I rented a room in a house (the landlord does not live on the premises). The landlord did not provide a rent book (or other appropriate document) covering my payment of rent when I first moved in. That was nearly a year ago … he has repeatedly refused to provide me with a rent book or ANY documentation covering my tenancy. On the face of it he is committing a criminal offence. When I moved in I claimed Housing Benefit from the local authority … I have just learned from them that the letter he sent to them when I first moved in stated that he was providing a room cleaner … which means that I am not a tenant … I am a lodger. As a lodger he can evict me at any time, raise the rent whenever he wants. As a tenant only a judge can evict me … he can’t force me out without going to court. However … he is NOT providing a room cleaner … never has done! A couple of days ago (28th Jan) I received a letter from the local authority informing me that the landlord had raised the rent by £10/week on the 1st Jan … but no extra housing benefit will be paid to cover it. The landlord has backdated the rent increase by 4 weeks! (which I’d already paid at the old rent). He expects me to pay him £40 to cover the period from 1st Jan to 28th Jan … but I only learnt of the increase on the 28th (from the local authority). I have been warned by the local authority Housing Department that if I challenge him about all this and demand the appropriate documentation he can EVICT ME before I have time to sort out the situation. He can lock up my room … with all my possessions in it … and I would have to arrange with him when to retrieve my stuff. Legally, because he is NOT actually providing a room cleaner, I am a tenant, not a lodger, and he would be breaking the law if he evicted me without going to court. Now here’s the rub … until recently he was, for 40 years, a Councillor on the local authority … he is a prominent member of the local Conservative Party. Most people of any consequence around town know him.
My advice would be to seek out the services of a legal aid organisation in your area.
You should take action sooner rather than later. There’s no use wishing you were young, or looking back and lamenting. Not that I’m saying your a bed-sitter…it’s just, you know, life can be a cold-hearted orb.
This is probably not the best forum to get the advice you need. I would try the Citizens Advice Bureau or a local housing charity. Urban75 is a London-based internet forum which, among other things, has a section on housing and benefits: benefits and housing | urban75 forums
He has done the same with the other 4 tenants in the house … backdated the rent increase by a month! A few months ago the fire alarm system went on the blink … and it cost him £4,000 to have it replaced. I was warned before I moved in that he was “only interested in money”. The house is in a nice quiet location and I had hoped to live out my life here (I’m 75). Fortunately I have enough savings to move my possessions into storage and find another place to live (I doubt if he’ll return the £340 month’s rent in advance/deposit I gave him). The last time I spoke with him we eyeballed each other … I thought: “You fucking cunt!” His wife was sitting there grinning at me. What he doesn’t know is that I’m “friendly” with the local Labour MP (I’v spoken with him a dozen times or more about a variety of subjects) … who will probably get a prominent position in the government if Labour win the next election (David Drew, a member of the Labour Shadow Cabinet as Farming and Rural Affairs Minister).
My purpose in posting this here is not to “get help” (though help would be appreciated if someone could come up with some original response I could get my teeth into, grrr!). My situation is an example of what is going on in the UK … a lot of people don’t have the intellectual and (limited) financial resources I have and end up in a “dark place” as a consequence of the machinations of people like my landlord.
You can stop right there: you are a tenant. From the rest of it, this seems to be a House in Multiple Occupation (see here). You need to visit the Citizens’ Advice Bureau and get proper advice. Once you’ve moved, I’m sure both HMRC and the local press will be most interested.
Quartz beat me to it. The CAB exists for exactly this kind of situation. I also suggest that you start looking for somewhere else to live; unfortunately, that will be harder than it should be since your current landlord is unlikely to give you a good reference.
You could also contact Shelter who have vast experience of dealing with problem landlords.
