How to Evict the Tenant from Hell

A couple of weeks ago we published an article on how to avoid the tenant from hell, but what if they have already infiltrated your defences?  They may have passed all the credit checks, ticked all the right boxes, paid rent on time and shown all the signs of being the model tenant only for problems to suddenly occur.  Whether you are having problems with rent being paid or damage being made to your property there are procedures you can follow to evict a tenant if things have gone too far.

Keep Communication Lines Open

Communication is the key issue when problems occur between tenant and landlord and it’s important that you make your intentions clear from the outset.  If your tenant has fallen behind with the rent or is refusing to pay then you have every right to protect your rental income and investigate legal proceedings if necessary.  The good news is many problems such as this can be resolved by finding out what the issue is.  If your tenant has fallen behind the rent because of a certain misfortune you can give them a date by which they need to come good with the rent giving them a little leeway.  After all, it’s going to be a lot more hassle to find another tenant than wait a couple of weeks for the rent that is due.

If your rental property is mortgaged then you may have an obligation with your lender to keep your rental income above a certain level.  If you have no choice, but to start the eviction process then you need to check that certain procedures are followed.

Before you begin the eviction process you must ensure that both yourself and your tenant has a signed copy of the tenancy agreement and that you are confident of the rent schedule.  You should also check that the rental deposit is protected sufficiently and that there are no disrepair issues with the property in question.

Issuing the Paperwork

If your tenant is more than 2 weeks behind with the rent then it’s time to serve a Section 8 notice.  This notice must be responded positively within two weeks of receipt and if the tenant has not done so you should begin legal proceedings immediately.  It can take anything up to 8 weeks for a court order to be issued.

Before you process your claim you should ensure you have all the relevant paperwork and evidence available.  If there are any errors or false claims these will be brought to light at the hearing and could result in a second hearing or a dismissed claim.

Problems with Legally Evicting a Tenant

Of course, in our democratic society, tenants always have the right to defending their position.  The court will send your tenant a copy of your claim to the tenant advising them strongly to seek legal advice.  Free help is available to tenants from Shelter, solicitors, the Citizens Advice Bureau and also their local housing authority and there are also a number of specialist Government websites offering advice to tenants facing eviction.  There is a severe shortage of council and social housing available in the UK right now and these organisations will do all they can to ensure tenants can remain in their rented accommodation.

However, the law is the law and you as a landlord have a right to evict a tenant who has breached their agreement or is refusing to or simply cannot pay their rent.  As long as you ensure you communicate with your tenant and attempt to resolve any difficulties you may be able to avoid the long and arduous process of tenant eviction. 
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Rate or Hate your Landlord?

As a property undergraduate I recall sitting in damp digs smoking roll-ups wondering why I was reading about the the history of Landlord and Tenant Law when I could have been shooting pool in The Ship and sinking pints of cider for less than the price of a load in the laundrette.

The purpose of Landlord and Tenant Laws, I learned, are to balance the rights of both landlord and tenant.  With this island’s history rooted in a feudal system where peons lived in hovels at the pleasure of the landed gentry the tenancy laws handed protection to the people with regards their home.  Now we have the European Court of Human Rights and are kicking The Peers out of parliament in favour of Our Peers (in principle anyway).

We also have the Internet, access to more information than ever and we are replacing mob justice with blog justice as brands and behaviour are discussed online – favouring consumer power over public hangings.

On The Modern Estate Agent blog, Martin Smith recently wrote about the importance and difficulty of managing online reviews for Estate Agents.  Well, Landlords may quiver in their boots now as a new website Rate or Hate your Landlord encourages tenants (yes you guessed it) to rate or hate their Landlord – publicly.

PR companies talk of online reputation management, which is fine for big business, but now your small business reputation may sink or swim based on what people are saying about you on social media sites such as facebook, twitter and ratings websites.

From a philosophical perspective you could argue that this is the most virtuous of virtual yardsticks, encouraging fair play and holding business to account in a way not seen since Anne Robinson presented Watchdog and supplementing the statutory rights applied by the Landlord and Tenant Laws.

Or, you could argue that small businesses will become slaves to public opinion and we’ll all start airing our dirty laundry in public.

After all customers are sometimes wrong, Tenants and Landlords can both lie and their are two sides to every argument.  The consumer has nothing to lose posting an anonymous review for a perceived injustice, whether real or not – the business does not share the anonymity and has to live or die buy its reputation.

And as for those damp student digs?  The day we left, the kitchen ceiling fell to the floor – literally.  We lost all our deposits – mainly to replace mattresses and re-seed the postage stamp lawn where excessive wear and tear (football) had resulted in a bald patch – supposedly costing hundreds of pounds.  If only there had been an outlet for us to vent our fury and shame our greedy Landlord. 
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Finding investment property is rather akin to sticking a pin in a map

Last week we thought about buy to let, and whilst that suits certain investors one of the real issues that’s been pondered increasingly is that of institutional money finding it’s way into residential investment.

Commercial property is a safer bet, at least in terms of a solid income, and simpler to manage.  Most tend to be for 15 years with the tenant responsible for all rent and rates as well as insuring and repairing the premises. With luck the investor gets the rent paid, upwards only rent reviews and is handed back premises in re-lettable condition. Capital growth is of less concern than income.

Residential letting is a different ball game. Tenants come and go more often, with attendant void periods.  Management is often of the micro variety and there’s little control of how the place will look when you get it back.  That’s before legal issues around tenants not paying or leaving are taken into account.

Whilst there’s more protection for residential tenants now landlords can still be at the mercy of rogue letting agents who still don’t (yet) have to belong to a redress scheme or be licensed.  Good management is not cheap and as usual you do tend to get what you pay for and this cost eats into the bottom line.  It’s certainly higher than with commercial lets.

The holy grail of course, and never has so much money been crying out for a good home, is the potential capital growth, and seeming rent increases, available to small time landlords.  Of course both capital values and rents can go down, as was seen a couple of years ago in London when both dropped dramatically, but overall the inexorable rise in capital values is enough to drive money into this area.

One fly in the ointment here is that traditional volume landlords have learned long ago that they don’t do this for income, long term capital growth has been spectacular.  In an ideal world rent pays any finance costs and upkeep as of course every few years the property will need updating.  This is fundamental and has held institutions back.  But the gains these landlords have made, just look at the number of property people in the rich lists, have been enviously watched for many years.

My company seeded and started a fund three years ago (great timing eh!) in only prime property, and given that we have over 50 years experience of managing such investments it’s been a success because we know what we’re doing, but has still been hard work.  Money is still slow to come in as for some reason the FSA has said that a property fund with ANY gearing (ours has 20%) is a “risky” one.  However, it has shown that efficient management is the key, and for any institution looking to start a purely residential fund it is the key.

Sourcing property for investment is also a headache and I was heartened to see an entrepreneurial company looking to help potential investors. Rankdesk (www.rankdesk.com) is currently something of a blunt tool but it seeks to rank properties with the kind of criteria used by potential tenants, i.e. closeness to transport, lift, condition etc.. With take up the efficacy will improve and become of real use, and given that finding investment property is still rather akin to sticking a pin in a map it could be the first step to genuinely helping people invest.

As for the players that control the really big money looking for a home in the resi world, they’re circling, but where will they land. 
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