Tenancy & repossession

[nicojo]

I have just opened some mail addressed to 'the occupiers' at my home address & the letter is a notice of commencement of possession proceedings for the house I am currently renting.

It appears that my landlady has not been meeting her mortgage payments with the rent I pay her!

I tried to contact the CAB for advice about my rights as a tenant in this situation - but they are closed.

Does anyone know if I have any rights in this situation? The mortgage company are obviously unaware that my son & I are living here, (I do have a legal tenancy agreement - assured shorthold - but have been here for 10 months so it just continues on a monthly basis) as it states that the only person residing in the property is my landlady.

If they repossess, will I have to move out immediately?

Any advice appreciated.

[nfn]

I faced a vaguely similar position a few months ago. Basically you cannot be thrown out onto the streets. You have to be issued with notice to quit by the person you pay rent to. If you pay monthly you must receive at least two payment days notice in writing ie. 2 months notice. I'm not absolutely sure about your slightly different circumstances so I urge you to phone your local CAB (in the phone book) if the office is closed. They were very helpful to me. Contact your local council and take the mortgage company's letter with you, you will get high priority for re-housing as you have a young son. Not ideal, but it's a roof over your heads until you find something more suitable. Very good luck, don't panic though CAB told me to squat in the house if I ran out of notice and still hadn't found a new place!! It didn't come to that!!!!

[Twenty20]

Unfortunately, you can be evicted immediately if the house is repossessed. The law applicable to ASTs wont apply i.e. in most cases you dont have to be given notice etc from the mortgage lender. This is different to when the landlord wishes to evict you where they would have to issue s21 or s8 notice and go to Court.

I would suggest that you contact your landlord straight away to find out whats going on and maybe start looking round for alternative accommodation.

By the way, with the way that mortgage interest rates have been rising, in a lot of cases the rent you pay wont cover the landlords mortgage payments, so they have to make up the shortfall if they can. Obviously, if they cant then the house is likely to be repossessed.

Talk to your landlord.

[Goodsoulette]

Go to shelter, my ladlady sold my house when I was renting it and they were no end of help. She got me in touch with housing associations and the council etc, you wont have made yourself deliberately homeless, so you will be probably be entitled to long term priority help from the council (depending on how old your son is). The coucil will tell you to stay at the property eg squatting until whoever reposses the house gets a possesion order. You cannot be thrown out until certain physical proceeding happen. I would have thought if a bank reposses it and you have nowhere else to go, a court would only grant a suspended possession order or at least one with a fair bit of time to find somewhere else to live. Dont be bullied out and if you get thrown out physically they have broken the law. As long as you have mail addressed to you at that property that is enough evidence that you are occupying it.

[Peter Pedant]

You need CAB advice and quite quickly

Clearly if the mortgage is being defaulted then youwill have to move out when a possession order is granted.

But hey come on ! This is England in 2007, so do youthink that will occur tomorrow? Just dont build any extenions or recarpet.

and of course apply to be rehoused.

PP

[Peter Pedant]

Oh, sorry the question was, if they repossess sudduv against the landlord, does the tenant have to move out immediately ?

No they have to get an eviction order against you.

[nicojo]

Hi all. Thanks SO much for your replies. Local CAB was useless but I spoke to Shelter. Basically, if the judge agrees to repossession at the court date, then a warrent still needs to be applied for which would give me a bit of time.

My options then would be to appeal to the court &/or the mortgage lender to see if they would allow me to remain in occupancy until the house is sold.

That was my main concern really. I am aware of applying to the local authority/homeless application etc, but that would really be my last resort. What I want to do is find alternative, private rented accomodation I was just terrified that the baliffs would appear on my doorstep shortly after the court hearing & chuck us out!

The bottom line is that there is no way of telling what my next step should be (apart from finding alternative accommodation) until the court date. Oh, I can also sontact the court & ask to be given details of the hearing which is positive.

Ho hum, it is certainly a learning curve! Thanks again everyone for taking the time to reply.