@Howard1 we don’t really know from @kay4 what the tenant has done so far in terms of 'refusing inspections ’ so hard to judge but if tenant not there when they turn up because not living there, then they won’t be there to stop entry, will they? They may not pop by to check their post every day…
At the very least trying to gain admission and do the inspection (and video ing what happens) is a good idea, so as to have evidence of the unreasonable behaviour of the tenant and for dealing with the insurance company in due course if needed.
As the illegal subletter appears co operative (based on @Kay4 's posts, possibly @Kay4 could get them to invite them in sometime.
The fact tenant has been refusing inspections is suspicious, and as a LL I would want to try to gain entry and find out what they are hiding. If it is criminal activity that may help speed up things. Or wouldn’t you care?
I’m not suggesting getting injunctions etc but just trying to do an inspection in the normal way.
Well you could write and say that you want to inspect at a certain time, if he says no then all you can do is comply with his wishes or go to court. He doesn’t have to be there to stop you gaining entry, he just has to write declining your request.
Just generally there’s no grounds for any landlord to require their tenants to reside at their address, you can’t insist on residence as far as I know. You can have a clause stipulating no subletting, but it’s very hard to enforce.
Similarly you can have a clause stating the monthly rent due, but that also is very hard to enforce, practically impossible if less than three months is owing.
Every landlord has a choice - put up with it, use expensive and unreliable legal routes, use bribes, break the law or get out of the business,
Erm it’s pretty normal to have a clause saying the resident must not leave unoccupied for more than eg 30 days - there are perfectly good grounds for this as normally required by insurance. Properties left empty have higher risks of various sorts and insurance will cost more, just like for your own home
The Govt model AST had exactly such a clause
‘3.1 The Tenant must occupy the Property as the Tenant’s principal or only home’
I agree all sorts of clauses in tenancy agreements are hard if not impossible to enforce (everything from cleaning to needing to have addition occupiers authorized by the LL -whether subletting or not- to not carrying out illegal activities) which is exactly why inspections regularly are a good idea if you care about what is happeningat your property. Under RRA there are specific grounds for breach of tenancy agreement so if trying to use these a LL will need evidence. They may well also use rent arrears grounds as not discretionary but the problem with those is that just before the case gets to court the tenant can pay enough so they are only 2 months in arrears not 3 and then it fails and the process starts again from scratch.. so the more evidence you can gather for a judge to see the whole picture the better.
No my understanding is it’s the other way round.. Tenant doesn’t have any blanket right to insist on being there nor to refuse inspections. Advice from Shelter to tenants is the tenant must allow inspections unless the proposed time is unreasonable. Perhaps @David122 can tell us.
If you repeatedly offer different reasonable times and ask when would be reasonable and the tenant makes no attempt to agree or offer a time and you then enter as LL at a time that is reasonable the LL has done nothing wrong and it would be the tenant who has to try to go to court to argue you had impinged somehow on their ‘right to enjoyment’ or not behaved reasonably. @David122 is that correct?
If eg they work during the day and can only do evenings they can say that and then agree an evening time. What they can’t do is deny entry continuously. @David122 is that correct?
Anyway we are told the tenant doesn’t live there so if @Kay4 drops a note in at say 5pm one day proposing an inspection the next day at 5.30pm it is quite likely the tenant won’t respond in time to write back refusing.
The landlords rights of entry and the tenants right to quiet enjoyment can be conflicting and I’m not aware of any case law giving landlords an unconditional right of access. The landlords rights are statutory and also usually contractual, but if a tenant refuses entry or physically blocks access, it would likely be harassment if a landlord tried to force entry. The tenants objection has to be active. Silence equals consent for a statutory or contractual right. A landlord can in theory get a court injunction to force entry, but my understanding is its long-winded and not always successful. Compensation could be claimed if the landlord suffered a detriment, such as property damage due to lack of access but thats not of much use if the tenant has no money.
I would suggest that any landlord in this situation should seek proper legal advice.
Think this situation on tenants who can refuse inspections and costs of injunctions to gain entry is a long standing position that is nothing to do with RRA and predates the current govt (and may well predate some previous ones given how short (Liz truss etc) they were)
Not ‘everything’ wrong with PRS is fault of current govt, even if we wished that were true and that a new govt would sort everything in LL’s favour (or other “magical” thinking)
@Howard1 thank you for sharing. From my (v fast) reading the tenant doesn’t have a right to continue the tenancy having left unless they have a clear intent to return and the possibility of doing so and the onus is on the tenant to demonstrate that.
