The topic for this month's blog was easy – and for those who attended our August meeting familiar – as these are the tales from PDPLA members of 'emotional support' animals, a solution for ASB and observations on how increasing regulation forces us to have less respect for our tenants
Emotional Support Rabbits
This series of stories started with Alwin who had a young lady student in an HMO who explained that she had an 'emotional support' rabbit at home and for her continued well-being, she would like to keep it with her in Portsmouth during term time.
As the rest of the household had no objections, Alwin, wanting to be a good and caring landlord, agreed.
Upon subsequent inspection, Alwin was somewhat dismayed to find the rabbit living in some sort of 'hide' in the main lounge (he somewhat foolishly assumed that rabbits lived in hutches and there would be one in the garden).
Matters worsened when the aforementioned emotional support rabbit failed to provide the required emotional support and the young lady student decided it was all too much and returned home to her parents minus one rabbit.
The remaining students, left to care for a (presumably highly trained) emotional support rabbit did not do a great job to that extent that, the emotional support rabbit became in need of emotional support itself.
Stressed rabbits dig.
This one, dug through the hide, through the carpet and almost completely through the floorboards before Alwin intervened. At this point, the RSPCA were persuaded to send an emotional support expert to retrieve the emotional support rabbit and ensure it received the required emotional support and Alwin decided that in future, emotional support animals may not be such a good idea.
In response to this tale, another landlord member spoke of a landlord friend of hers in Canada whose tenant had an indoor rabbit which chewed through electrical cabling and very sadly, the tenants 4-year-old child touched the cabling, was electrocuted, and subsequently died.
One of our wiser members (a member becomes wise having been burnt by a similar experience sadly) stated that she does not allow 'emotional support' pets of any form as, after speaking to the University she had been told that they don't allow students to have 'emotional support' animals on campus – only guide dogs and dogs for the hearing impaired – and if the Uni does not believe they are needed on campus, then logically, they will not be needed at home either.
So, we wait with interest to see the wording of the new governments rules allowing tenants to have a right to a pet.
A Cure For ASB
This one was a quick digress. A very experienced landlord member stated that in his decades of experience, all of the various agencies and authorities could do what they like but in his experience, the only cure for a tenant exhibiting anti-social behaviour (ASB) was a 'bigger tenant in the same household'.
Having seen instances over many years where multiple initiatives have failed and the result is that the problem tenant has been evicted and moved on to become someone else's problem – this logic is hard to argue against.
Detached Tenants
You are probably asking what a 'detached tenant' is? When I first started out as a student landlord, I was amazed at the lengths some of the old-timer student landlords went to, to ensure their tenants were happy and comfortable. On arrival, pick them up from the station and on occasion, from the airport, ferry them and their luggage to their new home, stay with them while they get acquainted then take them to the local supermarket or wherever to pick up essential supplies for the first few days and any missing bedding or pillows that could not be packed and brought in their luggage.
What I soon realised was that this investment of time built a relationship which these old timer landlords built upon through the tenure resulting in much lower turnover, many staying for the whole duration of their course and far fewer problem tenants (as those which might have been an issue were reported much sooner and solutions found which kept everyone happy).
Sadly, all the attempts by the various authorities introducing regulation seek to make us 'more professional' and the actual result is that for many reasons, we are discouraged from building strong relationships with our tenants but instead are expected to treat them as commodities, at arm's length, managed with paperwork and bureaucracy. This is where I derive the term 'detached tenants' as we are increasingly encouraged to detach ourselves from our tenants.
Think I am talking rubbish – another example from the August PDPLA meeting: Chris has '2 lads' (his term) in a 1st floor flat. They have been there 16-17 years and have always looked after the place and paid their rent. They are now in their late 50's or early 60's so 'lads' is probably not the best description but to Chris, this is who they are.
One of the 'lads' now needs a wheelchair to get around and living in a 1st floor flat, this is a challenge. Chris described his childhood game which he called 'slumping' where you go up or down the stairs on your backside, using your arms on the next or last step to lift yourself up or lower yourself down. Slumping is how this 'lad' gets to and from his flat, except he does it with one hand either pulling the wheelchair up the stairs or lowering it down, depending upon direction of travel.
This is obviously wholly unsatisfactory and potentially dangerous, yet Chris has contacted all the appropriate agencies asking for help and none have been willing to do so. Ideally, the 'lads' need to be rehomed somewhere more suitable but in today's environment that sadly is not going to happen.
The suggestion from several members who have been faced with similar challenges was to evict using Section 21 as this would invoke the local authority's duty to rehouse. Understandably, Chris recoiled from this suggestion arguing that he had no grounds to evict as they had always been good tenants and always paid their rent.
This sadly, is what I referred to as 'detached tenants' – if you want the system to work and you want the best outcome for your tenants, you must treat them like widgets and just evict them, hoping that the next person in the process treats them well and the process works and leaves them better off. This is hard, given most landlords experience of 'the process' and, especially with the longer-term landlords who have built a relationship with their tenants – the concept of just launching tenants into the regulatory miasma and hoping for the best is anathema. Yet, what is the alternative?