Updated guidance has been issued relating to possession actions to reflect the extension of the bailiff enforcement ban until 31 May.
The revised guidance for landlords, letting agents and tenants explains the possession action process in the county courts.
It comes after the government announced an earlier extension to the ban in February, which was due to last until the end of this month. The move means renters have had some form of protection from eviction for more than a year during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Housing secretary Robert Jenrick said: “We have taken unprecedented action to support both commercial and residential tenants throughout the pandemic – with a £280bn economic package to keep businesses running and people in jobs and able to meet their outgoings, such as rent.”
A taper of the ban is expected to be implemented beyond the end of May.
The revised guidance can viewed here.
Comments (25)
JB is obviously a troll.
Suggest we stop humouring him!!
JB says that landlords can, even should, sell, but then bizarrely claims its landlords wanting the tenants to become homeless when it is quite clearly JB who is the one arguing in favour of this. The landlords are trying to prevent it, so how much does JB care about the tenants whose rights they purport to support?
Also, they repeat the fallacy that landlords selling might reduce prices enough for more first time buyers to buy. Landlords have been selling at a rate of 4000 properties per month for the last two years yet prices in that time have risen at one of their highest rates ever – 6.4% in one of those years alone. Not to mention the fact that first time buyers are currently at their highest level since before the credit crunch and have had their numbers rebounding astonishingly since 2010 so the ability or otherwise of a first time buyer to buy, and the price that they pay, has absolutely zero dependency on landlords selling. It sounds logical, but it isn’t factually correct. Which is pretty much what all professional landlords have been saying since before the various attacks on the sector began.
I don’t Think any landlord is suggesting that their business should not change or the circumstances surrounding it alter. Most landlords are in it for the long term. This would mean by its very nature that change is inevitable. Landlords by and large are highly adaptable human beings who negotiate new problems on a daily basis. The main problem being debated here is that the government are not just changing the rules but deliberately mandating the ability of a consumer to walk away from paying, without any consequence, even in cases where that is clearly not necessary. Changing the rules is one thing, telling landlords they cannot participate in the process at all is quite another.
Facts and context, JB, facts and context. You should try using some.
often key workers
I know very few key workers such as nurses, hospital porters, workers in my local M&S, delivery drivers who have been able to afford one property let alone 2
where do you want all these people you want to make homeless to live?
In business you must accept that circumstances may change.
Any business carries that risk.As it happens a chap I drink with has been a LL for many years.
His view is that over 15 years he has made money and has been sensible and retained some lest he face a rainy day. His view is that overall he has done well so accepts that Covid is an unprecedented situation.
I have my own business. I will pay more corp tax due to Covid. That is just bad luck. If it made the business not worth doing I would not whinge about it I would just close and do something else.
LL have that choice if they wist to exercise it.
Just because you do not agree with something it does not make it unlawful.
Where would you like all the tenants who have lost their jobs due to Covid to live when they get evicted as you would wish?
‘ PRIVATE ‘ sector housing, is, well private, its a business like Tesco or any other where if you can’t pay for your goods, you don’t get them. Its the Govt’s responsibility to accommodate ( or pay for such ) for those who can’t afford it.
Does your ‘business’ allow people to avail themselves of your service or product whether they can or do pay for it or not ?
If it does, good for you, but there have been long-standing legislation concerning private renting, and once a pandemic comes along, the govt think they can off-load their welfare responsibilities onto private individuals.
That’s not a ‘business risk’, and I can’t believe anyone with enough sense to run a business would suggest it is.
Like me, the majority of LLs have done their best for their tenants who have lost their jobs, but what really gets my goat are the feckless tenants (I have one) who are exploiting the situation which the Government is facilitating. How can a LL with a small portfolio and no other income be expected to cope with the shortfall? Do you realise LLs in that position could actually lose their properties… just because a tenant refuses to pay rent? The fact that Rishi refuses point blank to help with rent arrears in England says it all. He expects the PRS to shoulder the burden.
I understand your question about where the tenants would go if evicted, and it’s valid. But if the Government wants the PRS to manage that situation, then it should support landlords and/or tenants. That said, miscreants should be put onto the street!
