Selling property before tenants have moved out

Spadger_2

Hi, Im new to all this so please bear with me,
We have been renting our property out in Scotland for nearly 2 years but my husbands job in the Forces means that we may soon be moving and will no longer be entitled to live in Married quarters, we will have to sell our house in Scotland in order to buy one for us to live in.
We have spoken to the letting agaent and they said we can give two months notice to the tenants but that we cant put the house up for sale untill AFTER the tenants have left?, the reasons being that it wouldnt be fair to the tenants to have to allow the letting agent in to show potential buyers around the property and also that we could get sued if the people who rent from us refused to move out before the exchab=nge date, even if though this would be AFTER the date that they were due to move out.
Is this true? surrely we are allowed to put a for sale sign up whilst the house is occupied? our contract states that the tenants have to allow future tenants in to view the house if we were renting out to someone new, whats the differance?
If we have to wait untill after the tenants leave then we might be waiting ages for the house to sell and we cant afford to pay the mortgage on an empty house plus the rent on the house we live in now as well.
Please help

clutton_2

yes it is right - well in england and wales it is. irrespective of what it says in your tenancy agreement a tenant is allowed "quiet enjoyment" and he is perfectly within his legal rights to refuse entry to ANYONE - even you during the term of his TEnancy Agreement. You may want to offer a financial inducement to them..........

but i suggest you ask a Scottish CAB as many scottish property laws are different.

Spadger_2

Thanks Clutton, if thats the law then thats the law, dont know how we are going to find the extra money to pay the mortgage though?

amandajp_2

We are in the same position with my husband's house. However, two possible solutions is that you could give the tenants first refusal (we have knocked a couple of thousand off the "fixed" asking price in recognition of them being chain-free and as it will save us at least two months in mortgage payments) or sell it to an investment buyer with sitting tenants (if they're good tenants this may prove attractive). Local estate agents or the letting agents may have suitable potential buyers for this (Our local agent will reduce the commission to 0.75% from 1.25% for this as it wouldn't require active marketing).

HTH
Amanda

KITCHEN1_2

Clutton,
What about access with reasonable notice for the normal purposes of property management ? Can the LL still be refused access under those circumstances ?
Have to say there are so many potential issues of conflict between LL's and tenants that I remain convinced that that it is worth investing time in getting a good relationship going. Having that makes it so much easier to deal with problems like this.

King_Of_Fools

Spadger wrote: »

Thanks Clutton, if thats the law then thats the law, dont know how we are going to find the extra money to pay the mortgage though?

You could always rent somewhere for a few months...

moneysavinmonkey

Spadger wrote: »

If we have to wait untill after the tenants leave then we might be waiting ages for the house to sell and we cant afford to pay the mortgage on an empty house plus the rent on the house we live in now as well.
Please help

Surely you factored in a void + costs into the exit strategy of your property business plan?? what you don't have a business plan? Hmm, well if you just got into BTL by accident then I'm afraid things like this will be a bit of a nasty shock.

You can't expect your tenants to allow strangers to trample round their home regularly for viewing, nor rely on them to move out when they say they will. Sorry- but put yourself in their shoes and you'll see why. You could ask them nicely to allow viewings but it's unlikely they'd really want to co-operate.

The idea about offering them first refusal is probably your best shot. Or if the rent is covering the mortgage (and particularly if you are likely to return to scotland) you could just leave the house and rent somewhere yourself.

Catblue

I think you need to contact the tenants and be really nice to them. Tell them that if they find a place quickly, you won't charge them the full rent. Tell them you'll give them a great reference etc. etc.

They might be lucky and find somewhere else quickly. Obviously, if they can't find anything suitable then they'll be there for the two months.

If the Letting Agent gives them two months' notice, and they refuse to leave after this two months, then you'd need to go to court to get them out.

This all takes time, so that's why the LA is urging caution. If you did have a buyer for your house at that point and the house is not vacant at exchange - that buyer could (and probably would) sue you.

PasturesNew

How long have they got on their current contract? (out of interest/nosiness)

silvercar

There is nothing wrong with you approaching the tenants and coming to some arrangement over viewings.

Any solicitor would say that exchanging is too dangerous while the tenants are still in place. If they didn't move out on the date their notice was up, you would have to take legal proceedings to evict them and this would mena that you couldn't provide vacant possession to your buyers. A problem you would have to pay financial penalty for, even though it would be your tenants who were in breach of their notice to vacate.

Anyway a property always looks better without the tenants in place. They do not have the financial interest in showing a property at its best.

moneysavinmonkey

Catblue wrote: »

I think you need to contact the tenants and be really nice to them. Tell them that if they find a place quickly, you won't charge them the full rent. Tell them you'll give them a great reference etc. etc.
.

this doesn't really help the OP as I understand their problem- they aren't concerned about getting the tenant out quickly more concerned about not having a tenant whilst they are trying to sell.... I think the average time on the market at the moment accord to rightmove is about 90 odd days.. so that's 3 months of mortgage to pay with no rent.

They'd be better offering the tenants half price rent to stay put but allow viewings rather than bribing them to clear off quickly. You'd still need to make sure you had vacant possession by the time of exchange though.