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International Law

The Landlord Law Blog

From Tessa Shepperson. Tessa, editor of www.landlordlaw.co.uk, ponders on life, the universe, and residential landlord and tenant law

Post Frequency: 1.7/day

Last Entry: November 25, 2009 at 08:47:00

Advance rent = deposit??

Posted on February 23, 2009
There is a report of a new tenancy deposit case on the Nearly Legal website. Although this is a County Court decision and therefore cannot bind Judges in future cases, it is interesting, and may be worrying for many landlords. It appears that in this case there was a dispute as to whether the deposit money was actually a deposit or ?future rent? as alleged by the landlord...

Legal Services Commission is arrogant and devious says former supervising solicitor

Posted on February 21, 2009
Although it is not directly related to housing law, I feel I ought to draw readers attention to an excellent comment in the Law Society Gazette from Michael Burdett who previously helped the Legal Services Commission (LSC) to set up the CDS (i.e. Criminal Defence Service) direct scheme...

Looking at things the right way

Posted on February 15, 2009
Reading the Sunday papers, in an excellent article on various women?s comments on the current crisis and whether it was fuelled mainly by male gung ho testosterone driven attitudes (very probably in my view), I was struck by a comment made by Emma Howard Boyd:I have spent a lot of time thinking about how you value things socially and environmentally...

Tessa on the Radio with Graham and Karen

Posted on February 11, 2009
I did my radio bit today with Graham and Karen on Radio Norfolk, and it was great! Not like work at all. I think I now want to be a radio presenter when I grow up. Radio Norfolk is based in Norwich?s Forum building, which also houses the main public library...

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Unlock Democracy - Charity of the Month (February 2009)

Posted on February 08, 2009
On my Landlord-Law site I have a book reviews section, and from time to time I get sent books to review. Generally they are landlord and tenant related, but I was quite excited, some time before Christmas, to receive a copy of Unlocking Democracy. I am ashamed to say that I was completely unaware of the Charter 88 organisation which preceded Unlock Democracy, a cross party organisation set up to campaign for democratic and human rights...

Two talks - a day in London

Posted on February 04, 2009
Had a reasonably pleasant day in London today, although I never enjoy rising at 5.00 am. I also had the embarrassment of having to ask the taxi man to return twice, once for my watch and the second time for my railway ticket (!). Still he was a cheery chap and didn?t seem to mind too much...

Radio calling!

Posted on February 03, 2009
Funny I should have written about radio last night. Because today a nice man from Radio Norfolk rang up and asked me to go on his program next week. Next Wednesday in fact, fact fans, 10.00 to 1.00, with Graham and Karen. For a program on renting property...

Blowing in the wind

Posted on February 02, 2009
One of my favourite songs by American singer songwriter Suzanne Vega is Gypsy, in particular these words:And we'll blow away forever soonAnd go on to different landsAnd please do not ever look for meBut with me you will stayAnd you will hear yourself in songBlowing by one dayI always loved that image of walking down a busy road and suddenly hearing yourself float by in sound, perhaps from a cafe, perhaps from a radio carried by someone on the street, none of them realising ...

My Deposits open to all

Posted on January 24, 2009
I have seen quite a few news and other items on the internet reporting the statement from the ?my deposits? tenancy deposit scheme confirming that, unlike Tenancy Deposit Scheme (run by the Dispute Service), they will not be withdrawing cover from unaccredited agents (see my report here)...

Good luck President Obama

Posted on January 21, 2009
When I watched the inauguration yesterday I half wished I was American. When I watched the Panorama programme on American healthcare later on iplayer I was so grateful to be British. America is a wonderful country with a great history and heritage, but we have things to be proud of too...

Obtaining credit ? small firms penalised

Posted on January 18, 2009
I feel I should record my recent (successful, sort of) attempts to obtain credit. We are actually doing fairly well at the moment (all things considered) but I decided I needed a small one year loan of about �3,000 to help me pay my tax, and help fund the purchase of a new printer and a few other bits and bobs...

Centrepoint ? Charity of the month (January 2009)

Posted on January 18, 2009
Centrepoint is a charity which for 40 years has been helping homeless young people in London, and more recently in the North East. Young people are given temporary accommodation, and are then helped to sort themselves out. The aim is that those helped will then move on and be able to live useful lives...

The Dickens case

Posted on January 12, 2009
Those who have read articles here in the past about ASBO landlord Dickens will find an excellent report on the Nearly Legal site here.

The new MacBook

Posted on January 11, 2009
I treated myself to an Apple MacBook over Christmas. I am still feeling a bit guilty about it because, frankly I could have got something much cheaper - but I wanted to try a Mac! Having got it though I am really pleased I did.The MacBook I bought was the cheapest available, the small white one, not the new and more expensive aluminum...

Preventing drug factories in rented properties

Posted on January 09, 2009
I have recently been provided by Suffolk Police with an excellent guide to spotting and dealing with drug production in rented properties. This is an increasing problem, for example drug producers renting houses for the sole purpose of growing cannabis...