It is not the responsibility of private LL to house for free those who refuse for WHATEVER reason to pay for the service. It is irrelevant if such feckless tenants have nowhere to go to. LL aren’t charities. I have no care for any tenant that would refuse to pay me for services I provide. If that means they are on the street then so be it. Why should I use my private capital to prevent rent defaulters from being homeless?? Perhaps in previous years they could have made arrangements to manage normal domestic expenses in the event of sudden income loss. Savings and income protection insurance covers this situation. Why do tenants believe they shouldn’t make arrangements to cover for these circumstances!? I’ll tell you why. Because they know that to evict them is a long and expensive process. Plus they know the Civil Recovery process is pathetic. Govt essentially supports the fecklessness of rent defaulting tenants. This Govt behaves more like a Corbyn Labour Govt would.
“I have my own business. I will pay more corp tax due to Covid. That is just bad luck. If it made the business not worth doing I would not whinge about it I would just close and do something else.”
….and if Government said you can’t close it but you must continue supplying the goods or services, and by the way your customers do not have to pay. And if you do manage to make profit they’ll tax you at 120%. Welcome to being a Landlord!
The reality of lockdown is starting to bite. If the government had bitten the bullet when it initially wanted, instead of listening to that idiot who forecasted 500,000 deaths, we would have kept the economy going and would not now be in this totally artificially manufactured situation. I just need to be rid of my feckless miscreant of a tenant, and I’ll be on my way out of BTL. Fortunately, I’m now a pensioner, and not embarking on my property investment journey. But if the stress is too much for me, I can’t imagine how bad it must be for those starting out and seeing their investment ‘stolen’, and with no way of reacting or recouping their losses. They must be desperate.
They made a business decision thetre is no guarantee in business.
I’ve been making qualified business decisions for 50 years. The business decision to invest in BTL was not based on Government facilitation of deliberate non-payment of rent with associated prevention of legal and deserved eviction!
In any business there may be unseen factors which change the situation/market. That is why no business comes with a guarantee.
Where do you expect the govt to put all the people who have lost jobs if they are throw out?
@ Jan Byers – Where or how the Govt discharge THEIR welfare responsibilities is a matter for them, or at least to pay for those welfare responsibilities.
Government manipulating the law to pass off their welfare responsibilities onto private individuals, 50% of whom are single-property renting, often key workers – is not a business risk, its nothing short of Outrageous and unlawful.
If Landlords were co-ordinated or had solid representation for a sizeable majority, there would have been a Judicial review by now.
Please advise as to why you believe that just because rent defaulting tenants cannot pay their rent for WHATEVER reason that a LL should be obligated io provide the accommodation service for free until the LL eventually manages to evict!!??
Saying a LL must do so because those feckless tenants don’t have the ability to go anywhere else is NOT an answer.
In case you didn’t realise LL operate in the PRIVATE HOUSING SECTOR not the SOCIAL HOUSING SECTOR!!
For somebody allegedly in business I have never come across such a naive idiot as you.
Your bonkers take on things are truly breath taking.
Fortunately for my local supermarket I believe in PAYING for the goods and services they provide.
I has never occurred to me to take the goods without paying and if caught to advise them to take action in the courts to recover the monies for those goods.
In the meantime of course I leave the store without paying with the groceries.
How long before that business would close if every consumer did the same as me!?
Indeed how long would you last in business if your clients refused to pay for your services!?
You have some very weird views that make no logical sense.
You have no sense of how an economy works.
Your particular Socialist trope that magically bringing more stock to market will reduce prices enabling tenants to buy just proves how detached you are from reality.
You can understand why all right thinking and sensible people would completely ignore your bonkers ideas.
Do you read the Morning Star as your daily newspaper by chance.
This would be logical based on your very weird views.
But necessarily your opinion is of no value.
You certainly belong in the comments section of that idiotic left-wing rag; the Guardian.
A business decision where not just the goal posts but the entire game is being constantly altered.
