[francistheswole]

I wrote 6 different cheques for my 2nd year house. I can't remember the dates of when each cheque is suppose to come out. The first cheque i piad was £120 which was in april(during uni) and then today my 2nd payment came out which was £507 which i can't afford. I was planning on moving into my student house in late aug. i don't think ill be able to pay that £507 comfortably(i'll have the money, but that money will be for living costs whilst in my 2nd year house) untill my student loans come in. What happens if i don't pay the £507?

my fault for not being organised tbh.

edit: collecting my keys on the 20th of aug

[Shelly_x]

If your contract starts before late august then you still need to pay for the period in which you aren't there. You could face being kicked out or taken to court if you don't pay. Or they will harrass your guarantor for the money.

[Gemzaar]

I am having to pay rent for July, August and September even though I'm not really living there, because our contract started in july.

[hunter0510]

For the landlord, the bills continue if you are there or not. The mortgage, insurance, waterbills etc. have to be paid and if the house is empty and council tax might kick in, which students are exempt from. For the landlord it is impossible to let a house out to someone else just for the 3 months as all tenancy agreements are for 6-12 months.

So the landlord would have to charge you a lot more rent for the 9 months in order to not make losses. Unite and similar seem to be offering this choice.
I usually have 5-6 students sharing and some of them always seem to stay over the summer and work.

Please note that in some university towns it is common practice for landlords to charge half the rent over the summer (retainer). It allows access to the property to carry out some repairs/redecoration. The landlord will usually know that before purchasing the property and it will be part of the calculation and decision if the property is worth buying.

[TenOfThem]

(Original post by francistheswole)

my fault for not being organised tbh.

yes

this is one reason why post dated cheques are bad

in this situation you will probably be charged by your bank as well

[mabrookes]

(Original post by hunter0510)
For the landlord, the bills continue if you are there or not. The mortgage, insurance, waterbills etc. have to be paid and if the house is empty and council tax might kick in, which students are exempt from. For the landlord it is impossible to let a house out to someone else just for the 3 months as all tenancy agreements are for 6-12 months.

So the landlord would have to charge you a lot more rent for the 9 months in order to not make losses. Unite and similar seem to be offering this choice.
I usually have 5-6 students sharing and some of them always seem to stay over the summer and work.

Please note that in some university towns it is common practice for landlords to charge half the rent over the summer (retainer). It allows access to the property to carry out some repairs/redecoration. The landlord will usually know that before purchasing the property and it will be part of the calculation and decision if the property is worth buying.

Council tax would not kick in on an empty property for some time, and there are no water bills on an empty property either.

If a landlord can't afford a few months what is going to happen if they dont rent the house one year? Personally I wouldn't invest in a student house unless I was capable of surviving with it empty for at least a year because it will always be a possibility (although I would obviously look at alternatives for the house as well if that worst case scenario happened). Half rent over the summer if you are not there is the best scenario for student houses, I wouldn't trust a landlord greedy enough to not be doing this.

(Original post by Shelly_x)
If your contract starts before late august then you still need to pay for the period in which you aren't there. You could face being kicked out or taken to court if you don't pay. Or they will harrass your guarantor for the money.

You would be fine for the first 2 months/8 weeks of the tenancy as there is nothing the landlord can do. Not a good idea though if you want to keep good relations, and given the percentage of student housing landlords that are really bad it could get unpleasant.

[hunter0510]

The councils have a funding gap as the government is cutting the reembursement of council tax by 10%. With the localism act they have given the power to make amendments to any CT exemptions. Many councils are cutting the exemption for empty homes and second homes.

As it stands right now, I wouldn't get an exemption anyways as the property is furnished. The exemptions only applied to me when I was undertaking structural work. See here

It's not really about how many months a landlord can survive. Renting out properties has to make some profit - if you like it or not - so the properties can be maintained. Noone invests to lose money.

Also what would stop landlords to let to families instead of students, if students would only pay for 9 months. And when a family goes on holidays they don't pay a retainer.

