A fairer deal for renters

The survey does not address how you index rent increases during an open ended tenancy.  If the indexation was based on a nationally recognised index (eg RPI) I believe both parties would see that as fair.

If there are no rent increase it will deter Landlords from offering properties in the first place and lead to a decline the number of rented properies.  It would also reduce mobility as tenants will not want to give up a tenancy where the rent is effectively going down relative to inflation.

Open ended tenancies would be most welcome as would the end of section 21 evictions. I accept that there are times when a landlord may need to take back possession, but these have to be for good, legitamate reasons and not because he wants to move another tenant in at a higher rent, for example.

Whilst I think the idea of only being able to end the tenancy with a valid reason I am cautious about what will be an acceptable reason. I only rent to students at the moment because when I was a student in London finding accommodation was a nightmare. I rent my house for the academic year, I am happy and my tenants are happy. They often stay for 2 years to the end of their courses. I plan ahead and if they don't want to stay on or are finishing in June I find new students (via an agent). I give a discount for the summer months, with their agreement to carry out any maintenance in that time. About half move in immediately and we work round them.  So what do we do if in the future the current students say they will move out but are either hedging their bets or change their mind  but they have the right to just stay on. This may mean in future years we can't arrange new students until June/July- bad for us, bad for the students. If we ask for a declaraion in March (ish) that they will be moving out, will that be legally binding or can they retract it at will. 

P.S. I agree with many of the commentators here, when I used to rent it wasnt the issue with eviction, it was the witholding of deposits and so many people buying property to speculate that it took me until my late 30s to be able to afford to buy that were the issue. We need a system that only allows a person to buy a single property within London rather than whole swathes of it pushing up the prices for all so that less people are renting. How many MPs own multiple houses - that is probably why we wont see this change.

The main problem is affordability and lack of decent quality accomodation.  Although I am no longer a renter, when I did rent (about 20 years ago), the situation seemed to be a lot less restrictive than now with much better quality properties - and I had a reasonable choice of where to live.  My friends who rent at the moment have a terrible time with large depoists, charges for everything, awful choice, and seem to have absolutely no rights whatsoever.  The chance to build up friendship groups is reduced as people in houses are coming and going due to terrible end of tennancy terms and there is no reason to create a home and stay in one place for a long time, putting down roots.  

Tennants need more rights and Landlords and Management agencies particularly need to be fairer.  Legislation needed!

The issue of rent increases is a red herring.  Any Assured Shorthold Tenancy ought to include a clause detailing the maximum rent increase for another year's tenancy - usually linked to CPI or RPI.  For those tenants that do not have such a clause in their ASTs, I would look towards the enormous cuts by Tories who have closed most advice centres such as the Citizen's Advice Bureau.

The effect of heavy legislation on landlords in cities such as New York has usually resulted in a decrease in housing stock for rent and a decrease in the quality of housing stock.  Let's not go down that road.

These proposals are rubbish and pointless - as it is, it is very hard to evict bad tenants or tenants who refuse to leave so not sure what this aims to achieve. I may need to move to Ireland because of my job and dont want to sell my London home but these proposals absolutely terrify me as they move all of the risk onto the homeowner so I would rather not rent my home out.

When politicians come up with new proposals to 're-balance' the relationship between landlord and tenant, what this really means is 're-balance' the relationship between good tenants and bad landlords.  Believe me there are planty of bad tenants and good landlords, and there is a welter of new legislation placing increasing burdens on us.  For instance, we are now required to perform the job of immigration officers, ensuring that each tenant has the right to be in the UK.  In most London boroughs additional licenses are required to feed the council coffers for their discretionary 'HMO' licenses. These are not the statutory licenses required by Parliamenmtary legislation, but licenses for flats for 1 or 2 people.  This increases the cost to the landlord, who has no choice but to pass it on to tenants in increased rent.  The rule of unintended consequences always applies. Make life too difficult for landlords and they stop renting or reduce the quality of their stock. My local council has now decided that any flat which is unoccupied, even during renovation, attracts a Council Tax. What council services are being utilised by an empty flat?  If the property remains unoccupied for more than a year - for whatever reason - the Council Tax doubles. How many landlords are going to undertake extensive and costly improvements when they are being actively discouraged by their local council?

We need RENT CAP / RENT CONTROL! Simple and clear; it has also been proved by many academic studies.