LL don’t want or expect business guarantees. But what they DO expect is to be able to attempt to make as much money as they can with those assets. The COMPLETELY DYSFUNCTIONAL REPOSSESSION AND CIVIL RECOVERY PROCESS MAKES A MOCKERY OF ATTEMPTING TO BE A LL. It was bad enough before CV19. It has now got to a completely ridiculous situation. It is the reason I intend to sell up. I can’t make profit if I have rent defaulting occupants who refuse to vacate. Of course even if it was possible to quickly remove feckless rent defaulting tenants there would be NO guarantee that the LL could source new rent paying tenants. That is the business risk all LL run but they can only run that risk if they can quickly get rid of rent defaulting tenants. If a LL can’t then there is no business possibility. All LL want is the opportunity to trade. That isn’t possible if you have an occupant who isn’t paying rent and refuses to vacate. I don’t know of any other business which requires the provider of the business assets to allow a non-payer to use those assets effectively for free until an extremely lengthy and costly repossession process has been concluded. It is my assessment that the game is no longer worth it with the inability to get rid of rent defaulting tenants quickly.
Yes but everyone wants to make as much money as they can. There is no guarantee. All business is a risk.
If you think it is not worth doing then do not do it. No one makes you rent properties it is a choice you made and can get out of if you want to.
The whole world has been affected by Covid. Where do you think the govt is going to put all the people who cannot pay rent as they have lost their jobs?
Being a LL is worth risking but only if repossession is made easy. If as is currently the case and scheduled to become even more difficult then such inability to achieve timely repossession does indeed make the business risk too much. You seem to suggest that LL should be aware of this effective theft possibility and make their decisions accordingly. The ultimate business logic of what you suggest is that all LL sell up leaving no PRS. That bizarre thinking would result in societal breakdown. So whilst the crudity of what you suggest is clinically correct if LL adopted your logic there would be anarchy. Which is why your business logic is incredibly stupid. Property rights are fundamental to the wellbeing of a modern society. Effectively allowing theft of a rentier’s assets until legal action is able to recover them surely must result in fewer rentiers. So where will homeless tenants live without a rentier providing the asset to live in? You are effectively calling for a Communist business model where a LL has to accept that if unlucky he must accept his property being appropriated for long periods without any rent being paid. That is hardly a business model that many LL would wish to continue with. But you believe this a risk that LL should be required to take. Why would LL wish to continue with such a dodgy business model? Many LL will take a view that the game is no longer worth it if unable to repossess easily especially from feckless rent defaulting tenants. We have been here before in the 50 to 70’s when the PRS reduced to about 7% of the property market due to bonkers regulations which restricted rents and facilitated sitting tenants. Regulatory change transformed the PRS which now houses millions of tenants with about 20% of the property market. If LL give up and the sector reduces to 7% again where pray tell will all the now homeless tenants live!!??
Being a LL is worth risking but only if repossession is made easy.
So if repossession is not made easy enough for you do not take the risk. That is a business decision you are free to make.
You seem to suggest that LL should be aware of this effective theft possibility and make their decisions accordingly.
What i said is that all business carries a risk there is no guarantee.
That bizarre thinking would result in societal breakdown.
Or in a lot of aprtments coming onto the market and if there is an oversupply prices may fall and enable FTB to purchase rather then rent.
So whilst the crudity of what you suggest is clinically correct if LL adopted your logic there would be anarchy.
I cannot see LL managing a coup.
Which is why your business logic is incredibly stupid.
I run a very succesful busines thanks. I do not expect a guarantee. It is not me who is whining because his business is suffering.
Property rights are fundamental to the wellbeing of a modern society.
Tenants have rights not just business owners.
So where will homeless tenants live without a rentier providing the asset to live in?
Tenants will become homeless if they are thrown out of the place they are in as you desire. Where will they live when they are thrown out which is what you want to happen to them?
You are effectively calling for a Communist business model
As a business owner I am hardly going to be a communist. I am a capitalist in that I accept no business has a guarante and the that things change. Good business owners adapt and change.
where a LL has to accept that if unlucky he must accept his property being appropriated for long periods without any rent being paid.
No as I said he has the right to sell and get out of it if she wishes to.
That is hardly a business model that many LL would wish to continue with.
They can leave the busines then.
But you believe this a risk that LL should be required to take.
It is any business person’s choice to consider the level of risk they wish to take.
Why would LL wish to continue with such a dodgy business model?
They do not have to they are free to leave.
Many LL will take a view that the game is no longer worth it if unable to repossess easily especially from feckless rent defaulting tenants.
