Landlord evictions soar to pre-pandemic levels in 2023

Landlords evicted more tenants in the final quarter of 2023 than they have since 2018, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) reveals.

It says that in the last quarter of 2023, there were 23,382 landlord claims, 18,003 landlord orders, 9,833 landlord warrants and 6,649 landlord repossessions in the county courts of England and Wales.

These figures represent increases of 14%, 12%, 12% and 23% respectively, compared to the same quarter in 2022.

The report also shows that the median time from claim to repossession has risen to 23.7 weeks, up from 21.7 weeks in the same period in 2022.

The MoJ figures also show that compared to the same quarter in 2022, mortgage possession claims increased from 3,163 to 4,384 (39%), orders from 2,482 to 2,702 (9%), warrants from 2,131 to 2,201 (3%) and repossessions by county court bailiffs decreased from 735 to 593 (19%).

‘Landlord claims have increased at a faster pace’

A spokesperson for the MoJ said: “Landlord claims have increased at a faster pace and now make up around 85% of the 2019 baseline.

“Landlord possession actions have followed a similar upward trend mainly driven by Accelerated and Private landlord possession claims which have continued to rise and are currently back to their pre-Covid baseline.

“In the Accelerated procedure, the rise is across all the action types of claims (16%), orders (20%), warrants (25%) and repossessions (34%) when compared to the same quarter last year.”

Surge in landlord possession actions

The report attributes the surge in landlord possession actions to the Accelerated procedure, which allows landlords to evict tenants without a court hearing if they have a written tenancy agreement and give the tenant at least two months’ notice.

The Accelerated procedure has seen a sharp increase in England, where it has returned to its pre-pandemic levels, with the number of Accelerated claims, orders, warrants and repossessions increasing by 23%, 29%, 31% and 39% respectively, compared to the same quarter in 2022.

However, the number of procedures declined in Wales with the number of Accelerated claims, orders, warrants and repossessions falling by 78%, 69%, 52% and 33% respectively, over the same period.

Proportion of social landlord claims has fallen

The report also reveals that the proportion of social landlord claims has fallen from around 60% before the pandemic to 36% in the last quarter of 2023.

The proportion of private landlord claims has risen from around 30% before the pandemic to 31% in the last quarter of 2023.

The proportion of landlord claims that are Accelerated claims has remained stable at around 33%.

The MoJ notes that London remains the hotspot for landlord possession actions, accounting for 33% of all landlord claims, 31% of all landlord orders, 33% of all landlord warrants and 28% of all landlord repossessions in the last quarter of 2023.

London also saw the highest increases in landlord claims (32%) and landlord orders (25%) compared to the same quarter in 2022.

‘Blighting the lives of renters across our country’

Ben Twomey, the chief executive of Generation Rent, said: “Today sees the continuation of an awful trend that has been blighting the lives of renters across our country.

“As long as landlords can evict tenants through no fault of their own with just two months’ notice, homelessness in England will continue to soar.”

He added: “Renters have been waiting five years since the government promised to end these evictions, and yet today we find out the government is delaying their plans again.

“Since that promise, almost 90,000 households have been forced out because of no-fault evictions – and this number is rising every day.

“In fact, since the law to change this was last debated in Parliament, we estimate that 5,891 more households have faced Section 21 eviction in the courts.”

Meanwhile, the Leader of the House of Commons, Penny Mordaunt, has confirmed that in the upcoming Parliamentary business, there are no plans for the Renters (Reform) Bill to return to the Report Stage. This means the Bill, which promises to outlaw Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions, will not be debated again until 4 March at the earliest.

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