Most people who use the word "greedy" don't understand the real costs of buying a property and the costs for the upkeep.

[mabrookes]

(Original post by hunter0510)
The councils have a funding gap as the government is cutting the reembursement of council tax by 10%. With the localism act they have given the power to make amendments to any CT exemptions. Many councils are cutting the exemption for empty homes and second homes.

As it stands right now, I wouldn't get an exemption anyways as the property is furnished. The exemptions only applied to me when I was undertaking structural work.

It's not really about how many months a landlord can survive. Renting out properties has to make some profit - if you like it or not - so the properties can be maintained. Noone invests to lose money.

Also what would stop landlords to let to families instead of students, if students would only pay for 9 months. And when a family goes on holidays they don't pay a retainer.

Most people who use the word "greedy" don't understand the real costs of buying a property and the costs for the upkeep.

They don't have to make a profit, id be worried if I was in that position. The main priority is to pay the mortgage and costs with the main investment the property itself.

I wasn't aware the changes were that wide, I have family renting both to students and also to the general public in a few cities such as Nottingham, York, Leeds and they don't currently have that problem if it is empty for short periods.

I said I wouldn't trust a landlord greedy enough to be doing it and I stand by that, they are actually greedy and don't need to or incompetent and have to because they had no idea/took no account of how students live (while making a mockery of attempts to include poorer students at times).
Just my opinion on the situation though.

[hunter0510]

Mabrookes,

Just so you understand where I am coming from: I am a landlady with several studentlets. They all are top spec with everything the students can hope for and I take pride in that. I have made it my mission to offer modern, clean accommodation and a great service allround.

That's probably why I haven't had a single day of voids since I started. I am not some sort of wealthy, lazy, greedy person or whatever people's stereotype of an investor is, but a single mum with two kids. I have studied and worked hard for many, many years and earned the money I invested into student lets.

Anyways, mortgages for BTL are usually interest only mortgages. Ask your family or friends. None of my students is paying down any of my mortgage debts. It is actually very rare that an investor takes out a repayment mortgage.

A landlord needs to make profits to be able to repair and maintain a property and improve it over time eg. insulation, new kitchens and so on. In which way is that greedy? If a landlord makes losses they will lose the property eventually. How can that be good for the tenants?

[hunter0510]

Also one of every lender's lending criteria is that the rental income has to be 125% of the mortgage payments. Why do you think that is? Because they want investors to be able to pay for the mortgage and not to go bust.

With HMO mortgages at 5.5-6%, that means the rental income has to be 15k pa or £1250pcm to obtain a 200k mortgage.

[mabrookes]

(Original post by hunter0510)
Mabrookes,

Just so you understand where I am coming from: I am a landlady with several studentlets. They all are top spec with everything the students can hope for and I take pride in that. I have made it my mission to offer modern, clean accommodation and a great service allround.

That's probably why I haven't had a single day of voids since I started. I am not some sort of wealthy, lazy, greedy person or whatever people's stereotype of an investor is, but a single mum with two kids. I have studied and worked hard for many, many years and earned the money I invested into student lets.

Anyways, mortgages for BTL are usually interest only mortgages. Ask your family or friends. None of my students is paying down any of my mortgage debts. It is actually very rare that an investor takes out a repayment mortgage.

A landlord needs to make profits to be able to repair and maintain a property and improve it over time eg. insulation, new kitchens and so on. In which way is that greedy? If a landlord makes losses they will lose the property eventually. How can that be good for the tenants?

The family I know this for, in Nottingham, do have repayment mortgages and are investing in the property, but I don't know about the others so maybe they are the same as you.

If you can seriously say "I have made it my mission to offer modern, clean accommodation and a great service all-round" then you are not the norm for student housing in most places and not who I was referring to. But it is hard to have any kind of sympathy for any landlord running a student house claiming they need the money, when they could just rent to families/working single people or any normal renting situation. Instead they target students, a group who specifically do not need the accommodation all year and could be fairly poor as well (with the government targeting poorer students). That will always be a little greedy to me, but there are exceptions to everything and it is just my opinion.

