Why councils can’t run private rented homes – after another failed landlord fiasco

Every private landlord in the country must know that their local council is hopeless and doesn’t understand the private rented sector – but did you know that they couldn’t run a bath?

I’m talking, of course, about the not-so-shocking news that another private landlord organisation created by a council has hit the buffers.

So, well done to Reading Council for blowing council taxpayers’ money on buying homes to rent out, creating a business to run the portfolio and then making a hash of it.

You see running a property portfolio with tenants isn’t as easy as it looks, is it?

We have to meet lots of legislation, keep a property safe for tenants and deal with clueless council staff.

But when the boot is on the other foot you really don’t know the first thing about a) running a business for profit (it takes hard work), and b) being a landlord.

Councils can’t deal with their own portfolio

I can’t be bothered researching how well council homes are run – I read enough on Property118 to know that councils can’t deal with their own portfolio – and they have lots of cash as well.

I suspect having to respond to tenant complaints in a timely fashion was an inconvenience. Like Clarion taking FOUR YEARS to fix a window. You simply can’t do that in the PRS.

You could try but the council jobsworths would be down on you like a tonne of bricks. Oh, wait.

Like I said, they can’t run a bath. And if they did, it would either leak or be in the wrong house.

And just like Nottingham City Council and its NCH Enterprises fiasco, it’s the tenants that pay the price with eviction.

But hold on, doesn’t this beg a serious question?

Stay put until the bailiffs come

Will Reading Council be telling the tenants of its own private landlord provider to stay put until the bailiffs come knocking?

Are they pointing the tenants to the services of Shelter?

If not, why not? This is what they would do when a private landlord wanting possession would be facing.

(NOTE: If you are a Homes for Reading tenant, please, please take advice and don’t leave the property when they tell you to. Only settle for a council house in fair exchange – probably the one you are in that’s being transferred to the council).

Also, my old friend Angela Rayner might get her act together and ban section 21 ‘no-fault’ eviction notices when the Renters’ Rights Bill appears later this year.

That would scupper the council’s bid to gain vacant possession by 2026 when the last tenancies end.

Or am I being churlish?

As a private company, the landlord must comply with the law.

It would be great to see some of the tenants get to court and claim hardship – and have the judge agree they can remain.

Council-run business can’t make money

It’s also hilarious that a council-run business can’t make money from the rents – so will replace those tenants with renters paying even less.

Please help me make sense of this.

I appreciate that there will be ’emergency workers’ getting a house, but there will be others on benefits.

So, the council will use its own resources (ie our cash) to make up the shortfall.

And what of the employees? Will they be laid off or reemployed by the council?

Whichever it is, I’m guessing that the exposure to working in the real world, that’s when stuff needs to get done, has been a wake-up call.

Running a business takes effort and commitment, looking after tenants takes effort and commitment – and you’ll get no thanks for it.

Of course, I imagine that if a private landlord decided to evict 94 families it would make the national news. Oi BBC, where are you?

Councils taking control of a landlord’s properties

Then we have councils taking control of a landlord’s properties – good luck to Merton Council

That’s a brave move to run HMOs without any landlording experience and, I guess, there will be some council staff in for a rude awakening.

Though I did laugh at Phil Turtle’s accurate take that council staff are ‘completely incompetent to actually manage an HMO’.

They have no idea how they work, absolutely none, so let’s hope this works out after the tenants weren’t treated too well by a landlord who gives us all a bad name.

A passive investment opportunity

The bottom line for all landlords and those who want to get on board is that landlording isn’t a passive investment opportunity. It really isn’t.

Even if you hand off the day-to-day responsibility to an agent, there are still a lot of things for you to do.

It won’t be like Homes for Reading which got to spend other people’s cash and still fail.

The big difference here is that councils tell landlords wanting possession for selling or they can’t pay the higher mortgage, that a landlord’s problems have nothing to do with the tenant.

So, what have these tenants in Reading done to be treated like this?

Reading Council speaks like the whole endeavour is an open and shut case.

If the tenants organise themselves, they can remain in their homes until a judge agrees to possession.

Unless there’s something tricky in the tenancy agreement that means you can do nowt.

Hey, Reading Council, will you like how it feels? Feeling sore and betrayed by the legal process?

Join the club, hun. Run a bath to calm yourselves down.

Until next time,

The Landlord Crusader

Share This Article