Lone tenant hassled over re-signing of contract

Hi Nigel

Chances are that your landlord knows nothing of this and that the agent is simply trying to screw extra fees out of both you and your landlord.

If you move out the letting agent will earn these fees anyway so would may well be rubbing his grubby little hands together in delight at the thought of unsettling you and earning some juicy fat fees from both the landlord and the next mug who rents the the property through his agency.

Letting agents like that really do make me sick!

I suggest that you look up the landlords address via land registry and then contact him directly and point him to this discussion. It will cost you £3 - see >>> http://www.landregistry.gov.uk/public/property-ownership

Then also point him to this discussion about Deed of Assurance >>> http://www.property118.com/deed-of-assurance-1/32440/

If the landlord denies all knowledge of the agents action then he may want some quality legal advice on how to get out of the contract he has with his agent. If you work together you you may be able to save yourselves a lot of money. If you are both of the same mind I suggest you point your landlord to this Barristers member profile >>> http://www.property118.com/member/?id=1945 and at the very least your landlord will get 15 minutes of free advice. If it then costs him a bit extra to get a snotty letter fired off to the agent then it could be worth it!

I wish you luck and wish you were one of my tenants.
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Hi Nigel,

I echo Mark's comments. However, if it is the Landlord that want's the security of a new fixed term then I do believe he has the right to ask. Not sure if he has the right to demand though.

Follow Mark's advice and good luck.

If you want a place in North London I would be more than happy to consider you as one of my tenants.

Steve.

I have to ask why it's such a problem to sign a new contract. Is the landlord putting up the rent? If you're on benefits then maybe it's going up because your LHA rate has gone up which will offset the increase anyway.

If you're insistent that 12 months is too long, why not negotiate a 6 month term?

Reply to the comment left by "Mark Alexander" at "03/06/2014 - 18:17":

As a former Land Registry employee I'd just like to warn you that property owners almost always forget to update their address for service with Land Registry (though nowadays they offer the option of up to 3 addresses, including an email and an overseas address) - even I'm guilty of this - I made a long list of organisations I needed to inform when I moved recently, but guess what, LR wasn't one of them..! However, I ensured that my tenants all had my new address - which I believe is a legal requirement in the absence of an agent's or business address, although they have my mobile and email which is how we communicate day to day, though of course I self manage my properties.

Hi Nigel,
In my view you are the perfect tenant and I have tenants in the same position as you that request a periodic tenancy which I always grant. It is obvious that if true, the landlord might be seeking security over the Winter months, but people move at all times of the year and I believe the rental market is busy in most of the UK.

I agree that you should seek the landlords address as whilst I have excellent agents working for me who do not quibble when a tenant requests periodic, I believe they are after their 12 month upfront fee.

With my agents, to save on paperwork and invoicing, with any of my periodic tenants, I am billed 3 monthly in advance with a pro rata return should the tenant give me 1 months notice.

Good luck with it and if you need anywhere in North West London, I'd be happy to accommodate you and put you in touch with more sympathetic agents. They aren't all the same!!

I thank everyone for their advice but just in the last half hour I have heard from my agent: The landlord has asked the agent to give me two months to quit!! He is wanting a long-term tenant (which by the way I was quite willing to be) and thinks as I will not sign then I could move on at any time. The agents have apologised for the landlord and say they are only doing his wishes. They are happy to keep me as a tenant and have offered me a choice of a couple of suitable properties with no signing or administration fees whatsoever. I thank everyone though for their advice. It looks like it may be the landlord who is a bit weird as the agents stressed they were impressed with what I had done to the house.

Reply to the comment left by "Perfect Tenant" at "03/06/2014 - 20:01":

Your landlord needs check up from the neck up but he is within his rights.
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i have a very similar tenant, just retired, you should just see what he has done to my property, he wants to stay, i want him to stay, why would i not?

I too have many tenants like Nigel and would like to have more. When they get too old to do everything for themselves I will repay them by going the extra mile for them as they have done for me for so many years, e.g. by organising somebody to cut their lawns for them. I did this for one of my tenants before he sadly passed away last year. I believe that what goes around comes around and I suspect Nigel's landlord could find himself with a void period.
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This is quite an unusual situation. Normally it's the Tenants that want the security of not losing their homes, as these days it's fairly easy to replace tenants as there are so many on waiting lists, and it's often a good chance to stick a few quid on the rent to offset the costs, etc.
Why any Landlord would be so desperate for a tenant to sign a new agreement is a mystery. In my experience, if the tenant wants to leave, they'll just stop paying the rent and leave at leisure, knowing they've got plenty of time before they are forcibly evicted anyway. So if I was you Nigel, I'd find somewhere else in your own time, as it's quite likely it'll be several months before the possession order gets to court, then even longer before it is enforced. You could potentially still be in the house at Christmas.