[hunter0510]

As in all walks of life, people are not the same and landlords are not all the same. There are some unscrupulous people around and they are a disgrace. And there are landlords who care about the teants and the properties.

There are around 1.25million students in private accommodation. To offer accommodation to students is simply responding to demand. Are you seriously suggesting I should feel bad because I offer students a good home?

It is not about "needing the money". I plough all the money I make back into it. I couldn't do that if I wouldn't make any money. I have built 2 extensions (25k total) in the past 2 years so that I can offer 1 shower room for every 2 students.
Only 8% of all investors actually live of the income. Most investor have incomes from other businesses or jobs and so do I.

It's not about feeling sorry for either the students or the landlords. To me it's all about getting it right, delivering what students want: right location, good sized rooms, modern interior, plenty of shower rooms, flat screen TV so they can connect the game consoles, wireless, dishwasher, plenty of fridges/freezers, microwave, tumble dryer etc.

The way you put it "targeting students"..."poor"... is like you are all victims. You have choices. You can live in the halls, rent from Unite or similar or rent a house privately. I know it doesn't effect you in Doncaster at the moment but soon your choices will be more limited as many councils have removed the "permitted development rights" for landlords to set up HMO's. The councils want more purpose built accommodation (unite and similar). It will have a big impact on students and maybe on the prices for private accommodation too.

BTW - Council tax applies for empty properties in Nottingham too. See here:

"Empty Properties
Properties that are furnished but not being used as anyone's main home will get a discount of 10% only. This would apply to second homes and un-let furnished rental accommodation."


Water rates apply unless the landlord asks to be disconnected. See here:
"If your property is furnished
For furnished properties, we recommend that your company charges its standard metered and unmetered charges in full, unless you ask to be disconnected. In this case, we recommend that all charges are waived other than the surface water drainage charge."

Thames Water:
"Unoccupied or empty properties
All owners of furnished/unfurnished unmetered properties are legally responsible to pay for water services even when the property is unoccupied.
We can only close the account if the property does not contain any furniture and is not undergoing refurbishment."

[francistheswole]

(Original post by Shelly_x)
If your contract starts before late august then you still need to pay for the period in which you aren't there. You could face being kicked out or taken to court if you don't pay. Or they will harrass your guarantor for the money.

yeah i got charged an extra £25 since my cheque bounced.

I'm seriously wondering how i'm gonna pay for this? i'm getting paid from work on friday but it's not enough, I've tried emailing my landlord or whatever, trying to explain that I won't be able to pay until I get my student loan which will be in late sept/early oct. I've told them that i'll pay the 2nd and 3rd cheque together as soon as I get the loan, but i don't think they're having it. My guarantor (my mother) is a widow and she's already stressed as-is so I don't want to ask her to pay for it. I Also have resits in aug so if they don't let me move in there's no way I can resit them. I understand it's not their job to have sympathy, there's must be something they can do or i can do?. I wish i just lived in private halls so much less stress.

[francistheswole]

Also it turns out the first thing i paid for was the retainer

what exactly does the retainer do?

[JoannaMilano]

Retainers are usually a reduced rate of rent that you pay over the summer. You don't have access to the flat, but you only pay a percentage of the rent.

Lots of students prefer this as they arent in the uni town over summer, do reduced rent + no access beats full rent and access they won't use.


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

[francistheswole]

(Original post by JoannaMilano)
Retainers are usually a reduced rate of rent that you pay over the summer. You don't have access to the flat, but you only pay a percentage of the rent.

Lots of students prefer this as they arent in the uni town over summer, do reduced rent + no access beats full rent and access they won't use.


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

my retainer was only £169

but I read on other websites that paying the retainer does allow you to move in during the summer

[JoannaMilano]

(Original post by francistheswole)
my retainer was only £169

but I read on other websites that paying the retainer does allow you to move in during the summer

Why would a landlord let you move in if you're only paying a fraction if the rent? It'd possible the retainer might let you move stuff into the house but unless you're paying full rent I don't think you could live there