Apart from that, I have taken my previous landlady to court over a dispute about our deposit, and I won the case. During that process I have learnt a lot, and mostly that landlords/ladies hold extortionate amount of power over tenants. This is so wrong! They can evict people whenever and as they like and withold deposits for trivial reasons. Estate agencies only work for the owners and treat tenants as if they are doing a favour to them while they're charging tenants loads of money!

I'm from Turkey, and while the UK thinks they're superior than us, it is far far more just in Turkey; all the regulations favour tenants. There's too much greediness from owners here and they just want to get the most from tenants without giving anything back. It has to be stopped!

The proposal seems to skew ownership rights from owners to renters / users.

I suspect, that often landlords use no-fault evictions when there is in fact a problem with a tenancy. No landlord wishes to have an empty property when it could be rented out and generating an income. In many ways the renters hold much power already. If they do not like their rented property they can move to a better one. In many respects it is the landlord who has problems associated with renting out their property.

I do agree, however, that tenancies could be lengthened beyond one year maximum should all parties agree.

Dear Mayor,

While I am sure the intent of these proposed new rules is to improve things for renters, I fear the unintended consequeces. I fear this might deter Landlords from providing rental property, which could lead to a shortage of such property, and therefore ncreasing rents.  As your Planning departments do not undertand that Social Housing provision in new build schemes is insufficient to meet the needs of 'ordinary working' Londoners (as it is only accessible to a tiny minority of the special sub-sections of sociery that qualify for new social housing) a reduction in Private sector rental provision could be a major problem for the "ordinary working" londoner.  

Please be very careful before you go tinkering with a sector where the Landlords are already being disincentivised by hositle fiscal policies. 

As it is not appropriate for everyone to buy a property at every stage of their lives, and as social renting is not a realistic option for most 'ordinary working Londoners', do not take actions that are likely to decrease the provision of private rented housing. 

Yours faithfully,

Malcolm Beckett

One size fits all is stupid.

We need all kinds of rentals both for Landlords and Tenants.

Some Landlords will have a reason to want a long term Tenant, some equally will want a short term.  Some Landlords will want instant repossession at a fixed date and, of course, some Tenants will be happy with this.

Other Landlords will want a Tenant to stay long term, some Tenants will want to stay long term.

If all options wereto be possible, then rents should fall as more Landlords will be able to offer the deal they actually want, at a reduced rent.

Two further suggestions:-

1)    Court time and costs could be minimised if Landlords could aurtomatically evict in accordance with leases, with the original signed lease including an agreed formal eviction notice.  This would be much fairer than at present as no costs are involved and both Landlord and Tenant know where they stand at the outset.

2)    The Government should publish an annual rental index showing a fair annual rent increase percentage.

Over a very great period of time, maybe the past 100 years or thereabouts, the Government has gradually interfered in more and more aspects of legal agreements, especially leases. 

This is wrong. 

Leases are agreed between the parties before money changes hands.  They should be allowed to mean exactly what they say.  To make this safer, maybe the law should specify a "key details" section as a special part of the Lease to be signed by Landlords and Tenants so that everyone can easily understand what the contract means before contracts are signed.

Fairness is key.  Changing the terms even by Government decree is not fair on anyone.

The current system where many tenancies are 1 year, and no-fault notice cannot be given by the landlord for 1 year, but the tenant can give 1 months notice from 6 months is weighted towards the tenant: If they breach their obligations, it can take months to evict them.

I would support rolling tenancies, but the notice periods ON EACH SIDE should be equivalent, possibly increasing as time goes on.  Conversely, if a tenant eg stops paying rent, why should they be allowed to stay free  for months?  Renting is about commerical contracts, run in good faith.  We have safety nets, like housing benefit.  Why should landlords fill the gap?  Show me other commercial contracts which expect continued service when in breach. 

Finally - Note that deposits are generally now limited to 1 month or 6 weeks rent at most; most tenancies are already running without full advance rent cover.

The choices in the survey are far too limited. For instance, I would have liked to be able to say there should be rent controls; to say that part of the answer is council housing - not private, not social, and definitely not "affordable". The proposed changes feel like tinkering rather than getting to the roots of the problem.

Many families want to live together as Extended Families to take care of each other. Local Authorities and Social Housing Landlords are not providing Homes that are large enough even though an Extended Family can afford a larger Home. The provision of Housing is now mainly the size of a shoe box with a balcony. All new developments in London are compartments stacked in blocks. This is not an adequate provision of Housing Stock. Extended Families take care of each other and are less of a burden on the costs of the Care System and provide the Social Care that Local Authorities do not. London needs bigger Homes not shoebox compartments.