Landlords and tenants need clearer standards

Why we’re calling for a national housing body for the private rented sector

The private rented sector is an essential market for 4.7 million households. That includes 1.7 million families raising children — 3 times more than a decade ago.

In response to its growing importance, the government has announced a series of reforms as part of its ‘new deal’ for the private rented sector in England — looking to abolish Section 21 “no fault” evictions, and introducing a mandatory redress scheme for private landlords.

Those changes are much needed but alone won’t be enough to improve standards in such a vital market. Our new research — ‘Getting the house in order’ — shows why.

Tenants face widespread problems

Standards in the private rented sector aren’t good enough. 60% of renters have experienced disrepair that their landlord was responsible for fixing. With many tenants waiting too long to have it fixed, spending their own money on repairs, or simply having to move out.

Often, that disrepair is a result of a landlord failing to meet their legal obligations — something which both landlords and tenants report is widespread in other areas.

Landlords aren’t meeting other legal obligations either:

Failure to meet legal obligations puts renters — including many families — at risk. It means tenants can’t always trust their landlords to provide them with a safe home.

A repairman recently came to Katya and her wife’s property to fix their boiler. He said it was emitting 5 times the safe level of carbon monoxide, which was potentially fatal. Katya’s wife recently had a fit, which they now believe was due to the carbon monoxide. There are no carbon monoxide monitors or smoke alarms in the property.

There are a range of reasons for continuing problems in the private rented sector, two stand out from our research:

1. Regulation in the PRS is complex and confusing

One reason for the failure of landlords to meet their legal obligations is the nature of regulation. 1 in 3 landlords find it difficult to keep up with rules and regulations. This difficulty isn’t surprising. Regulation is complex and confusing for even well-intentioned landlords.

Many regulations aren’t clear-cut, and rules can differ between different local authorities. When landlords have questions, it’s difficult for them to know where to go for answers.

Tenants face the same problem. 9 in 10 tenants don’t know whether a responsibility is theirs or their landlord’s. If tenants don’t know when their landlord is breaking the rules, they can’t be expected to report it.

2. Enforcement isn’t working

A second reason for such widespread problems in the sector is a failure of enforcement. Currently, enforcement relies on tenants reporting breaches of their rights. They can either report issues directly to their landlord or through a formal mechanism, like Environmental Health, or the courts.

But tenants often don’t use these processes. 13% of tenants who experienced disrepair didn’t report it to their landlord at all. And just 1 in 20 went to court or reported their landlord to Environmental Health.

Even when tenants use these formal routes, local enforcement is often ineffective. Just 13% of those who pursued some kind of formal action said their problem was fully resolved. These problems echo the findings of Freedom of Information requests made by Generation Rent and the RLA.

Landlords and tenants are ready to see change

9 in 10 tenants think landlords should be able to show they have some kind of good practice code at the start of a tenancy, and 75% of landlords agree that it would make their job easier having a single, national body responsible for standards.

Protections for renters and support for landlords currently lags behind those in other consumer markets. There should be a national housing body for private renting that sets consistent standards, providing more protection for tenants and making it easier for landlords to do their jobs.

A national body would build on the government’s ‘new deal’ for renters, to reset how the market works for tenants and landlords.