Landlords in the UK are struggling to regain their properties from tenants who have breached their tenancies or stopped paying rent, due to inefficiencies and backlogs in the court system, a leading tenant eviction specialist says.
The situation is expected to worsen with the potential abolition of Section 21, which allows landlords to evict tenants without giving a reason, under the Renters (Reform) Bill. The recent case of Dr Renée Hoenderkamp, a landlord who filed an eviction notice in January 2023, and who is still waiting for a bailiff appointment after 13 months.
Her tenant has damaged her property and owes her rent.
She isn’t the only landlord struggling to get a court date – and landlords also have to face a backlog in bailiff availability.
Paul Shamplina, the founder of Landlord Action, a company that helps landlords with eviction cases, said “it’s incredibly disheartening to see landlords facing such prolonged delays in regaining possession of their properties. It’s a system in crisis. The inefficiencies within the court system are causing undue hardship for landlords who simply wish to exercise their legal rights. The delays have serious consequences for landlords who have tenants causing anti-social behaviour or not paying rent. It is important to point out that these are also not Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions where perhaps the landlord wants to sell, they are Section 8 evictions which have been brought to court because the tenant has breached their tenancy agreement, and the judge has granted possession. Yet landlords are still being forced to wait months and months to get their properties back.”
Court system is failing to balance the rights of landlords and tenants
Mr Shamplina also says that "the court system is failing to balance the rights of landlords and tenants, with landlords suffering from administrative shortcomings. Getting a court date is a lengthy ordeal for many landlords who want to evict their tenants. Even after the court grants them possession, they will have to wait longer to get the sealed court order that allows them to use bailiffs. Bailiffs won’t book an eviction date without the sealed order, slowing the process down even further and creating frustration for landlords."
Landlords will have to rely on the overloaded court system to evict
The abolition of Section 21 could make the situation even worse, as landlords will have to rely on the overloaded court system to evict tenants.
However, the government says that Section 21 won’t be abolished until the courts can handle the caseload.
Mr Shamplina said “surely, it’s time for substantive reforms, including the option for landlords to employ High Court Enforcement Officers in cases of significant arrears exceeding six months, mitigating the backlog and ensuring a balanced, effective resolution mechanism for both landlords and tenants. Despite the severity of the situation, this is still not happening frequently enough. Landlords deserve a judicial system that operates with transparency, accountability, and timely efficiency, yet the current situation is the most dire we’ve encountered at Landlord Action.”
Landlord evictions soar to pre-pandemic levels in 2023
Landlords evicted more tenants in the final quarter of 2023 than they have since 2018, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) reveals. It says that in the last quarter of 2023, there were 23,382 landlord claims, 18,003 landlord orders, 9,833 landlord warrants and 6,649 landlord repossessions in the county courts of England and Wales.
These figures represent increases of 14%, 12%, 12% and 23% respectively, compared to the same quarter in 2022. The report also shows that the median time from claim to repossession has risen to 23.7 weeks, up from 21.7 weeks in the same period in 2022.
The MoJ figures also show that compared to the same quarter in 2022, mortgage possession claims increased from 3,163 to 4,384 (39%), orders from 2,482 to 2,702 (9%), warrants from 2,131 to 2,201 (3%) and repossessions by county court bailiffs decreased from 735 to 593 (19%).
Landlord claims have increased at a faster pace
A spokesperson for the MoJ said “Landlord claims have increased at a faster pace and now make up around 85% of the 2019 baseline. Landlord possession actions have followed a similar upward trend mainly driven by Accelerated and Private landlord possession claims which have continued to rise and are currently back to their pre-Covid baseline. In the Accelerated procedure, the rise is across all the action types of claims (16%), orders (20%), warrants (25%) and repossessions (34%) when compared to the same quarter last year.”
Surge in landlord possession actions
The report attributes the surge in landlord possession actions to the Accelerated procedure, which allows landlords to evict tenants without a court hearing if they have a written tenancy agreement and give the tenant at least two months’ notice.
The Accelerated procedure has seen a sharp increase in England, where it has returned to its pre-pandemic levels, with the number of Accelerated claims, orders, warrants and repossessions increasing by 23%, 29%, 31% and 39% respectively, compared to the same quarter in 2022.
However, the number of procedures declined in Wales with the number of Accelerated claims, orders, warrants and repossessions falling by 78%, 69%, 52% and 33% respectively, over the same period.
Proportion of social landlord claims has fallen
The report also reveals that the proportion of social landlord claims has fallen from around 60% before the pandemic to 36% in the last quarter of 2023.
The proportion of private landlord claims has risen from around 30% before the pandemic to 31% in the last quarter of 2023. The proportion of landlord claims that are Accelerated claims has remained stable at around 33%. The MoJ notes that London remains the hotspot for landlord possession actions, accounting for 33% of all landlord claims, 31% of all landlord orders, 33% of all landlord warrants and 28% of all landlord repossessions in the last quarter of 2023.
