Troubled trainee F stands alongside me, it’s a labour of love – only without the affection.
‘Nobody in?’ he queries, as I bang on the grubby doorknocker one more time and check my appointment details. But even as I confirm it’s the right place at the right time, I hear shuffling footsteps behind the weathered door and slowly several chains and bolts are drawn with Hammer Horror prescience. Subconsciously I take a half step back and prepare for F to take the impact.
The terraced house is at obvious odds with the homes either side. They have new roof tiles, replacement windows and neatly trimmed hedgerows. In stark contrast the rundown pile we are outside shows years of neglect. Peeling woodwork shed’s ancient shards of faded gloss paint and cloying cobwebs shroud the dim porch light, still lit despite the daylight and despite entreaties to save energy.
The long-standing occupant, reluctantly unshackling his security measures, is a sitting tenant on a protected rent. The landlord wants to sell-up and realise his investment, the old boy finally revealing himself as the door creaks open, isn’t keen on shifting.
‘I’m not moving you know.’ Growls the man, nicotine stained teeth bared aggressively. He’s dressed in a food-flecked vest and those baggy trousers old men like to pull-up to nipple height. ‘I know me rights.’
There are fewer and fewer of these entrenched renters left, as time and MRSA pick them of. Their below market rents were invariably set before the introduction of the Assured Shorthold Tenancy regulations fuelled the beginning of the buy-to-let boom. Effectively guaranteeing landlords possession of their properties at the end of a set term and safeguarding their investment. Those that remain tend to only leave reluctantly and more often than not, horizontally.
The defensive old fella warms marginally when he realises I’m not able to turf him out on the street, and begins to regale F and I with tales of his earlier life. He even offers us a drink, but I politely decline having seen the ancient butler sink, slippery wooden draining board piled high with dirty crockery. No danger of him succumbing to infection, I think as we leave, his immune system must be more robust than mine.
‘He’d have talked forever.’ Muses F as we sit in the car outside and I write up my notes. And I tell the perpetual trainee people like that are invariably lonely and once you’ve overcome their inherent dislike of our profession you can win them over. ‘Just concentrate on talking about them though,’ I advise. ‘It underpins your pitch if they’re selling, plus they don’t know too much about you if it all goes pear-shaped.’
F scratches his chin, cogs almost audibly whirring unless it’s that radiator fan failing to cut out again, then asks almost intelligently.
‘How do you price something like that, if he won’t shift?
And as we’re not due back in the office for a while, I explain about hope value.
Investors gauge what they are prepared to pay, on the return from capital required. Rent received against purchase price, to give a gross percentage yield. Too little and the money is better off in a deposit account, particularly as any short-term capital growth has been dwindling.
‘Yeh right,’ says F brow furrowed like a farm track. I’ve clearly lost him, something I’ve been trying to do for months as it happens, but he ploughs on. ‘But what’s the hope value then?’
It’s a tricky equation, part experience part finger in the air guesswork, predicated on how long any buyer expects the old tenant to live before they get vacant possession. The younger and healthier the occupant, the further below open market value the bid, to make up for the paltry rental return. Auction is the route for disposal I’ll be recommending, as only specialist buyers will have access to funds.
‘So a normal buyer would catch a cold if they owned something like that.’ Ponders F as we cut through the park and pass another sitting tenant stubbornly ensconced on a bench, claw-like hand asking for change. And I nod, before adding.
‘Unless the occupant does first.’
‘Nobody in?’ he queries, as I bang on the grubby doorknocker one more time and check my appointment details. But even as I confirm it’s the right place at the right time, I hear shuffling footsteps behind the weathered door and slowly several chains and bolts are drawn with Hammer Horror prescience. Subconsciously I take a half step back and prepare for F to take the impact.
The terraced house is at obvious odds with the homes either side. They have new roof tiles, replacement windows and neatly trimmed hedgerows. In stark contrast the rundown pile we are outside shows years of neglect. Peeling woodwork shed’s ancient shards of faded gloss paint and cloying cobwebs shroud the dim porch light, still lit despite the daylight and despite entreaties to save energy.
The long-standing occupant, reluctantly unshackling his security measures, is a sitting tenant on a protected rent. The landlord wants to sell-up and realise his investment, the old boy finally revealing himself as the door creaks open, isn’t keen on shifting.
‘I’m not moving you know.’ Growls the man, nicotine stained teeth bared aggressively. He’s dressed in a food-flecked vest and those baggy trousers old men like to pull-up to nipple height. ‘I know me rights.’
There are fewer and fewer of these entrenched renters left, as time and MRSA pick them of. Their below market rents were invariably set before the introduction of the Assured Shorthold Tenancy regulations fuelled the beginning of the buy-to-let boom. Effectively guaranteeing landlords possession of their properties at the end of a set term and safeguarding their investment. Those that remain tend to only leave reluctantly and more often than not, horizontally.
The defensive old fella warms marginally when he realises I’m not able to turf him out on the street, and begins to regale F and I with tales of his earlier life. He even offers us a drink, but I politely decline having seen the ancient butler sink, slippery wooden draining board piled high with dirty crockery. No danger of him succumbing to infection, I think as we leave, his immune system must be more robust than mine.
‘He’d have talked forever.’ Muses F as we sit in the car outside and I write up my notes. And I tell the perpetual trainee people like that are invariably lonely and once you’ve overcome their inherent dislike of our profession you can win them over. ‘Just concentrate on talking about them though,’ I advise. ‘It underpins your pitch if they’re selling, plus they don’t know too much about you if it all goes pear-shaped.’
F scratches his chin, cogs almost audibly whirring unless it’s that radiator fan failing to cut out again, then asks almost intelligently.
‘How do you price something like that, if he won’t shift?
And as we’re not due back in the office for a while, I explain about hope value.
Investors gauge what they are prepared to pay, on the return from capital required. Rent received against purchase price, to give a gross percentage yield. Too little and the money is better off in a deposit account, particularly as any short-term capital growth has been dwindling.
‘Yeh right,’ says F brow furrowed like a farm track. I’ve clearly lost him, something I’ve been trying to do for months as it happens, but he ploughs on. ‘But what’s the hope value then?’
It’s a tricky equation, part experience part finger in the air guesswork, predicated on how long any buyer expects the old tenant to live before they get vacant possession. The younger and healthier the occupant, the further below open market value the bid, to make up for the paltry rental return. Auction is the route for disposal I’ll be recommending, as only specialist buyers will have access to funds.
‘So a normal buyer would catch a cold if they owned something like that.’ Ponders F as we cut through the park and pass another sitting tenant stubbornly ensconced on a bench, claw-like hand asking for change. And I nod, before adding.
‘Unless the occupant does first.’
Posts
2 comments:
The reason these people wont leave is because the tenancy laws are now so bad for tenants they would be mad to. Tenants need more security of tenure in this country. The current laws are simply evil.
Sold a two bed flat upper floor flat in Dudley Road Kingston on Thames with 48 year old sitting tenant for £147,000 Market value at peak was £260,000. The property was in dreadful condition but tenant would never ever let us in and rather than get a court order we just left her alone.
Post a Comment