New landlord - 25% rent increase!

Cakeguts

295pcm sounds extremely cheap for any part of the country. When you think about it if the house needs a lot of repair they aren't going to be able to do very much with a rent of less than £3600 per year so I can see why they think they need to raise the rent.



In the North West even £350pcm is cheaper than usual.

msrt5mp2

Comms69 wrote: »

<--- small Lancashire city


I'm only making my point based upon your opening statement:


Ideally I would move to somewhere nicer but money is a problem as even if I got one of the comparably priced properties (of which none are available right now, the cheapest currently is around £350pcm)

Yeah I worded that badly, lack of sleep! I was referring back to the previous paragraph. Basically there are always properties much better than mine at the £350 mark, more expensive than I am paying but less than they want so to have my property in the same bracket as them is ludicrous as it really is very run down. But there are also a lot of properties of varying standards, most better than mine, regularly available between £280 and £350 - including one directly across the road on my street that went 2 weeks ago and is the same price as mine £295 and has just been fully renovated and is beautiful.

Cakeguts

msrt5mp2 wrote: »

It's not matching market rent, the price they are now asking is way above comparable properties in the area, especially considering the condition it is in.

I'm not sure where you are from but this is a small Lancashire town where rent is a LOT cheaper and the house was only bought for £30,000 last week, a 2 bedroom terrace.

How could you possibly know how much it sold for? It won't have been registered at the land registry yet so the sold prices will not be available. Was it in an auction where the guide price was £30,000. Guide prices are not sold prices it could have sold for a lot more than that.

msrt5mp2

Cakeguts wrote: »

295pcm sounds extremely cheap for any part of the country. When you think about it if the house needs a lot of repair they aren't going to be able to do very much with a rent of less than £3600 per year so I can see why they think they need to raise the rent.



In the North West even £350pcm is cheaper than usual.

I get that but they weren't aware of the repairs needed, the council came round after they had bought it, they didn't view the property or survey it, they just bought it on the cheap as it is in a very deprived area with lots of boarded up and empty houses, drugs and anti-social behaviour etc and is one of a number of similar areas in our town has been given funding to improve things and some opportunists like these guys are trying to make money on the back of it at the expense of people in situations like me.

Luckily I have spoken to the person today in charge of this project and the licensing and she will be putting a stop to it as when I explained she got it straight away and informed me that a lot of others had been trying to do similar.

It is cheaper than usual, for somewhere of a decent standard in a slightly better area the minimum you are looking at is £350-£400 even in this town, but there are many areas such as mine that are pretty horrible and you can get for £250-£300. But when you only get £265 in Housing Benefit beggars can't be choosers, it's not nice but such is life! Hopefully this initiative will help with that and if not at the very least make some of these homes nicer for those of us who have little choice to live in!

msrt5mp2

Cakeguts wrote: »

How could you possibly know how much it sold for? It won't have been registered at the land registry yet so the sold prices will not be available. Was it in an auction where the guide price was £30,000. Guide prices are not sold prices it could have sold for a lot more than that.

No it wasn't an auction it was a standard estate agent listing and sale. The price was initially put up at £35,000 but the landlord took £30k due to lack of interest.

msrt5mp2

G_M wrote: »

Indeed.

You have a perfectly valid tenancy agreement with the new landlord at present.

However, as it is periodic, it provides you with minimal security, as described in the link above.

The LL can either evict you (following the correct process), or increase the rent (again, by following the process described in the 2nd link)

Thank you for this. I had read similar things but didn't know how it would transition with the new landlord as I did not have an agreement with them.

G_M

the change of landlord is simply that - a change of landlord.


the tenancy agreement continues unchanged unless either


* it is ended by you or a court
* a replacement one is agreed by you and the landlord, or
* a new rent is imposed according to the legal processes for doing so

PersianCatLady

msrt5mp2 wrote: »

Yeah I worded that badly, lack of sleep! I was referring back to the previous paragraph. Basically there are always properties much better than mine at the £350 mark, more expensive than I am paying but less than they want so to have my property in the same bracket as them is ludicrous as it really is very run down. But there are also a lot of properties of varying standards, most better than mine, regularly available between £280 and £350 - including one directly across the road on my street that went 2 weeks ago and is the same price as mine £295 and has just been fully renovated and is beautiful.

Before you start panicking about affordability, have you checked with the council to see if your HB / LHA would increase if / when the rent increases??

Your rent appears to be below market rate and if you are entitled to full HB / LHA then I would have thought that you would be entitled to the maximum amount of LHA for the type of property that is appropriate for your needs.

Do you mind me asking, why do you only receive £265 in HB / LHA when your rent is £295??

Does your accommodation have more bedrooms that you need?

Do you know what the maximum LHA payment is in your area for the type of property you are entitled to??

If I have been too nosey then please excuse me and accept my apologies.

msrt5mp2

PersianCatLady wrote: »

Before you start panicking about affordability, have you checked with the council to see if your HB / LHA would increase if / when the rent increases??

Your rent appears to be below market rate and if you are entitled to full HB / LHA then I would have thought that you would be entitled to the maximum amount of LHA for the type of property that is appropriate for your needs.

Do you mind me asking, why do you only receive £265 in HB / LHA when your rent is £295??

Does your accommodation have more bedrooms that you need?

Do you know what the maximum LHA payment is in your area for the type of property you are entitled to??

If I have been too nosey then please excuse me and accept my apologies.

Yeah no problem at all - any help or advice is appreciated so if you need more information to do so that is fine.

I am in touch with the council currently and the person managing the selective licencing project has put me in touch with several senior people at the Council in relevant departments who can hopefully help me further as well as her dealing with the landlord in trying to resolve this.

I do have more bedrooms than I need or really want as it is just me and I am in a 2 bedroom terraced, albeit a very small and run down one but somewhere smaller would be preferable as I do have more space than I need and it would likely have slightly cheaper bills etc.

The problem is that these two bedroom properties in such areas are actually the cheapest in the town or nearby region. There are very few 1 bedroom properties that are available in my locality and those that are are mostly luxury mill conversions with rents of about £450pcm that do not accept DSS or shared accommodation which is still usually about the same as what I am paying currently and I'd get the same rate as I do now I believe.

It would appear that I am on the shared accommodation rate of £62.40 per week due to the extra bedroom as my decision notice says weekly gross rent £68.08, £62.40 weekly benefit award. The council website lists the rates as such;

Shared accommodation rate £62.40
One bedroom rate £75.00
Two bedrooms rate £85.00
Three bedrooms rate £99.04
Four bedrooms rate £137.31


To be honest up until the last year or so I have been very much in a haze heavily medicated and sedated after leaving hospital so I certainly did not have all my wits about me in the past to know if this could be challenged or not but given my current rent made only a top up payment of £22.72 a month necessary this is just about manageable - obviously any more would be very difficult.

HampshireH

It does sound like your banding is incorrect and should be a 1 bedroom benefit (therefore you pay the underoccupancy % for the 2nd room)

I would challenge your banding and seek for it to be backdated!

Surely the rate you receive should be for HMO type accommodation

Goodluck