As the dust settles after the violent riots in the UK’s major cities, those apprehended for their parts in the riots have now almost all appeared in court. However, the aftermath of the riots may well impact badly on private landlords and many will be checking their property damage insurance is intact as new tenants come into their properties.
Guilty tenants may be evicted
The problem has been recognised by the National Landlords Association (NLA) who are concerned that many social housing providers are threatening to evict tenants who have been found guilty of offences relating to the massive scenes of destruction that befell many of England’s big cities. The suggestion first came from Government sources and many social housing groups were quick to say they would enforce evictions. The acid test has now come and Wandsworth council in London has already issued one notice and others will soon follow.
Landlord organisation fears trouble makers will flood into private sector
The NLA believe the last refuge for the rogues in this circumstance will be the private rental sector and they are concerned that landlords will not have the powers to carry out sufficient checks on new tenants. David Salusbury, the Chief Executive, highlighted the problem by pointing out that private landlords have no facilities to get background reports on people coming out of social housing. He is not convinced that private landlords will be able to cope with high levels of anti-social tenants nor the districts that many residential lets are situated in.
Landlords will hope they are not the unlucky ones
Of course landlords can purchase the services of agencies who will do credit checks and various other background details of would be tenants, or they can choose to get landlord insurance that encompasses this sort of thing along with many other services, but this takes time and with many landlords already saying they will not offer tenancies to people on benefits due to the governments intransigent behaviour on direct payments it seems they will have to hope that rioters and looters look elsewhere to find a new home.