Catching out tenant subletting a room

Pmarmalade

My colleague has just recently become a landlord and thinks his tenant is illegally subletting the second room in the flat. The tenant claims his partner keeps clothes etc. in the second room for when she's staying over but it appears to be occupied.

Is there a way to prove he is sub-letting? How far can he go without intruding on the tenant's rights during an inspection?

evoke

Just turn up one day and demand to see if the other room is occupied. Stuff what the lawful tenant says. I'd kick out the lawful tenant and someone decent as soon as possible.

chappers

Are you sure he is sub-letting and doesn't just have a lodger.

Pmarmalade

Sorry, lodger, yes. The tenant agreement does not allow either.

chappers

A difficult one the LL has no real right to enter the property. If the LL is recieving the rent ok then I would be inclined to just let it go as the lodger has no rights to reside should a problem occur between the tenant and the LL

molerat

evoke wrote: »

Just turn up one day and demand to see if the other room is occupied. Stuff what the lawful tenant says. I'd kick out the lawful tenant and someone decent as soon as possible.

On the way remember to pop into the shop for a soap on a rope

The_Palmist

can you not just ask him ?

If he does not want to keep someone in [to share rent, bills etc.] and if there is enough space [extra rooms etc.] can you two not just come to an agreement ?

lazer

The_Palmist wrote: »

can you not just ask him ?

If he does not want to keep someone in [to share rent, bills etc.] and if there is enough space [extra rooms etc.] can you two not just come to an agreement ?

Common sense answer,

I don't honestly see what harm it is doing you if someone else is living at the property as long as you are still getting the rent.
For the record, I use the spare room in my bf's house as basically my dressing room - it is full of my stuff, and no-one actually lives in it!

The_Palmist

My ex Land Lady used to be real paranoid about such things even though she used to live in the flat downstairs and we shared the front entrance. My GF used to come down for weekends and sometimes over holidays and there was once LL kicked up a fuss. We found this quite annoying as we like to think we were model tenants and were already paying rent at my place and my GF's. A bit of a chit chat sorted this out and we all lived happily ever after. Sometime having a face to face [chat] works wonders than any Sherlock Holmes move you might be planning.

chris_m

Pmarmalade wrote: »

The tenant claims his partner keeps clothes etc. in the second room for when she's staying over but it appears to be occupied.

lazer wrote: »

For the record, I use the spare room in my bf's house as basically my dressing room - it is full of my stuff, and no-one actually lives in it!

Hehe, the partner owns up :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Voyager2002

I suggest a conversation, and offer a contract to the second tenant if such a person exists.

This could be serious if you (or your mortgage lender) ever need possession of the flat.A contract between landlord and tenant gives defined rights and obligations to both parties, and makes it reasonably clear how the law should be applied if any problems arise. However, if someone is living in the flat without a contract then resolving any problem becomes a complicated and expensive process, since the courts would first have to establish the status of that person in order to know what rights and obligations they had. Mortgage lenders hate this kind of situation, and would cause a lot of trouble if they knew that this was happening.