot just issue letter after letter, leving more and more charges.

Interest can be charged from the first day that the payment is overdue too.

As for who's responsibility it is, it's the tenants. The landlord says "you must pay rent by the Xth of the month" your direct debit / standing order is set up with your bank, therefore it's up to you to ensure that your bank can ensure that the funds arrive by a set date (mine has this facility, perhaps you need to get your bank to check it?).

If my employer didn't pay me on my pay day, I wouldn't accept "we've sent it, but it's not got there yet". I'd expect interest and compo for any charges on my account / failed direct debits etc.

Ok, so some people don't like the fact that others are landlords. seems a bit petty to me.

By the way, I think your attitude is disgusting.

You are a landlord not a bank. You have no right to charge for writing letters. Completely illegal. You can't charge for your time in administering the property, and you need to factor that in when choosing whether or not to buy property and current massively inflated prices compared to rental yields.

You are providing accommodation for potentially vulnerable people and you need to comply with the law which recognises their position as far more important than yours of how you are going to have a massive 'portfolio', and make millions of pounds. You need to manage your own cashflow and the reality of running a BUSINESS is that creditors often won't pay on time. If you are screwed as a result I have to say that this is your own fault for not having a viable business plan.

There are far too many people buying property without any thought or planning. You wouldn't invest £200k in a restaurant or a bookshop without doing research so why are so many people getting buy-to-let without having a clue about what they are doing? A friend owns a property in Ealing and is thinking of buying another. He has no idea what his yield is, and says he thinks the rent doesn't cover the mortgage (but isn't really sure), but is still thinking of buying another because he says it has gone up £20k already. This is sheer madness.

As the creditors are legally protected, if they pay a few days late and you don't like this, STOP DOING BUSINESS WITH THEM. If you don't like this, don't become a BTL landlord.

This is supposed to be MoneySavingExpert.com, not ScrewYourTenants.com.

I have nothing against landlords, but there are far too many landlords who are clueless about tenant rights or choose to trample without any care over them. I have experience this in the past where my landlord, an IFA who bought a BTL as an investment thought I should pay for normal wear-and-tear to the house and thought the oven should still look like new, and tried to screw me by withholding part of my deposit for no reason (he returned a deposit based on one month's rent, hoping I'd forgot that I'd actually paid six week's rent in deposit - even though as an IFA he must have remembered). Suffice to say, I never hesitate to sue.

I have nothing but contempt for these people.

Tassotti

Claws away people.

Let's face it...All Landlords are scum...all tenants are scum...

The Agreements I use state interest will be charged at 4% over Bank of England Base Rate per day, effective after 14 days.

Looks like I am complying with the OFT then.

To the OP, I am pretty sure also that a 'fixed' charge cannot be issued for late payment, hence the 'over base rate' thang, and therefore is unenforceable.

Tass

whambamboo

Tassotti wrote:

Claws away people.

Let's face it...All Landlords are scum...all tenants are scum...

The Agreements I use state interest will be charged at 4% over Bank of England Base Rate per day, effective after 14 days.

Looks like I am complying with the OFT then.

To the OP, I am pretty sure also that a 'fixed' charge cannot be issued for late payment, hence the 'over base rate' thang, and therefore is unenforceable.

Tass

Good on you. It's nice to see a landlord who knows what he's doing, as there are far too many amateurs who don't bother to do their research and try to rip people off.

Landlords must comply with the rules, and ultimately if they don't like the way the tenants pay their rent, they can follow the legal process to evict them.

RobKingston

Thanks all, your conclusions are pretty much what I suspected all along

clutton_2

""vulnerable tenants" - if you called any of my tenants that - they would probably slap you across the face with a wet fish !!! Please, dont be so patronising !!!!! or so angry !!!

I find it quite sad that just because you have had a bad experience with a landlord, you seem intent on tarring all landlords with the same brush.

westernpromise

You have to love the assumptions here..."rich landlords"..."vulnerable tenants"...LOL! Labour voter perchance??

My tenants earn way more than me, they both work for Goldman Sachs...but presumably I'm still "rich".

whambamboo

westernpromise wrote:

You have to love the assumptions here..."rich landlords"..."vulnerable tenants"...LOL! Labour voter perchance??

My tenants earn way more than me, they both work for Goldman Sachs...but presumably I'm still "rich".

I'm about as Tory as they come. I was pretty p***ed of when the current scum won in 1997.

Nonetheless, the fact is a landlord is acting as a business, and the tenant is a consumer.

Consumers are protected in law, business are generally not (or to a lesser extent). It doesn't matter how rich the tenants are, housing is protected as a human right under the Human Rights Act of 1997/ECHR, whereas being a landlord is not. The landlords serve the tenants, not the other way round.

whambamboo

clutton wrote:

""vulnerable tenants" - if you called any of my tenants that - they would probably slap you across the face with a wet fish !!! Please, dont be so patronising !!!!! or so angry !!!

I find it quite sad that just because you have had a bad experience with a landlord, you seem intent on tarring all landlords with the same brush.

I'm not tarring anybody, I'm just saying that many landlords are clueless about the realities of property ownership, and yes, in general tenants *are* vulnerable - if the landlord kicks you out of your house with no notice, then nearly every tenant would be in quite a lot of difficulty.

real1314

whambamboo wrote:

By the way, I think your attitude is disgusting.

You are a landlord not a bank. You have no right to charge for writing letters. Completely illegal. You can't charge for your time in administering the property, and you need to factor that in when choosing whether or not to buy property and current massively inflated prices compared to rental yields.

And your ability to read is appalling:
From the OFT document:

"[The tenant must] pay the reasonable costs of the Landlord's Agent for each letter the Agent, acting reasonably, has to send to the tenant concerning breaches of the tenancy agreement."

and

"The tenant is responsible for any reasonable costs reasonably incurred required to compensate the landlord for any breach of obligation on the tenant's part."

I shan't bother checking anything else you've said, as you've reprimanded me for not reading something that you linked to that wasn't even in the thread, and you haven't even read it properly yourself. Hardly worth reading ill-informed criticism.

I think your attitude is pathetic, but my view is backed up by evidence (that you provided).