Question for the legal / renting brains here.

Short version:
Friend letted his house via whitegates agencey to a family who had rent payments paid from the DSS direct to whitegates.
However the change in law has meant that the payments were sent direct to the tennant.
They've since stopped paying and have now lawfully been moved on.

However my friend is now owed 3months rent (£1500) and in the wake of the family leaving they've left an estimated £2000 worth of damage.
The bond was only £500 which clearly wont cover the above, what I want to know is what is the best way for him to get all of/the most back from either whitegates or the tennant.

surely criminal damage should cover it, but as they were paying via DSS, even if they are found guilty, told to pay damages, chances are your mate will get £5 a week for the rest of his life.

is a cr4p situation tho, really hate it when people cant be trusted with money that isnt even theirs to use.

so use a solicitor to pursue them through the courts?

Does no liability fall on whitegates to resolve damage/missed payments?

Oh his insruance is for buildings, it doesnt cover contents.
An inventory was completed as were 2 inspections by whitegates during her tenancy.

[yorkie_chris]

Could the family be sold to a cambodian sweatshop?

Your mate needs to have a lok at the agency agreement - what did it say about what the agent would do? And about their performance on collecting arrears? How did the family leave - evicted or voluntarily, did nobody explain the accelerated procedure and its pitfalls? And was the s21 notice served at the start of the tenancy or only when the possession action started? If the latter, then there will have been a built in 2 month delay, if the former then time runs from the date of service so you don't have to wait 2 months at the end.

As for the tenant, if they're DSS funded then likely they have no money anyway, so query whether worth pursuing. The Court issue fee to recover £3,500 is £108, £100 on line. Then if they defend there's the £100 Allocation Questionnaire fee too, so even if s/he does all the work without a lawyer, it will require at least an extra £200 throwing at it.

£500 deposit is a joke...

[dizzyblonde]

Originally Posted by Ed

.

£500 deposit is a joke...

pretty average bond amount that round these parts. The bond/deposit is usually a months rent in advance and a bond of an equivalent amount isn't it?. or so it was when I rented (which is rather a long time ago)

Tiz why when I chat about selling this house and moving on, and the subject of 'possibly renting it out' comes into conversation ..its not going to happen....too much risk, even if its a nice rose tinted idea to some.

[yorkie_chris]

I'm not surprised so many landlords ads specify "no DSS"

Whose bright idea was it to pay the rent to the tennants not the landlord? Did they not expect it to be immediately spent on booze by a significant minority of feckless morons?

[the_lone_wolf]

Ed, as an aside to the main topic, if you let your house, via an agency or any other way, can you legally state "No DSS tenants" or similar? (edit, YC seems to think so...)

Every time I hear of this kind of thing it's always DSS tenants being problematic, hope the OP gets it sorted but the general way these things go is that it's not financially viable and the scum who've stolen the money and trashed the house get all the defence from the law - just my personal opinion but they ought to be struck off the housing list and left on the street instead of being moved to a new house at the public expense...

S21 served to tennant when it all went tits up then an abandonment notice was issued when she failed to respond to the letting agent.

Originally Posted by yorkie_chris

I'm not surprised so many landlords ads specify "no DSS"

Whose bright idea was it to pay the rent to the tennants not the landlord? Did they not expect it to be immediately spent on booze by a significant minority of feckless morons?

That seems exactly the case, the first month payments were forwarded to the tennant she went off on a bender for a few weeks.
Leaving cats unattended in the house which seem to have caused most the damage/stains.