Money Moral Dilemma: Should I reduce my furloughed tenant's rent?

liz_bartun

How much of that £2500 will be take-home pay will depend on her tax code and any (lawful) deductions her employer applies to her salary. It certainly won't be £2500 in her pocket as some people here seem to believe.
However, I think she's taking the p*** here and would ask her what hardship she is expecting to suffer to get a fuller picture.

ap23xo

Yes you should. You don't know what outgoing they have and the effect this could be having on their finances and their mental wellbeing. Offer it to them for 2 or 3 months and you will restore some faith. 

If landlords can’t afford their own property without tenants, then it’s the tenants providing them with housing - not the other way around.

I pay £1300 for a 1 bed in London and my partner has been furloughed. We will be able to pay our rent and bills but not be able to save for other things during the year. 

Jennymoney

The tenants are so lucky as to hit the cap, and not be paying half their income into rent even now.  Most aren’t so lucky.  So they have a cheek, which is what you wanted to hear.  The question therefore becomes, can you afford to make a (smaller) reduction or delayed payment plan for the sake of good relations?  If you can’t, make clear to them that you can’t because as you say, your income is less than theirs.

pollypenny

As their income is more than your own, I would refuse their request, with some regret. 

If they are good tenants, a longer chat might be needed to keep them happy. 

Heather_Bean

mrpunk50 said:

I've been lucky to have reasonably nice landlords, and now (thank God) I have managed to buy a house. However, this doesn't blind me to the fact that landlords are parasitic vultures. You artificially inflate the housing market in order to keep a monopoly on property and make profit off the fact that others cannot afford to buy. 
Every month, you take more than a quarter of this woman's wages (by your calculations, her wage is £3333/month, and the rent is £750). Then you have the audacity to wonder if she should budget better, so that you can carry on taking your cut.
In an ideal world, the vulture class of private landlords would be extinct.

I am a private landlord and to call us all 'parasitic vultures' is extremely unfair! 
The landlords may have a mortgage on the property (I certainly do) and may not be able to afford a cut in rent, however having said that IMO perhaps a compromise of a small rent reduction for 3 months, see how things progress. It would benefit nobody to have this situation escalate into tenants being homeless or landlords having a void.
When my tenants have a problem (whether slight or not) they come to me asking me to deal with this - I have never, ever refused to deal with something urgent, or even something as a faulty shower, (something that is not classed as essential as they have a bath). I have always taken the view that although it's not their house it is their home.
My current tenant had asked for rent payment date changes to enable him to pay more efficiently (which I agreed to....) and still cannot manage to pay on time every time. They have damaged items within the apartment, (cooker hob being one example,) and had the audacity to ask for a new living room carpet (to replace one that they have stained) in their chosen colour and for me to pay for it????   
If I was to 'tar' all tenants with the same brush as this the description would not be as nice as 'parasitic'.

Mageean123

2.5K a month and they cant afford 750 a month; they should be in a position to pay that off no problem, I dont earn that a month and im paying out the guts of £950 a month. You have your own bills to cover unless you own the house outright then the mortgage should be coming first and foremost in your mind. 

Afourteen

mrpunk50 said:

I've been lucky to have reasonably nice landlords, and now (thank God) I have managed to buy a house. However, this doesn't blind me to the fact that landlords are parasitic vultures. You artificially inflate the housing market in order to keep a monopoly on property and make profit off the fact that others cannot afford to buy. 
Every month, you take more than a quarter of this woman's wages (by your calculations, her wage is £3333/month, and the rent is £750). Then you have the audacity to wonder if she should budget better, so that you can carry on taking your cut.
In an ideal world, the vulture class of private landlords would be extinct.

So I'm  a parasite am I???
In that case I'd better live up to your estimation and kick my tenants out! The same Tenants that didn't tell me they were in Financial difficulties some time ago and didn't say anything until it became clear that I wasn't getting rent from them. In total they missed some 5 months payments. They have repaid some of the missing rent - which by the way is over 20% down in real terms on what it was when they moved in. Do I expect to get it all back? hopefully but I'm not holding out much hope. During that time I've had the property redecorated, re-carpeted, upgraded the central heating and a new washing machine (cause they had a dodgy Indesit machine and I wasn't prepared to have that in the property once I knew of the issue). I still have to maintain the property in good repair and be responsive when there is problems.

Hopefully with now having your own property you find just how expensive it is to own a house and maintain it in good repair and comfortable to live in.

m1ckyg

So their income has reduced by 25% and they expect your income to reduce (from them) by 25% too? This does not seem fair. Working from home means she may have less costs, e.g. travel costs. With non-essential shops closed, it generally means people are buying less and spending less. Even if she has other debts we are not aware of, a lot of institutions have offered payment holidays, free overdrafts, etc, so she should approach those first. I am sure if she added the potential savings of working from home as well as any finance holidays she could take, it actually means she is not hit by as much as 25% of her salary? Whereas if you take 25% off, you are fully hit for 25%. Of course, I am not saying do not help, we all need to help each other, but perhaps instead of you taking the full 25% hit, why not split this 50/50 so offer 12.5% ?

Bunji

I don't think so. They are acting like football clubs asking the government for help. I earn £1200, my partner is on disability and that takes our income to £1550. Our rent is £500 and if my pay dropped 25% I would consider my rent to be a 'priority bill' and rightly so. They are the bills you pay first. If they need to cut back they should start somewhere else. If they have an annual holiday then maybe instead of saving for that, they pay you. 

fscot58

I too am a landlord and need the rent as it’s my sole income. During this exceptional time I’d my tenant comes to come with proof of their situation I’m willing to come to an arrangement that will not increase their debt and worry as I believe we all have to share a bit of the financial pain that’s out there.  If they can prove their case listen and discuss. You may only reduce it slightly but surely something is better than nothing all round.