Tenant in Jail, can he be evicted?

Breynia

Hello,
Hopefully someone can help me with this problem. We have a tenant who has not been paying his rent and has been served with an eviction notice. However, the letting agent has found out that he is in jail. Does anyone know what the procedure is for evicting this tenant, or what do do with his property? No one will give out the information as to which jail he is in or for how long (data protection act!)
Thankyou

Jay1b

Well he cant exactly stop you from entering the property can he? He cant stop you from removing his stuff from the property either, right? He wont know you've done it until he is realised, bit late then...

"Oi Mr Policeman, 5 years ago I was evicted illegally" hardly going to stand up is it?

Try to find out what he has been done for though... Self preservation is a wonderful thing!

Ok, yeah this isnt legal, but who really cares?

izoomzoom

Surely your EA should know the process for evicting your tenant ?

Imagine you would need to apply to the courts etc

BobProperty

Jay1b wrote:

Well he cant exactly stop you from entering the property can he? He cant stop you from removing his stuff from the property either, right? He wont know you've done it until he is realised, bit late then...

"Oi Mr Policeman, 5 years ago I was evicted illegally" hardly going to stand up is it?

Try to find out what he has been done for though... Self preservation is a wonderful thing!

Ok, yeah this isnt legal, but who really cares?

Completely wrong IMHO, a few years back I was either at a landlord's meeting or on a Landlord's training course and someone sued the landlord for unfairly evicting him. The tenant was jailed for several years but as the landlord hadn't followed procedure the tenant was awared compensation. The court held that being inside was "temporary" so in theory the tenant could have come back at a time in the future to resume his occupation.

black-saturn

He might only be in prison for a few weeks or months. I would say that it is still against the law to enter the property and it would certainly be against the law to move all his belongings out. If you want him out I'm afraid you will have to serve an eviction notice just like you would with any other tenant.

Manchester_Justin

It may be that a probation officer will be monitoring him as part of his rehabilitation once he's released.
The officer might assign him to some other accomodation, such as a regularly used halfway house for ex-prisoners. In that case, your problem's kind of solved, since he'll want to pick up his stuff and have to leave.
Obviously doesn't solve the issue of 'when', but it's a possible 'how'.

amboy

hopefully some good news, but a friend who rented to someone who went to jail had their rent paid by the LA.

Iwould check if this is the case as it was a while ago

arnie&caseysma!

Breynia wrote:

Hello,
No one will give out the information as to which jail he is in or for how long (data protection act!)
Thankyou

Once a case has been to court and the person convicted it becomes 'public interest' which is why results of court cases get into the newspapers. Because of this you should be able to find out how long he has been sentenced for. Have you tried the CPS if you are in England?

scrivomcdivo

I know that Housing Associations evict tenants who have convictions. I am a police officer and we work closely with local housing associations sharing information (legally of course) and many tenants get served eviction notices due to their convictions.

arnie&caseysma!

scrivomcdivo wrote:

I know that Housing Associations evict tenants who have convictions. I am a police officer and we work closely with local housing associations sharing information (legally of course) and many tenants get served eviction notices due to their convictions.

If only it was that easy in our area! Used to live in a street with both Housing Assocation flats and houses, and also shared ownership homes. Unfortunately at least one of the tenants was a drug dealer/user, and was also up for culpable homicide of his own brother by selling him the drugs that killed him. He is still the tenant of that house even though he is in prison as his girlfriend and children still live there. Even worse is that she has now moved her equally bad new boyfriend into the house (user/dealer again) - can you imagine the problems when he gets let out in a years time? They all have convictions and unfortunately are still there in the middle of a street with a mixture of decent young families and elderly folk.