Tenant not paying rent and uncontactable...please help!

BitterAndTwisted

Your sister should get on with that letter and the rent-statement asp. If the agreement states that rent is due monthly it doesn't matter whether the tenant has been paying fortnightly and the landlord has been accepting it so far.

Rent-due day is today: does that mean the £725 figure given includes this month's rent? If so, your sister needs to issue a Section 8 Notice on the 22nd of June if no payments have been receive by then.

School-friend or no school-friend: this is business arrangement and needs to be dealt with in a business-like manner. No sensible landlord would accept a tenant being so seriously in arrears unless the tenant makes a sensible arrangement to pay off the arrears and get the rent account up to date, and keeps to it.

G_M

ChinUp wrote: »

Thanks for the replies, Benji answers to your questions below:
The tenancy commenced on 21/2/12
There was no end date specified but it clearly states 12 months from 21/2/12.
No the tenant didn't pay a deposit. The tenant is someone my sister knew from school,always unwise not that this should matter but for some reason my sister felt it was ok not to take a deposit.mad!
The agreement states that the landlord can use the 1988 housing act but I don't think it states section 8 specifically.
The agreement states the rent is due monthly but the tenant asked to pay it fortnightly which is what she had been doing.Note that a month is not the same as 2 x fortnights. Tenant is paying for 28 days only each month. Has this been included in the arrears? The daily rent is £12.98.
The rent is £395 per month
The amount of rent unpaid is currently £725

Thanks in advance for any further advice.

Arrears are just under 2 months (assuming the arrears are correctly calculated - see above).

As soon as they reach £790, issue a S8.

jjlandlord

ChinUp wrote: »

The agreement states the rent is due monthly but the tenant asked to pay it fortnightly which is what she had been doing.

What did you agree?
If you did agree to the request, rent may now be payable fortnightly so this should be taken into account when calculating arrears, e.g. to determine amount and date of s.8 ground 8's threshold.
Note also G_M's comment about amount of payments.

If your tenancy agreement has not clause allowing use of s.8 grounds, then even if you serve a s.8 now, or soon, no possession order can take effect before the end of the fixed term tenancy.