Make Some Money

back in may i wrote about my bad tenants situation in this post http://www.daveso.com/property-investment/watch-out-bad-tennants/
since visiting them 2 of the 3 bad payers are slowly paying of their arrears by paying more every month. I have 1 tenant though that just does not play ball. I have changed her payments to weekly payments to make it easier for her to pay. she assured me that she would never be late on her payments again.

it’s the banks fault - i’ve paid you

after going to see her she paid for about 4 weeks in a row, then its back to her old tricks with only 2 payments the next month. in July she paid on the 10th and then no other payments were made. so much for her promises. “it’s the banks fault - i’ve paid you” she keeps telling me. looking at her bank statements i can see that she has paid the bank £35 each time for cancelled standing order. her bank Natwest are charging her £35 each week as she has insufficient funds to pay me. this is appalling that her bank should keep doing this to her and i believe she can claim these charges back. this shouldn’t really be my problem though as whilst she isn’t paying rent i am paying it for her. she is living in my property for free! this wouldn’t be so bad if i didn’t have to pay anything, but i have a mortgage on the property and without her rent i’m paying hundreds in mortgage payments that should be covered by her rent.

no other choice

i have to do everything legally and i have already given her every chance to pay on time. regretably i have decided to evict her unless she pays most of her arrears and starts apying on time. unless she does this i don’t think the situation will improve and i will be paying for more of HER rent. i don’t actually think she can afford this as she is not working her partner only works part time and she has 2 teenage kids. i feel really bad about this, but i’m not prepared to pay for her to live in my property.

Do it right, within the law

there are 2 main ways to do the eviction right. you must serve one of the following notices and then apply to court after 14 days.

section 21 notice

a section 21 notice can be served if they are out of contract (the 6 or 12 months signed for has elapsed), no reason needs to be given for a section 21 notice to be served. some landlords ask the tenants to sign this as part of the tenancy agreement, thus making it easier to get the tenant out. i need to consider doing this.

section 8 notice

a section 8 notice can be served if the tenant has broken the terms of the tenancy agreement. this is usually due to non payment of rent, but can also be due to disturbance or damage etc.
if using the section 8 notice for non payment of rent you can use grounds 8, 10, 11 depending on the situation. here is a brief explaination of each ground:
ground 8 at the time of the notice at least 2 months or 8 weeks of rent is unpaid
ground 10 at the time of the notice some rent is unpaid
ground 11 at the time of the notice payment of rent has been persistently delayed.
i have used all 3 grounds as if you only use ground 8 the tenant can pay you £10 to bring the arrears to less than 2 months and the courts may not evict. not that i really want to evict, all i would like is some of my rent please.

i served notice on 31st August so i’ll report back on how it all goes. i really don’t want this to go through, but i also don’t want to be a mug anymore by paying someone elses rent for them. i guess its all part and parcel of the proffession i have chosen..