Buy to let landlord : Britain's benefit tenants

gazter

Just watching this from the other day, they have a landlord bemoaning that the rental income said in the auction is not what he's getting, because of voids, squatters etc.

I have sympathy, but he said this, to quote:
"we did a lot of research from watching things like 'Homes under the Hammer' and a lot of other auction programmes"

F F S.

Pixie5740

A fool and his money are soon parted.

I don't often get to see HUTH but the one episode I have seen this year involved a man bidding on a house despite telling his wife they were just going to look and find out what the process was like. The wife and daughter were then left to "renovate" the house. Yes the house was in a bad state at the start but what they had done decor-wise wasn't much better.

Brown carpets aren't necessarily horrible but these were diarrhoea brown with red walls. Everything looked cheap and nasty and was obviously bought because it was cheap and no thought was given to whether or not anything went together.

I don't know how the presenter kept a straight face when they went back to view the property.

IamZlatan

Yeah we watched that too, made my gf's blood boil that program.lol. I have sympathy for that guy but if his research is watching 'Home Under The Hammer' then hes in trouble, and I know nothing about the property market.

We were curious as to why the housing benefit isnt paid direct to the landlord? Surely that would solve the problem of tenants getting into rent arrears?

Pixie5740

IamZlatan wrote: »

We were curious as to why the housing benefit isnt paid direct to the landlord? Surely that would solve the problem of tenants getting into rent arrears?

A few reasons I can think of:

1. To treat tenants in receipt of HB as adults capable of managing their own finances.
2. To get tenants used to managing their own finances before the universal credit comes in.
3. Some LL with T on HB weren't carrying out repairs because they were getting the full rent each month regardless of what state the property was in.

Better_Days

IamZlatan wrote: »

We were curious as to why the housing benefit isnt paid direct to the landlord? Surely that would solve the problem of tenants getting into rent arrears?

My understanding is the thinking behind it is that the government want people to take responsibility for their own finances. The problem is that a proportion of HB claimants struggle to take responsibility for their finances, especially when there are changes such as benefits cap and the bedroom tax. And there is a smaller proportion who I suspect do not have the capacity (for a number of reasons - poor physical or mental health, lack of literacy/numeracy etc) either temporarily or over the longer term, to manage their finances.

It was interesting how the Letting Agents were informally taking over a support role for some tenants in some situations, because it is the in the LA financial interests to do so.

On the whole it is probably better from the LL POV if HB is paid directly to them but it can leave the LL in the doo doo if it later transpires that the HB was not due.

[Deleted User]

This programme shows a disproportionate picture.., I receive HA.., I pay my LL on time every month, even if I have a problem with benefits coming in. Its the first thing that gets paid, before food even.

This programme shows tenants that just can't manage. Fortunately, they are far and few between. But one of the agents in the programme also said that these properties were bought by LL's who just wanted the properties filled. Whether a tenant could manage or would be a good tenant didn't seem as important as you'd expect.

Where i live, LL's now won't even look at benefit recipients because they don't have to.., more tenants than properties.