Hello,
I’m looking to seek advise regarding a rent repayment order claim from tenants that recently vacated for not having a HMO. No issues with the tenants during the tenancy.
Before they moved in they confirm they are related and based on this info I accepted them as tenants.
Any advise on how to proceed and as there is nothing in writing, what is the best course of action going forward to defend against their claim.
Contact a solicitor and see if you have a case to counter with a fraud claim. How many of them were there, what ages, and what relationship did they claim to have?
Do you have anything in writing - emails, WhatsApp etc stating that they are related?
apparently not @David122
astonishing
@Ale do you have any other evidence they told you they were related- if you asked them to ‘confirm’ then that suggests they indicated they were related earlier- in their original request to view?
Or if there was any witness to what they told you when they confirmed? - evidence doesn’t have to be written.
Or during tenancy was there any correspondence- whether from you to them or vice versa, which indicated you believed they were related (if they had told you they were eg brother and sister then maybe at some point you would have referred to ‘your brother’ or ‘your sister’). That will demonstrate what they had led you to believe. And if they weren’t related and being honest they would have told you.
If you rent (or have rented) any other HMOs and checked the people are related and can show that (evidence in writing or from those tenants) that would demonstrate you are aware of the req and do check.
Do you have a checklist for each tenancy and did you tick ‘related’ for these tenants or have any other contemporaneous evidence /records showing you checked? Even an email to a friend saying they were a really nice family you’d found for your place. Or if you told the neighbours? Surely if you thought they were a family or related you must have told somebody.
Check with former LLs this may be a professional scam they may have done before
Check with neighbours if they told them they were related that would also indicate/evidence their deception
If they were on UC (may be family components?).or other family related benefits you may be able to show they were deceiving others too re their relationship status
Good luck
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