Archive for the ‘Techie @ Lenwell HQ’ Category

Our general advice is if in doubt obtain a court order! I know, this takes time and costs money! However, the Protection from Eviction Act provides the tenant with a good deal of rights if a landlord takes back possession of a property during a tenancy without a court order.

The standard ‘abandonment’ procedure we use is as follows:

1. Try and contact the tenant in whatever way possible and record each of your attempts (you may need to tell a judge the extent you went to if the tenant claims unlawful eviction).
2. Visit the property and carry out an inspection (after sending a letter to confirm the date of the inspection).
3. Look for obvious signs of occupation (toothbrushes, food in fridge etc).
4. Ask the neighbours have they seen the tenant.
5. Mark the door with a  small piece of tape and place an abandonment notice on the door.
6. Revisit the property after 48-72 hours and if the mark has not moved arrange for the locks to be changed.
7. Leave the abandonment notice on the door and don’t relet the property until at least 14days has passed.

Despite following the above procedure the tenant can still return and want to take back possession of the property. In most circumstances if this happens we would recommend a landlord allows the tenant to retake possession.

We understand the abandonment procedures in England are not fantastic and a court order remains the only 100% safe way a landlord can recover possession of his property.

This blog entry was written by Rob Wellstead, Managing Director of Lenwell Property Services. Lenwell have offices in Luton, Dunstable, Bedford and Northampton, therefore, if you have a letting requirement in any of these areas please call Lenwell! For other areas we recommend only using the services of an ARLA agent (Association of Residential Letting Agents. This blog does not represent legal advice just the opinion of an experienced letting agent! Please don’t act (or refrain from acting) as a result of this blog, if you do and it all go’s wrong you only have yourself to blame! As with all landlord and tenant legal issues recommend in the strongest possible terms taking professional legal advice first.

Protection from Eviction Act 1977

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1977/cukpga_19770043_en_1

Protection from Eviction Act 1977

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1977/cukpga_19770043_en_1

Housing Act 1988

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1988/Ukpga_19880050_en_1.htm

Housing Act 1996

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1996/ukpga_19960052_en_1

Housing Act 2004

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2004/ukpga_20040034_en_1.htm

This can cause a landlord a great deal of problems not only with the inevitable ‘clear up’ costs but also the concern of what to do with the goods. We have experienced tenants leaving possessions at a property on numerous occasions and unfortunately there is no hard and fast rule to follow. Therefore, I have detailed below an actual case:

1. We visited a property after a tenant fell into arrears of rent. The property appeared unoccupied. We were unable to contact the tenant therefore, we visited the property and ‘marked the door’, placed an ‘abandonment notice’ on the door and returned two days later. Two days passed by and we had received no response from the tenant and the ‘marked door’ had not been touched. Therefore, we re-entered the property and took possession.  We found the property required cleaning but also had what appeared to be most of the tenants possessions still in the property.
   1. This created a problem as we had not obtained a court order to regain possession of the property, the tenant and we had reasonable grounds to assume the tenant was no longer leaving at the property. However, the Protection from Eviction Act 1977 provides the tenant with a great deal of protection where a tenant regains possession of a property without obtaining a court order.
   2. Therefore, this is what we did!
      1. i.      Took a detailed inventory of the property along with a video of the property. Our standard practice involves completing an inventory at the start of each tenancy along with a video. This recorded the exact condition of the property and would prevent the tenant claiming the property was immaculate and also that they’d left the crown jewels at the property!
      2. ii.      Changed the locks and left an ‘abandonment notice’ on the front door.
      3. iii.      Instructed a cleaning contractor to move all of the tenants goods into one room, the goods were bagged ready to be thrown.
      4. iv.      Arranged for the entire property to be thoroughly cleaned, garden maintained and placed the property back on the rental market.
      5. v.      We waited 28days from when we changed the locks before we disposed of the tenants goods. However, if we’d had found a tenant sooner we may have disposed of the goods sooner.
      6. vi.      The above action has been discussed with our local county court judge during court proceedings and the above action was felt to be reasonable, things would probably have been different if:
         1. The tenant was not in arrears! If they had simply abandoned but continued to pay the rent (it does happen, I promise!), we would have obtained a court order for possession before taking any further action.
         2. The property was tidy and appeared ‘lived in’ rather than abandoned but the tenant was in arrears. We would have waited longer by marking the door and waiting for 14 days to see if anyone was accessing the property.
         3. We had obtained a court order. We would have disposed of the goods sooner. There is law that protects the tenants goods when they have been evicted but the law also allows for landlords to make a reasonable charge for the cost of storage etc.
         4. The goods were valuable. If the goods had been valuable we would have waited for 28days before selling them and using the proceeds to offset the debt.

This blog entry was written by Rob Wellstead, Managing Director of Lenwell Property Services. Lenwell have offices in Luton, Dunstable, Bedford and Northampton, therefore, if you have a letting requirement in any of these areas please call Lenwell! For other areas we recommend only using the services of an ARLA agent (Association of Residential Letting Agents. This blog does not represent legal advice just the opinion of an experienced letting agent! Please don’t act (or refrain from acting) as a result of this blog, if you do and it all go’s wrong you only have yourself to blame! As with all landlord and tenant legal issues recommend in the strongest possible terms taking professional legal advice first.

Useful Links

Sale of Goods Act 1979 http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1979/cukpga_19790054_en_1

Protection from Eviction Act 1977

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/RevisedStatutes/Acts/ukpga/1977/cukpga_19770043_en_1

Housing Act 1988

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1988/Ukpga_19880050_en_1.htm

Housing Act 1996

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1996/ukpga_19960052_en_1

Housing Act 2004

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2004/ukpga_20040034_en_1.htm

Click below to download a copy of the Local Housing Allowance Guidance Manual used by DWP.

lha-guidance-manual-oct07

The new coalition Government has been very quick to seek to reduce the levels of unnecessary red tape that had built up under the last Government and which affect all of our lives and, in particular, make running consumer facing businesses such as ours, a minefield of paperwork and regulation. We naturally applaud this approach.

Slightly disappointingly, the Government has however announced that they do not intend to regulate the lettings industry further and we feel that there is a missed opportunity in this decision. Lenwell is proud of its professional standing in the world of lettings and property management and we have ISO 9000 accreditation and are members of the Association of Residential Lettings Agents, the National Association of Estate Agents, the Property Ombudsman Service and The Dispute Service. This ensures that our clients and customers can be certain of being dealt with professionally and have the peace of mind of knowing that independent redress is available in the unlikely event of a dispute arising which we cannot resolve.

Self regulation is fine but at Lenwell we would have liked to see the Government insist on certain minimum requirements and operating codes for anyone practising in the lettings industry.

Lenwell were proud winners of three more Industry awards including
the GOLD Award for  Technology and Online and
the GOLD Award for Best Customer Service

The awards were presented at the Lettings Agent of the year awards 2010
More details will follow

With reports of house prices on the rise once more, ARLA research (from
Quarter 1 2010 ARLA Review and Index) shows that the value of rented
properties has increased by as much as 14% May 09 – May10