LA have decided to bring in Mandatory LL licence

[scoobydo123]

Ok not stritctly BC or planning but you guys have lots of knowledge and give levelled response. What are your thoughts on the above in general? Dont agree with it one bit do not see any advantage for anyone both LL and T's.


My current situation

My local council where i live, and also rent 2 properties notified all homes within the borough (via a flyer included with council tax calcs) that they were introducing Mandatory LL licencing. I did not see, nor did any of my tenants this flyer so missed out on the discount rate of £180 per property.

I only found out recently when speaking with someone else who is selling a rented property, the LA are chasing them for £500 before they sell on. Next person if renting will have to pay £500 as it is not transferable.

Have tried to contact LA to register the 2 I have at the discount rate as I have approached them but they say I have to pay full amount £1000 as I missed to early adoption discount. Offered to pay at the discounted rate as they have not had to do any "legwork" to track me down but they are saying they have followed all procedures. I have complied with the spirit of the discount as I contacted them within 4 days of finding out about the legislation.


Note that had visted one of the properties about another issue (HMO but non licenseable) due to a friendly neighbour complaint and it was not mentioned in the dialogue between myself and the LA. They did say it was the best HMO they had ever visited

Got another 2 properties in adjacent Borough dare say they will introduce this stealth tax as well

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

I honestly don't understand a word of that its so badly written.

 

[tony1851]

In the same boat; my LPA liases with HMO and BC re licencing - threatened a s. 12. IN under HA 2004 if I don't act PDQ.
BC are also considering serving a s. 38!

 

[scoobydo123]

The legislation is supposed to help with anti social behaviour and untidy gardens! Not sure how that works, ASB by tenant and LL is responsible for their actions.

If no licence then cannot evict tenant under s.21, how many decent LL are going to get caught out on this with trying to get rid of problem tenants only to fail on something that they were not aware of.

 

[JohnD]

I honestly don't understand a word of that its so badly written.

He appears to be saying that he did not read a notification that was sent to him in the same envelope as his Council Tax bill.

 

[scoobydo123]

Who is to say flyer was in with the reminder or even that the reminder was hand delivered by the company that was contracted to do so. My tenants also did not see the same flyer. Will be interesting for those Landlords that manage their properties from afar how would they know that they need to get a licence? Hopefully no fines for them for non compliance! Would fully expect to pay the higher rate if they had to chase me for the money but I contacted them. When I asked how we were notified they said it was via the flyer and social media (facebook twitter) why not check HMRC SA105 for a more directed approach?


Anyway notwithstanding my actual circumstances what do you guys think of the effectiveness of the scheme?

Cheers

 

[SimonH2]

I'm a landlord myself - complete load of bo***cks. Typical "Tony Blair" thinking - we have a problem with people ignoring the law, but if we pass another law making the illegal act illegal then it'll all be hunky dory

So a number of councils have imposed selective licensing in order to deal with issues that they already have the means to deal with - but haven't done so. Somehow imposing SL (with it's extra costs) will magically make landlords who break the law suddenly (often in pursuit of profit) comply. I've responded to consultations in a few areas - pointing out that when the consultation cites rents being too high for tenants to afford them, imposing something that's going to increase rents is going to be counterproductive.

Not sure how that works, ASB by tenant and LL is responsible for their actions.

Yeah, that's about it. It's partly about shifting responsibility (for that, read "cost"). So instead of the LA taking action (which they can do), they can instruct the landlord to take action and thus shift the burden to the landlord.

It'll be interesting to see how well things are enforced - or not. My expectation is that we'll see a string of cases against generally good landlords for minor technical infringements (such as failing to register for a scheme they didn't know about in some cases), while the dregs that get us a bad name continue unimpeded.


I would have to wonder how a landlord could miss finding out though - at least if you're a member of one of the associations (NLA or RLA) who have both been covering the various SL proposals.

 

[scoobydo123]

I dont know how I missed the announcement of the legislation, maybe whilst I was being a good LL and holding down a fulltime job and bringing up 3 children and paying my taxes

Cheers for the balanced view, i am not a member of any of the mentioned bodies and just get on with looking after the properties and my tenants will have to keep a closer eye in the future. Next thing if they dont get enough take up to "run" the scheme will they be asking those who have paid to pay more money? Or flipside is if everyone did pay up at the higher amount and they had to do no chasing would they be refunding everyone who paid in.

 

[cw018666]

in all honesty,

having been a private sector housing enforcement officer,

its all about the money, if the area is heavily populated by students then its a good income!

we charged £630ish for our licenses, and yes you cant spread the cost, however if its up to standard, i.e free of cat 1 hazards and has the appropriate level of fire detection, (see lacors guide) then you will get 10% off

you may also get 10% off if you are a registered landlord or an accredited landlord if they have those schemes in place

in wales the landlord licensing is coming in soon, all landlords will have to declare their proeprties and license themselves! it remains whether the La's have the power to enforce

 

[SimonH2]

in all honesty, ... its all about the money, if the area is heavily populated by students then its a good income!

I don't think most people thought otherwise.

it remains whether the La's have the power to enforce

And therein lies the problem. The LAs don't have the resources to enforce the powers they already have, so how are they going to enforce these new powers ? If they don't enforce them, then the same landlords that are a problem now, will continue being a problem - so we're no better off, but our tenants are worse off because one thing that's absolutely certain is that the costs will get passed on. With typical costs being something like £500 for 5 years, then that equates to a little under £10/month to get added to the rent.

Luckily there's no hint of it round my way, but it if did come round to it, I'd be very tempted to break it out as a separate item so the tenant can see that the council is taking a slice "for nothing whatsoever". That's one of the insidious things - it's going to put rents up, when the rents go up it will be "the evil landlords fault", and the usual suspects (Shelter come to mind) will call for more and tougher restrictions. Yes the people who are going to be paying more rent are oblivious to this fact and think it's a good idea

Up in Cumbria they've launched an Accredited Landlord scheme. I don't think there's much by way of detail yet - all I know is that at some point only accredited landlords will be able to advertise on the council's website (eg for student accommodation), and NLA Accredited Landlords like myself get a "free pass" into the scheme

 

[SimonH2]

http://www.landlordzone.co.uk/landlordzone-update/manchester-finds-another-way

Ruling out the path many other councils have gone down by introducing selective licensing, which Manchester City council says is “very expensive and produces mixed results”, the council plans to “crackdown” on slum landlords, whilst at the same time introduce a ‘rental pledge’ that will spell out the expectations of both the industry and tenants – a measure which has been introduced in Liverpool and London.
...

So it looks like Manchester have seen sense.