London also saw the highest increases in landlord claims (32%) and landlord orders (25%) compared to the same quarter in 2022.
Blighting the lives of renters across our country
Ben Twomey, the chief executive of Generation Rent, said “today sees the continuation of an awful trend that has been blighting the lives of renters across our country. As long as landlords can evict tenants through no fault of their own with just two months’ notice, homelessness in England will continue to soar. Renters have been waiting five years since the government promised to end these evictions, and yet today we find out the government is delaying their plans again. Since that promise, almost 90,000 households have been forced out because of no-fault evictions – and this number is rising every day. In fact, since the law to change this was last debated in Parliament, we estimate that 5,891 more households have faced Section 21 eviction in the courts.”
The Renters (Reform) Bill will harm tenants and landlords, warns property expert
A property expert is warning that the Renters (Reform) Bill, which aims to end no-fault evictions and improve security for tenants, will have negative consequences for both tenants and landlords. Chris Daniel, who has more than 20 years of experience in the property sector, said that "the Bill will make it harder for landlords to regain possession of their properties in cases of rent arrears, anti-social behaviour, or damage. The current possession process is already ineffective and does not provide adequate means for property owners to control the misuse of their private properties. The bill will only worsen the situation by removing Section 21, which allows landlords to evict tenants without giving a reason if they provide two months’ notice."
Increase the cost of rented homes
Mr Daniel of Possession Friend, a service that helps landlords with eviction cases, said “The Renters (Reform) Bill will reduce the supply and increase the cost of rented homes in the UK. Fewer properties will be available and rents will rise. If only tenants could realise the impending consequences that will affect them.”
Mr Daniel also debunked the accusation of landlords profiting by rent increases, saying that "tribunals often award a higher rent than that challenged by tenants."
The portrayal of landlords in the media
However, Mr Daniel also criticises the portrayal of landlords in the media as being either anti-landlord and biased – or uninformed and misled by tenant campaign groups. He says that" coverage of the private rented sector needs to be reported by journalists with a ‘straight bat’ and also highlights the shortage of housing, the gaming tactics of local authorities and the flawed Universal Credit system as being major issues for landlords to deal with. There are also issues with tenants who ‘game the system."
The shortage of rental accommodation
Mr Daniel also argues that "the shortage of rental accommodation is not due to private landlords buying up housing stock, but down to councils and governments failing to meet tenant demand."
He outlined the gaming tactics of local authorities, such as deceiving private landlords on benefit placements, or advising tenants to breach possession orders, incur costs, and sustain a CCJ. He also says "that the government is effectively supporting councils to transfer their responsibility for dealing with anti-social behaviour onto landlords via licensing schemes. Landlords are also not discriminating against tenants on benefit, but it is the flawed Universal Credit system that landlords avoid, as it causes delays and uncertainties in payments."
Shelter threatens government after big rise in Section 21 evictions
Shelter is warning that the government’s failure to abolish Section 21 evictions will backfire and that “renters will remember who stood with them” at the General Election. The campaigning charity claims that latest figures show 26,311 households in England have been removed from their homes by court bailiffs as a result of Section 21 since the government first promised to scrap them back in 2019.
The figures on repossession and evictions released by the Ministry of Justice also show 9,457 households were kicked out of their homes by bailiffs in the past year, up by 49 per cent from 6,399 households in 2022.
A further 30,230 landlords in England started Section 21 eviction court proceedings in 2023 – a 28 per cent rise in one year.
The charity claims that Section 21 evictions are a major contributing factor to rising homelessness because they allow the eviction of tenants with just two months’ notice without having to give them a reason. It says most renters move out before the end of this notice period to avoid the eviction claim going to court, so the repossession statistics apparently only show part of a much bigger problem.
Shelter’s research shows that it took a third of tenants longer than two months to find a new home the last time they moved, “leaving many to face the terrifying threat of homelessness once a no-fault eviction notice lands on their doormat.”
The government first promised to scrap S21 in its 2019 manifesto. In May 2023 it committed to the policy by publishing the Renters Reform Bill. Since then, the government has said the ban will only be introduced after unspecified court reforms take place.
Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, says “it’s utterly shameful that the government is bowing to vested interests while renters are marched out of their homes in their thousands. How much longer are renters expected to live with the threat of unjust no-fault evictions hanging over them?
When plans for the Renters Reform Bill were first drawn up, they promised renters an escape from an insecure and unjust system that left them in constant fear of losing their homes. But, without serious amends, this Bill won't be worth the paper it’s written on. There’s still time and opportunity to deliver a Bill that makes renting safer, fairer and more secure, but the government must grasp the nettle and oppose attempts to water down the Bill from inside its own ranks. When they head for the ballot box, England’s 11 million renters will remember who stood with them.”