Landlords evicting tenants to raise rent
The credit crunch has lead to a surge in illegal evictions for tenants in the rental market.
According the Threshold National Housing Organisation, tenants struggling to make payments were being forced to leave their homes by unscrupulous landlords.
The downturn in the economy has meant an increase in evictions by landlords who are finding it difficult to meet rising mortgage costs.
Landlords across the country are attempting to ditch current tenants and move in new tenants paying higher rent, Threshold claimed this week.
Threshold director Bob Jordan, said many tenants were coming home only to find the locks changed or with people there trying to "force them out".
"In general, Threshold deals with 250 evictions a year and certainly in 2008 that figure will be significantly higher. The downturn in the economy has affected people living in the private rental sector and the number of illegal evictions," he described.
"Whereas landlords in the past have been more forgiving of tenants if they got into rent arrears, what we are noticing now is that if a tenant gets into a week's or month's arrears, landlords are moving very swiftly against them. They are not even willing to use the legal mechanisms there. The reason some landlords do that is because they themselves are struggling to pay mortgages," he added.
Forcing
He also described how many tenants were keeping up with their payments but landlords were still forcing them out in an effort to secure higher rents.
He also suggested that the Government should step in and help or face bigger problems down the road.
"If people become homeless or lose their homes the cost to the Exchequer will be much more," he said.
- Lisa-Anne Crookes
