Life on the other side of the headlines

Published: 29/05/2014

Landlords have been widely criticised of late, cast in the role of ‘fat cat’ cashing in on the misfortune of tenants who are unable to clamber on to the property ownership ladder. However a recent story demonstrates things are far from black and white and that landlords can often be left high and dry by tenants too.

The story involves Blackpool landlord, Sean Feeney who let out a property to a mother and her three children. However after the tenancy ended, Mr Feeney was left with a property ‘strewn with rubbish, dirt and graffiti’.

Speaking to the Blackpool Gazette, he said:

“The whole house is pretty much ruined. It will have to be gutted, and the last time this happened it cost £1000 to take everything to the tip. I don’t know how people can treat a property like this. I will easily have to spend another four or five thousand pounds on it. I don’t know how the carpet has got into that state – it looks like they have had cattle in there.”

Rob Denman, Head of GW LET comments:

“There’s a reason why we called our dedicated landlord service GW LET. The LET stands for Landlord Empowerment Team and we’re trying to even the letting playing field.

“Many of the laws associated with letting property favour the tenants. For example, if a tenant stops paying their rent, a landlord must first wait until a minimum of two months or eight weeks has passed before they can even begin the eviction process which, in turn, can take anything up to six to twelve months. During this time a landlord is unlikely to be receiving any rent.

“Current anti-landlord campaigners – from Shelter to the Labour Ed Miliband – appear utterly unaware of the real picture and instead have jumped on the back on the antics of a few rogue landlords and tarred the entire industry with the same brush.

“Mr Feeney’s story is one of many. I can only hope examples such as these shift people’s one-sided perception but until they do, we remain firmly on the side of legitimate landlords.”

Content correct at time of publication