Tenancy deposit protection award made to tenant in new case in Birmingham

Posted on January 08, 2009
I have learned from the excellent 'Recent developments in Housing Law' section of Legal Action Magazine, of Ferguson v. Jones (November 2008) a new tenancy deposit case in Birmingham County Court.Here Mrs Jones was an assured shorthold tenancy. Her landlord failed to protect her deposit within the prescribed 14 days...

DPS open to all landlords

Posted on January 07, 2009
Having seen comments on forums about the Deposit Protection Service refusing to accept deposits from landlords, for example if the money is paid over more than 14 days after it is paid to them (putting them in default of the scheme, unable to evict tenants under s21, and vulnerable to being sued for the ?fine? of 3 x the deposit sum), I thought I had better check this out with the company itself...

TDS ditches unregulated agents

Posted on January 06, 2009
TDS, the tenancy deposit scheme aimed at letting agents, has now announced that it will only accept agents and landlords who are members of recognised professional bodies as members from now on. With effect from 6 April 2009 they will be withdrawing membership from current non regulated members...

Credit crunches I have known

Posted on January 03, 2009
I met one of the partners of the firm I used to work for this morning, and chatting to him reminded me of the crashes and crunches of the past. I was at school in the 1970s and the winter of discontent. It seemed great fun as a kid when the power went off...

Musings on the tenancy deposit protection scheme

Posted on January 02, 2009
One of my landlord clients who has successfully defeated a nuisance claim brought by her tenants under the tenancy deposit protection legislation, has reported an interesting conversation she had with the Judge. Apparently the Judge said that the judiciary generally are unhappy with the legislation...

Homeless hostel too comfortable says VAT man

Posted on December 23, 2008
Reading the recent issue of a href="http://www.roofmagazine.org.uk/"Roof Magazine/a, I came across this utterly bonkers decision by the VAT authorities.br /br /Byker Housing Association has built a new 31 bed hostel for the homeless in Newcastle ? however the VAT authorities have deemed it to be a commercial building (i...

Painsmith Blog

Posted on December 23, 2008
I have just discovered the excellent blog from Landlord and Tenant specialists Painsmith Solicitors. It has some really interesting posts, as one would expect, and I shall certainly be reading it in future. Highly recommended to anyone interested in landlord and tenant.

Shelter ? Charity of the Month (December 2008)

Posted on December 20, 2008
a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_xl7ovECJ56g/SUzFadj40yI/AAAAAAAAAKo/Iye1ump5ciQ/s1600-h/shelter_logo.gif"img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 197px; height: 52px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_xl7ovECJ56g/SUzFadj40yI/AAAAAAAAAKo/Iye1ump5ciQ/s200/shelter_logo...

Convicted HMO landlord ? doing the community a service?

Posted on December 19, 2008
This is the sort of attitude that Local Authorities have to put up with. Mr Bowden in Ipswich, who recently pleaded guilty convicted in the Magistrates Court to operating a house of multiple occupation without a licence (a href="http://www.eveningstar...

Landlords responsiblities for fire safety

Posted on December 16, 2008
I have been sent a press release by the Fire Brigade regarding a sucessful prosecution of a landlord who was found guilty of breaches of fire safety legislation and ordered to pay nearly �13,000 in fines and costs. The press release reads:Uxbridge Magistrates' Court fined Armajit Singh, �5,600 for seven breaches of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005...

VAT changes ? how these are being dealt with on the Landlord-Law site

Posted on November 29, 2008
Mr Darlings reduction of the VAT rate to 15% from 17.5% has created a bit of a headache for myself and doubtless lots of other UK traders. This blog seems to be the best place to explain the way I have decided to deal with the various prices on Landlord-Law...

Student lettings - new agreements on Landlord-Law

Posted on November 26, 2008
I am just finishing a fairly long running project (about 2 months) to develop some new special tenancy agreements for student lets, for my Landlord-Law site.Developed initially in response to a query from one of my members on the discussion forum, they are designed to deal with two particular problems with student lets:The fact that they are generally signed when the previous tenants are still in occupation (which could potentially cause major problems if they refused to move out, as legally they are entitled to do), andThe fact that landlords will want to let the property for the whole year, but many students will not want to live there over the summer...

HMO licensing ? tenants entitled to rent refund

Posted on November 21, 2008
I was interested to read the report here about a landlord in Liverpool who was convicted of operating a House in Multiple Occupation (HMO) without a license, and fined �3,000 plus costs. The Council then wrote to all his tenants, who successfully claimed back a part of their rent...

Stop the traffik ? charity of the month

Posted on November 18, 2008
Those of us who live independent lives in the west are very privileged. Many people are not so fortunate. Some are bought and sold as commodities. Children stolen or sold by their families into slavery. The reason (or one of them) ? so cheap goods can be sold to us...

Landlords credit checks and happy tenants ? two surveys

Posted on November 16, 2008
I have recently been given information about two surveys in the private rented sector. First survey ? credit checksThe first survey is perhaps the more serious of the two. The Letting Protection Service have commissioned a survey of 1,389 private landlords which shows that most landlords do not carry out proper checks before letting tenants in to their property...

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