That is a valid business decision. I have certainly looked at busines opportunities in the past and decioded they wre not for me.
As for feckless some are of cousre – I would hope a LL referencing agency would sort the wheat from the chaff before they sign a tenancy agreement . Many others are decent hard working people who have lst their jobs through no fault of their own.
If LL give up and the sector reduces to 7% again where pray tell will all the now homeless tenants live!!??
I am sure the deluge of apartments will reduce prices and be more affiordable for some current tenants.
I commend your concern for the homeless. Pray tell where the homeless tenants who you want to throw out because they lost their jobs during Covi will live.
But the Government has moved the goalposts massively. Who in their right mind would enter a business where the Government said Customers were not obliged to pay and the supplier had to continue to provide the goods/services ad infinitum ( unless he could find someone to take on his obligations)?
Most Landlords entered the business at a time when non-paying tenants could evicted within a few months, now if your lucky it’ll take about 2 years during which Landlords have continue providing accommodation for free. And then having successfully evicted assuming you haven’t fallen in the many pitfalls Government has since put in your way. You have next to no chance of recovering any losses incurred.
Please don’t insult Landlords by saying uts a business risk. Government changing tax rates by 10% is a business risk, legislating to legally allow non payment and disallowing eviction is off the scale.
You can bet your bottom dollar that the ban will be extended to September 2021 and probably beyond that until all the furlough fallout has occurred. When furlough ends there will be massive redundancies. Very few rent defaulting tenants will comply with NTQ. It will take at least 2 years to evict from September 2021. Though I reckon many LL will have been bankrupted by the time they have managed to evict. That is if the lender hasn’t repossessed the LL property!!
Yes but no business comes with a guarantee. Of course there will be massive redundancies in all sectors. That is the real economic world.
Equally a report in the Times said that 75% % of companies asked said that they intend to employ more staff when the situation normalises.
Ian, Look at my prediction in latest post on my Face Book page
You’re right, no business is guaranteed future custom, but rent arrears are different in they’ve already used the service…and the Government are assisting in this!
Paul,
I have an N5B in court that has just passed the 1 year mark. This is for a tenant desperately keen to be evicted to escape a hideous domestic situation and who asked me to instigate it. One YEAR! FFS…
Yep it is anecdotal evidence of LL like you that scare the living c### out of me. I simply cannot and will not sustain such circumstances. I simply don’t have the capital ro subsidise feckless rent defaulting tenants. This is why I can’t wait to sell up. I’m rumming a very successful and profitable situation but am aware how things could change detrimentally in an instant. I’m simply NOT prepared to have my domestic circumstances held to ransome by some feckless rent defaulting tenant. For me now the business risk is too much. I admire LL who have slogged away with the burden of feckless rent defaulting tenants. It is something I could not and am not prepared to do Which is why I am desperately trying to leave the PRS. I am NOT prepared to leave at any price though!! I sympathise with your plight and the more I hear from LL like you the more I am motivated to get out of the AST PRS. I’m definitely considering 1 FHL a different form of letting that has it’s own stresses. But quite frankly the stress of not being able to repossess a property from a feckless rent defaulter beats all other stresses!! Quite frankly I would welcome such smaller stresses compared to the major one of getting rid of an AST rent defaulting tenant. I like to be in control of my business assets. Being an AST LL you are definitely NOT in control. This is something I have determined I am no longer prepared to tolerate. So if it means I sell up everything and return my capital to a savings account then that is what I will do. I’m not prepared to invest in shares nor commercial property. I have due to lack of capital a very low risk outlook. I’m a very nervous capitalist!! The PRS was a relatively safe option but no longer. Being a bit of a coward I’m no longer prepared to risk all on some feckless rent defaulting tenant. I’m a timid little chap and don’t see why I should be abused by feckless tenants. So I have little alternative than to get out of AST lettings I have no idea what is due to replace the AST but it is guaranteed to be a far worse proposition otherwise there would be no need to abolish it. I’m also aware of the CGT imperative. I want to be gone before Rishi comes after 2nd property owners of all types. It is gonna happen because that is where the money is!! I hope you resolve your unfortunate circumstances soon and don’t suffer too much because of them. Your experiences just motivate me even more to get out of this game.