Ah, the How to Rent Guide. Is there anything that would so predictably cause problems and yet has been so frequently messed up by MHCLG? The latest instalment of the saga goes like this. On 21 July 2021, MHLCG updated the 'How to Rent Guide' page. But...
Surrender to the churn – deposits and shared houses.
Sturgiss & Anor v Boddy & Ors (2021) EW Misc 10 (CC) It is, as HHJ Luba QC notes in this appeal judgment, far from an uncommon scenario. A group of people, say four of them for neatness, take a joint tenancy of a house or flat. (Neatness because the...
RROs – late payments, rent arrears and deposits considered by the Upper Tribunal
Kowalek v Hassanein Ltd (HOUSING - RENT REPAYMENT ORDER) (2021) UKUT 143 (LC) An Upper Tribunal appeal decision on a Rent Repayment Order decision that raised three issue. t"he treatment of payments made by a tenant after the landlord has stopped committing...
Intentional homelessness, affordability and allowances
Patel v London Borough of Hackney (2021) EWCA Civ 897 A second appeal to the Court of Appeal, following a s.202 review decision and s.204 appeal on the issue of whether Mr Patel's private sector accommodation from which he was evicted for rent arrears was...
Committed to committal
Gunn & Launders v Khan (2020) EWCA Civ 1905 (Not on Bailii. Judgment on Westlaw. Only just come across it, via Legal Action) This was an appeal by the landlord, Saakib Khan, of an order sentencing him to six months imprisonment for contempt of court for...
Doors, fixtures and demises
Marlborough Knightsbridge Management Ltd v Fivaz (2021) EWCA Civ 989 In which the Court of Appeal grapple with whether a front entrance door to a leasehold flat is a 'landlord's fixture' or something else. This was the landlord's second appeal from the Upper...
The Building Safety Bill
The Building Safety Bill is here. There is a lot in it and I can't claim to have mastered it in the few hours since it was published, but I wanted to get something down on paper as soon as possible. This is, so we have been repeatedly told, the vehicle...
Domestic Abuse and Priority Need
After assorted rumours, it was officially announced that section 78 Domestic Abuse Act 2021 came into force today, (Monday 5 July 2021), although the regulations bringing it into force weren't actually published until about 4.30 pm (I was hunting for them)....
Breathing Space for Wales? Extension of possession notices, restarting of eviction warrants and a new Hardship Grant
We are grateful to Mike Norman of Harrow Law Centre for this update on the position on possession notices and proceedings in Wales. In many ways the latest updating Welsh regulations dealing with possession notices, applying from 30th June 2021, are...
‘If you’re not too hot, we’re evicting you”
Last night, as housing law twitter (yes there is such a thing) did what it does, this tweet from @marieajparis definitely caught my attention https://twitter.com/marieajparis/status/1410593210628395011?s=21 (If you can't see the tweet, it says "My client...
A reasonable excuse defence to an RRO – ‘they told me they’d tell me’
D'Costa v D'Andrea & Ors (HOUSING - RENT REPAYMENT ORDERS - the defence of reasonable excuse) (2021) UKUT 144 (LC) An Upper Tribunal appeal of a rent repayment order. Ms D'Costa was the owner of a property in Tower Hamlets. In 2015, she let the property...
EPCs and pre 1 October 2015 tenancies
Minister v Hathaway & Anor (2021) EWCA Civ 936 A Court of Appeal judgment on the applicability of the Assured Shorthold Tenancy Notices and Prescribed Requirements (England) Regulations 2015 to tenancies that pre-date 1 October 2015. The Hathaways had...