When I first moved in the landlord asked for 1 weeks rent. I’m not short of money so I offered him 4 weeks rent, which he accepted. As a pensioner I’m entitled Housing Benefit from the Council. The landlord insisted on this being paid direct to him rather than, as usually done, to me as the claimant. This Benefit is paid a month in arrears. My recent contact with the Benefits people and the Housing Advice department has been that BECAUSE MY BENEFIT IS BEING PAID DIRECT TO THE LANDLORD I must be an unreliable tenant as far as my managing of my finances is concerned. Their communication with me is based on this belief …with the exception of the last person I had dealings with everybody I’ve spoken to has not spoken to ME but to the category of person they believe I must be because they pay my Benefit direct to the landlord. I managed to crack this scenario by engaging in a ‘Question Time’ style debate with the senior person in the benefits department … she is now totally on my side.
Yes. There are other features, like not having a lock on your door (because the landlord must have access to the room if you’re a lodger), in case the landlord claims he does live there. Though even if he does live there you’d have to share a kitchen, bathroom or living with him for you to count as a landlord. Simply providing a cleaner does not make someone a lodger.
If you can persuade the council that you actually are a tenant - and you should be able to really - then you’ll be able to contest the rent and your landlord won’t be able to chuck you out. At least he won’t legally. That won’t stop him doing it, and probably keeping your deposit (it sound extremely unlikely that he put the rent in a deposit scheme like he’s supposed to). Hope you manage to move soon.
Apparently up until 5-6 years ago the house I’m living in was a lodging house (think of it as some sort of hotel). The landlady came daily to clean the place. This included entering the LODGERS’ rooms to inspect and clean them. The place was full … two sheds in the garden has lodgers in them. The utility room attached to the kitchen also had a lodger in it. The larger rooms, including mine, had 2-3 people in them.
Then the landlady had a mental breakdown…a major one. A cleaner was employed for a few months.
Legally after the cleaner left and wasn’t replaced the lodgers’ status became that of tenants. The landlord, however, will not accept this reality.
He has keys to all the rooms.
I am going to change my lock. I will demand that he lets me pay my rent by direct debit weekly into his bank account. As my brother has been diagnosed with cancer and I will probably have to spend time with him 50 miles away it’s not appropriate for me to have to knock on his door and hand over cash. He MUST, by law, provide me with a detailed description of my tenancy (furniture, its condition, what I can use around the house, etc,) and a rent book … which he has to fill in when I’m back on the premises. If he hassles me I can take him to court for harassment. As I have a health problem that I will not be able to cope with if I become homeless and I’m 75 if he succeeds in evicting me I’ll stand in the center of this small small town with a placard telling everybody what he’s done.
The place where I live is close to 100% White. Both the people I spoke to in the Housing Department were Muslims (who probably commute in from a nearby city where there are a noticeably higher percentage of Muslims). Both the people I spoke to gave me the impression that they were not, at first, being very straight with me. I’ve deduced that they are following instructions from more senior people … who are WHITE. The problem is this: If they help me deal with my rogue landlord he can respond by thinking “Fuck this hassle” … and decide to evict me (the judge is OBLIGED to grant an eviction order if the landlord says he wants to sell the place, for instance). I would then be eligible, as a 75 yr old with health problems, for rehousing by the local authority. So … without thinking much about the details of my problem both people advised me to just accept the CRIMINAL behaviour of my landlord. I could end up homeless if they helped me.
To elaborate, your narrative doesn’t make much sense. What does the employees religion, or your ethnicity, have to do with anything here? You’re attributing motivations to people with no evidence or reason. If I understand the setup over there, the Housing Department are the people you should be talking to. You apparently didn’t like the answer they gave you so you’re assuming they gave you bad advice. That may or may not be true, it’s hard to tell from what you’ve told us.
Based on your previous threads about your interactions with nurses and Islam I don’t perceive you as a reliable narrator with respect to this case.
Based on your previous threads about your interactions with nurses and Islam I don’t perceive you as a reliable narrator with respect to this case.
[/QUOTE]
I’ll not post anymore … but there’s such a thing as “Living in the real world”.
When I was young we spoke amongst ourselves about WICKED PEOPLE!!!
