The anti-landlord agenda continued in full force on the BBC with both Radio 5 and BBC1 giving highly one-sided presentations against landlords, making sure that when the NRLA came into the conversation it was purely on a defensive standpoint with little or no opportunity to push back.
Radio 5 interviewed a lady who had received a section 21 notice from her landlord and cited the fact that she had complained about the landlord’s poor response in fixing issues that she had raised. No attempt by the BBC to get in touch with the landlord to explain herself and the reason behind the section 21. The NRLA stated that there were enough measures that could be exercised by the local authorities to remedy these issues, but the reality is they simply do not have the resource to manage this situation. Similarly, BBC Breakfast interviewed a young man from a tenant support group who produced a lot of rhetoric about thousands of bad homes without providing any factual evidence along the way, he described the private rental sector as the ‘Wild West’, wealthy landlords taking tenants money and not providing habitable housing. The NRLA eventually got some input and took him to task on the ‘Wild West’ issue by pointing out that the majority of landlords own between 1 and 4 properties and see this as a pension plan, and also that only some local authorities take enforcement action whereas others do nothing.
Issues should not arise but as with all things in life it is about how they are dealt with. Like a good car dealer repairing a fault on a car without question so landlords should do the same. Issues become toxic when communication breaks down by either party being aggressive or the landlord not bothering to respond and the issue becoming much greater than it should have been. There are bad landlords out there without doubt, there are rules and regulations in place so that they can be dealt with and prosecuted and/or fined. As I have said on many occasions the good landlords are being penalised unnecessarily and forced out of business because the numbers no longer add up. As the NRLA pointed out, more section 21 notices will be landing on tenants’ doorsteps in the coming months purely because the buy-to-let model is no longer profitable.
This advert landed in my Facebook feed today:
Speaking of the Wild West it would appear that a cowboy solicitor is getting in on the sue culture in our society today. I wonder if he will approach landlords looking to sue tenants for unpaid rent, and damages to property? No, I didn’t think so either!
If you are a landlord struggling to make sense of the current situation, why not contact us for a no obligation discussion to look at your options.