Wednesday, Aug 11, 2010
Should be allowed to use hard force like USA
ITV: Forced out by squatter
A charity worker and her 4-year-old son have been forced to live in a tent after a squatter took over their house in Brighton.
Susan Butler rented out her home while she was working abroad helping homeless people.
But when she got back her tenant refused to leave the house or pay any more rent.
~******Just to note I would have dragged them out , changed locks and made sure they were out, not called police**********
Posted by mark @ 01:33 PM (2062 views) Add Comment
22 Comments
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1. mark said...
Officer she attacked me with a knife when i came to collect rent, I had to beat her to death....lol
2. Catmandu said...
What can you say?? It's a disgrace. It's also a disgrace that it takes so long to evict someone in these circumstances.
3. This comment has been removed as it was found to be in breach of our Blog Policies.
4. drewster said...
I've watched the video, here's the brief summary.
Owner buys a house in Brighton, lives there for a few years, then goes abroad to do charity work. While abroad she lets the house to a tenant. They sign a six-month tenancy agreement (presumably an Assured Shorthold Tenancy). The first few months of rent are paid but then no more. The owner comes back from abroad and wants the house back, but the tenant won't leave. Cue drama.
There's an interesting twist. The owner believes that the tenant actually wants a court order and a forced eviction, so that the tenant can get a council house. This seems quite plausible.
The video ends with a lawyer explaining that because of the court process, it could take up to four months for the owner to get her house back.
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I don't think there's anything particularly unusual about this story. Landlord websites are full of horror stories about tenants refusing to leave, how slow the eviction process is, and how much damage they sometimes leave in their wake. If you choose to be a landlord, it's a known business risk. Amateur landlords (such as the owner in this video) aren't aware of all this.
5. mark said...
Still she should not have any rights much like in most of the USA, once she does not pay, owner should be allowed to enter and evict with force and a good kicking.
luckily we never had an issue when we used to own BTL however we heard of many horror stories such as pot growers etc, the key is to have a clause allowing access to inspect once a month
Captcha campaign WE WANT IT REMOVED
6. drewster said...
Mark -
(1) Email webmaster@housepricecrash.co.uk
(2) There are two sides to every story. This case seems clear-cut, but what if the tenant claimed she had been paying all along? What if the tenant claimed she was actually the owner, and maybe even had some fake documents? What if the tenant had lived there for several years and had told all the neighbours she owned the house? You'd need a judge (or at least a magistrate) to examine the evidence and rule either way, before the police could evict the tenant. The real shambles is how slowly our legal system runs.
7. braindeed said...
dirty mark @3 said...
'the key is to have a clause allowing access to inspect once a month'
....Another deep and meaningful philosophical discourse, from today's resident Immanuel Kant
8. mark said...
braindeed ?????????????????????????????????
9. sj032 said...
Drewster, what's with all the what ifs??? It seems that a good dose of common sense could sort this out. No need for judges and the like. If it's your property then I agree totally with mark. Go in to you property and throw the guy out on his ear by whatever force necessary. If done tactfully,I'd expect the most you'd get from the law would be a caution.
10. Fakiee said...
Cant she just have the locks changed?
11. hpwatcher said...
I think this story has given me a great idea about how to reduce my costs.
braindeed ?????????????????????????????????
Just agree with the resident troll - saves a lot of time.
12. fubar said...
Silly mare deserves everything she gets.
13. hpwatcher said...
'the key is to have a clause allowing access to inspect once a month'
Yes, but even if she did have that clause, would she be able to get in? They could still tell her to bu99er off and not let her in.
Even if she was able to get in, what could she do?
14. mark said...
the key was directed at the drug growers, you can never stop non payers, that is a risk with renting as the law is on their side, same as murderers, thieves etc
what on earth is that shape in the captcha, GET RID OF CAPTCHA CAMPAIGN
15. drewster said...
Mark, I don't think the law is on the renters' side. For every story about a dodgy renter, there's another story about a dodgy landlord. If the owner in this case had hired a couple of heavies to evict the tenant at the crack of dawn, we'd be reading the poor tenant's sob story ("I was only a few weeks late with the rent!")
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On the recaptcha issue, I just received an email back from the webmaster:
"Thank you for contacting us. We were forced to add it to the comments pages a few months ago as we had been inundated with spam. I'll ask our developers if there is anything we can do to improve it."
That makes sense - although we don't see the spam, the gnomes behind the scenes are busy filtering the comments. (Users like us with an admin password are presumably exempted).
16. techieman said...
thanks drewster - i will stop reporting the campaign comments from now on. Very sensible.
17. mark said...
drewster "late is late" I know a guy in liverpool who will take the doors and windows out if you don't pay..
ooh jeez i cant type that captcha..lol
18. Alice said...
I work in housing and advise tenants about their rights. The tenant is not a 'squatter' and she has rights to be there. I feel sorry for the landlady but she really should have known the risks before she granted a tenancy. Once a landlord grants a tenancy they effectively lose control of the property and to get possession they have to get a court order.
Landlords should not be allowed to kick people onto the street. The Protection from Eviction Act is there for a reason; to ensure that no tenant's home can be taken away without the landlord going through a legal procedure. If a landlord evicts a tenant without a court order, and if necessary, a bailiffs warrant, they can be prosecuted by the local authority and can even go to prison.
I think people are forgetting that if the tenant left and she had nowhere to go, she and her child would be homeless too.
The landlady should have done her research before letting her house.
19. 51ck-6-51x said...
"Should be allowed to use hard force like USA"
- No, contractual agreement issues should be resolved by a fair legal process, otherwise this could end up with large scale landlords running legitimised extortion rackets (maybe this happens in some places state-side?)
The problem is the convoluted process here.
What would certainly improve things is less court cases and more arbitration
(Maybe a move towards a *cough* private judicial system *cough* would improve things somewhat?!)
20. mark said...
sick6sick
in some states in the USA the second a payment is missed you can legally arrive and evict the tenant with a private "police" force for added safety
21. Beardiebloke said...
I don't get it. Why would you be a landlord if you haven't got enough money to go without rental income for a good six months? No point in whining about the law being unfair when you knew what you were getting yourself into.
22. Treebeard said...
Wait until she leaves the house, break in.
Change the locks. Jobs a good 'un.