Maybe your home has a leaky roof, or perhaps there’s mould creeping along the walls. You reach out to your landlord, hoping for a quick fix, but instead of arranging repairs they hand you an eviction notice. It’s an unfortunate reality that some tenants in the UK face, despite the housing laws in place to protect them.
Retaliatory eviction happens when a landlord tries to evict a tenant in response to the tenant exercising their legal rights, such as requesting repairs or complaining about the living conditions. It’s a problem exacerbated by the UK’s housing crisis. A quarter of private renters – around two million people – who dealt with issues in their home didn’t report the problems to their landlord out of fear of revenge eviction, according to YouGov figures produced for Shelter last year. Tenants who flagged problems to their landlord or letting agency were 159% more likely to receive an eviction notice than tenants who didn’t.
“Day in day out Shelter hears from people who are forking out huge sums on rent while living in nightmarish conditions because private renting is woefully under-regulated,” said Polly Neate, chief executive for Shelter. “It is a travesty that so many private renters are too afraid to complain about the mould growing all over their kids’ clothes, or the water pouring in through broken window frames, in case it costs them their home.”
When tenants report problems like faulty heating, dangerous wiring or mould growth, they should be able to expect that their landlord will fix the issues – this is outlined in most tenancy agreements. It’s essential to understand your rights to avoid falling victim to retaliatory eviction.
Can my landlord evict me for asking for repairs?
Your landlord shouldn’t be able to evict you just because you’ve asked for repairs, like fixing a dodgy boiler, or reported a problem with your home. If you’ve raised a legitimate complaint about the condition of your property, the landlord is legally required to investigate and carry out any necessary repairs to keep the property safe and habitable.
Unfortunately some landlords see repair requests as a nuisance or an extra expense and may retaliate by serving an eviction notice. This is most commonly done using a section 21 no-fault notice, which allows them to remove tenants without giving a reason as long as they follow the correct process – just one of several reasons experts have long campaigned for no-fault evictions to be scrapped.