Study Exposes Criminal Landlords In UK Rentals

An investigation of criminality in the private rented sector exposed a vile shadow world of abused tenants living in shocking conditions.

Universities in Northumbria, Sheffield and York joined with campaigners Safer Housing to look at landlord perpetrated crime across the country.

The study defines different types of landlord criminality:

• Slum landlords letting unsafe, dirty, overcrowded and dilapidated properties. These landlords intimidate tenants, ignore housing laws and work to avoid effective enforcement
• Scam landlords who make money from fraud, subletting from unwitting landlords to turn homes into houses in multiple occupation (HMO) without planning consent or licences
• Criminal letting agents who scam would-be tenants out of deposits or allow organised crime gangs to exploit rental properties as cannabis farms or brothels

Making life harder for slum landlords

The study offers three solutions - landlord registration to control access to the letting market, tighter regulation and stopping repeat offenders from letting by imposing banning orders.

Other parts of the study looked at enforcement against slum landlords, landlord abuse against tenants harassment, illegal eviction and banning orders.

The research found rogue landlords behave like criminals in a bid to avoid the attention of enforcement officers. To combat this behaviour, the report urges local councils to better resource housing teams and to enhance their decision-making.

"Key strategic decision points include: when to move from informal to formal enforcement, what legislation and which legal powers to utilise for enforcement, whether and when to issue Civil Penalty Notices (CPNs) or pursue criminal prosecution and, when issuing CPNs, where to set the fines," says the study.

The report also claims slum landlords have little interest in tenant welfare and use the threat of homelessness as a weapon to exert control.

Vulnerable tenants suffer abuse

The study continues by saying tenants often mistake coercion as a right to enter the home whenever a landlord wants, which is illegal under landlord-tenant law.

The study notes that many vulnerable tenants rent substandard homes from abusive slum landlords.

"Tenants do not always recognise their experiences as harassment. Behaviours can include a landlord trespassing and interfering with property use by cutting utilities. It can also include stalking-type behaviours, interfering with tenants' belongings and physical intimidation," says the study.

"Illegal evictions take place in a number of ways and can include a failure to complete the required paperwork, through to coercive acts to bring a tenancy to a close and 'lock-change' evictions, preventing a tenant from entering their home."

The authors point out that no organisation is tasked with recording how many illegal evictions take place.

Official data indicates approximately 30 banning order applications have been made since the legislation was introduced in March 2024.

Only six bans have been refused, and two failed because the notice of intended proceedings was not correct. Two successful banning orders have been appealed to the Upper Tribunal - in both cases, the order was upheld.