Hi all, looking for some advice please. Our tenants of 6 years have during Covid been made redundant and had a baby. They have messaged us today asking us to evict them with the 6 month Covid notice period.
I am assuming they are asking to be evicted and effectively made homeless to try and get priority housing from the council. However, as silly/risky as it sounds to me, as a landlord we are all being asked not to evict people during these times if avoidable. So I find myself in a dilemma…do I go ahead and issue a section 21 just saying I want the property back and then sit and wait for 6 months for them to hopefully be rehoused and in the meantime keep paying their rent…or do I refuse and risk them not paying their rent, in which case again they are protected for 6 months accumulating arrears?
I asked her to confirm in writing her request to terminate her tenancy (it’s a rolling contract with 2 month either side)…but I am assuming that if she gives notice she forfeits the governments 6 month Covid protection and would therefore have to vacate within the 2 months in the contract? So she won’t do that and is insisting we serve them notice instead.
I’m afraid if I go ahead and agree and serve the notice that somewhere down the line if she can’t get a council house and wants to pull out that I will be taken action against for in effect making a family homeless during this crisis and adding to the local authorities burden unnecessarily.
Does anyone have suggestions, thoughts or experience of anything similar?
Thanks in advance