Whether you are a residential landlord or let commercial buildings, disputes with your tenants can cause significant problems. Tenants who don’t pay, or cause damage to your property, are the most common cause of these disputes and are in breach of the terms of their lease, whether they are a business or an individual. Where tenants breach the terms of their lease, this can impact your cash flow. You need to rectify that as quickly and effectively as possible, and our expert debt recovery team at iResolve-Legal are here to help you recover any monies owed to you by your tenants.
Commercial Landlords
Where a commercial tenant breaches the terms of their lease, this can impact your cash flow by requiring repairs to be carried out or causing a reduction in rent revenues. At iResolve-Legal we can help recover your lost revenue or secure compliance with the lease obligations through negotiation, mediation, or litigation. Our debt recovery and contractual disputes departments will step in to manage your case for commercial properties.
Residential Landlords
For residential landlords, however, where a tenant breaches the terms of their lease, we are required to proceed differently to ensure you comply with the strict laws protecting residential tenants in Scotland. Our expert residential property team can help guide you through this specialist area and recover monies owing to you from rent arrears.
How can we help?
We offer a seamless, low-cost process that we carefully manage from first discussions through negotiation and, if necessary, raising a case at the housing tribunal. Throughout this process, we bring transparency both in terms of cost and strategy. In addition, we individually tailor our approach based on your needs.
Landlord Dispute Resolution Services
Negotiation Stage
Engage your customer
Before raising a claim, we will discuss the communication you have had with your tenant and consider whether further contact might bring matters to a conclusion. We will also use this process to ensure that you have carried out all the necessary steps required by law before taking any enforcement action. For instance, it is essential to try to establish why your tenant is not paying rent. If that is due to financial difficulties, particularly through the recent lockdown, you must refer them to sources of help. If eviction is necessary, you must also notify your tenant of the tenancy terms and the outstanding amounts and take steps to try to agree arrangements for repayment of sums.
If that does not resolve matters, and your tenants are in receipt of benefits, you can apply for direct payment of the rent from this source, and we can help you do this.
Having engaged your tenant in these discussions, whatever the outcome, we would also recommend that you arrange for a property inspection at this time to ascertain whether the tenant is still occupying the property and whether it has been maintained.
Housing Tribunal
Payment Order
Although failing to pay rent is a breach of contract, there is a particular procedure to obtain an order for payment for residential tenants. This is done by applying to the First-Tier Housing Tribunal.
Once you have an order from the Tribunal, you can enforce that in the same way as an order for payment from the court.
Eviction
Rather than apply for a payment order in isolation, however, we would also advise you on your prospects of applying to evict your tenant on the grounds of failure to pay rent. In addition, we can help with eviction notices if you require your property back for any other reason.
However, specific steps must be taken before proceeding with a notice to evict.
Pre-Action Requirements
There are several pre-action requirements when seeking to evict your clients for rent arrears. First, as already highlighted, you are required to notify your tenants of the terms of the tenancy the amounts outstanding and take steps to try to agree arrangements for repayment of sums.
Housing Tribunal
If the rent arrears continue to increase, you are entitled to serve notice to leave. If your tenant does not leave in response to this notice, then we can raise an action to evict on your behalf alongside an action for payment of the outstanding sums.
What Costs can we Recover?
Here are a few examples of the typical costs our clients seek to recover.
- Estate agency fees;
- Home report outlays;
- Rent arrears
- Factor costs
- Gas and Electricity balances
Contact Us for a Free Initial Assessment & Advice from Our Specialist Landlord and Tenant team.
We understand that seeking to recover rent from your tenant can seem daunting, but we will make the process as straightforward as possible for you. When you contact our team, we will take the time to understand the circumstances of your claim. After an initial consultation, our solicitors will then advise you on whether your claim has a good chance of succeeding and what you should expect to pay for our services. There is no obligation to continue with your claim at this stage.
To get started with your claim, contact us today by calling 0141 442 0401 or completing our online enquiry form, and a member of our team will get back to you right away.