court date from council help

paul31_2

Hi hope someone can give me a bit advice please.got a letter through the post on thursday in regards to a court date for council looking for possession of our house.I knew we had arrears but we were paying £20 per week extra on our rent to cover this....my question is is it to late to sort this out before it gets to court?the court date is 18th may,thanks for any advice.

ValHaller

paul31 wrote: »

my question is is it to late to sort this out before it gets to court?

Answers to all these please

• How much is your rent?
• How much do you owe?
• How much money could you throw at it?
• What notices have you been served?
• When were these notices served?
• On what grounds are they seeking repossession?

Then the experts will probably have enough to get started.

G_M

ValHaller wrote: »

Answers to all these please

• How much is your rent?
• How much do you owe?
• How much money could you throw at it?
• What notices have you been served?
• When were these notices served?
• On what grounds are they seeking repossession?

Then the experts will probably have enough to get started.

Depending on the answers to the above, no - it is not too late.

TALK. To the council.

PAY off the arrears.

AGEE a payment plan.

paul31_2

thanks for reply....Rent stands at £84 per week,their seeking possession on grounds of unpaid rent....amount outstanding is £1200.Its all come out the blue as the missus has just showed me this letter....weve had a big row over it as shes been paying other unimportant debts rather than the rent...i`m in bits over this.If i they`ll accept id be prepared to throw another £50 a week to clear it maybe more.

G_M

Oh dear - PLEASE answer the questions:

• How much is your rent? £84 pw
• How much do you owe? £1200
• How much money could you throw at it?
• What notices have you been served?
• When were these notices served?
• On what grounds are they seeking repossession? arrears

ValHaller

At a rough calculation, if you could find £500, you would reduce the arrears to below 2 months so I think you would be able to avoid eviction. If you could give the dates of the rental period (yours will be 4 week periods, I believe) a more accurate answer could be calculated. The basic rule will be something like that you must never go from one rental period into the next owing 2 months rent or more from before the new rental period.

paul31_2

well just spoke yo the missus and i`m going to pay an extra £100 per week on top of the £84 rent,hopefuly i get my tax rebate sorted too so im going to pay that off the amount outstanding also.Trying to sift through the paperwork is a nightmare.The most recent letter is giving us a court date and forms to fill in for court too

tbs624

OP - Is this an introductory tenancy?

G_M wrote: »

AGEE a payment plan.

Sounds like there had been an agreement of sorts in place, with the OP paying an extra 20 quid per week on top of the current rent but that this has not been kept to.

OP - if it is a joint tenancy, you *have* to take joint responsibility for ensuring that the rent is paid in full and on time, and that any historical arrears are brought up to date asap.

This will sound harsh but the fact that you are suddenly able to produce an extra 100 quid per week to get the arrears cleared suggests that your priorities are seriously skewed.


Get your proposals for clearing the arrears put to the Council *in writing*, delivered by hand to a named person ( get a receipt). Do it first thing tomorrow (ie Monday morning) Keep a copy for your own records and actually make the first additional payment.

Seek help from a housing advisor before you lose your home. Note that the Council has to follow a Rent Protocol if using arrears as the grounds for repossession. Edited to add : The housing charity Shelter has a leaflet called "rent arrears" which you should be able to access online.

If you and your OH have problems budgeting there is a board on here that can help you with that.

lighting_up_the_chalice

With that level of arrears, the Council will be quite keen to get to court with this one. It is VERY unlikely that you would be evicted at the first hearing. The likely outcome is that the court orders rent + £xx which, if you stick to it, will avoid eviction. It's called an SPO (Suspended Possession Order) and, whilst it won't necessarily lead to eviction, it is the first step in the process. From the councils point of view, they have the security of either getting the arrears paid or going for an OPO (Outright Possession Order) if you fail to keep to the agreed plan.

The only way you can realistically avoid an SPO is to pay the arrears in total before (or on) the court date. If making an arrangement via the court hearing, I would suggested aiming for the lowest amount the court/council will accept. You can always over-pay it if you want, but if you promise too much and find it unaffordable, your home may be at risk.

Remember, if evicted as a result of your own actions or inactions (including rent arrears), you may be found to have made yourself "intentionally homeless". Under these circumstances, the council would have no duty to provide alternative accommodation. Even if accepted as homeless, the council may discharge that duty into the private sector.