We have suffered from an anti social next door neighbour on and off for 3 years,they are renting privately and the landlord failed constantly to do anything about them.After my partner was assaulted by this tenant and she was cautioned the police called the council antisocial team in and as it stands at the moment the neighbours teenage sons have recieved ASBC's each and are about to be arrested for criminal damage to our property.The council say that if the behaviour carries on they will take over the property and evict her but this it seems will be a long drawn out affair that could take months and months to come about.

I would like to sell my property in the very near future and find it totally unfair that we again will suffer by having to sell probably at a low price because of having to declare the neighbours behaviour to any potential buyers.

I recently heard of a case whereby somebody in the same position as me found out who her neighbours landlord had his mortgage through(apparently completely legal to do through the land registry)and complained to them as being the lender until the mortgage is fully paid they are the righful owners of the property and in this case the mortgage company came down on the landlord like a ton of bricks forcing him to take action or the mortgage company would ask for the loan back.

Has anybody heard of anything like this happening and is is correct that until a mortgage is paid off the mortgage company actually are the rightful owners of the property?

I

I believe you are correct in stating that if a mortgage company holds an interest in a property, they are the legal owners of the property. Although this may be part ownership, due to the terms and condition of the mortgage, they have a lot of say in regard to many aspects.

For a period of time, I had some dealings with mortgage/insurance related issues and I came across 3rd parties e.g. neighbours tipping off the company, by phoning or writing with allegations. The mortgage companies legal department did enter into correspondence with the mortgage holder and I believe that action was taken.

So in your position I would certainly write to your neighbours mortgage company, advising them of the situation. They may or may not write back to you, as the letter will be viewed as purely an allegation. But it should prompt them to review the mortgage and if the mortgage holder has not advised them of the letting or appears to be in breach of any t&c's, they will write to them. The ultimate sanction as you say, is for them to ask for the loan back.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Huckster

While I do feel for you, because I had a neighbour from hell myself who kept keying my car just for the heck of it, unless this person is related to your landlord or the landlord is there helping them vandalize your property, I'm not sure what you think the landlord's responciblity is for this? Do you think the bank checks if people intend to be good neighbours before they grant mortgages? Its not the bank's responcibility to keep people acting like decent human beings and it's not a landlord's either.

The only grounds that will give mandatory eviction to a landlord in court are the tenant being 2 months behind on the rent. The landlord can't put the person out for them being anti-social or for any old reason. They have to go to court and get a court ordered eviction. They can ask the tenant to go with 2 months notice if they're on a periodic tenancy but if the person doesn't go, the landlord will then still have to go to court. I'm not really sure the landlord has any obligation to do anything about antisocial tenants.

This kind of issue between two people who live on a street seems like its for the police to manage, not a landlord. If the people in question owned this house who would you run to? The landlord should have reference checked these people to protect his or her own interest in the property, but they don't become these people's parents because they rented a property to them. The people in question are still responcible for their conduct, and to me running to the bank to tell on the landlord seems a bit backward. If the landlord is trying to go to court to get them out legally they're under no obligation to share this with you and indeed could likely be in breach of a law somewhere if they discuss this person's financial or other business with you. There are big penalties for illegal eviction so no matter what this landlord may or may not want to do, its not as easy as just telling them to go because they behave badly.

Couple of additional comments:

1. You can download title information from the Land Registry website (not very expensive) and this should show what / who's legal charge is registered against the property.

2. I think the lender would only become involved if the property was being let without their consent - which does happen. Then it could get messy for the mortgage holder who would find himself in breach of his mortgage t & c's - not every lender will allow mortgagees to let their property. But that is an entirely seperate issue to your problem because I don't think if the mortgagee is letting lawfully that most lenders would want to or be entitled to get involved. .

3. What can the landlord do about them? I have had occasional complaints about tenants (mainly noise related) from neighbours but in every other respect I found the tenants to be model tenants. When I spoke to the tenant the issue became one of 'six of one, half a dozen of another'. It really is a matter for the authorities not the landlord.

Unfortunately there is a lot more involved in this particular case than I am really prepared to divulge on this forum but it is definitly not just a case of an unsociable neighbour turning up the music too loudly late at night.It is more to do with many different criminal activities by these tenants that are being dealt with by the proper authorities as the landlords only concern was collecting his rent and ignoring the fact that his tenants were breaking the terms of the tenancy agreement over and over again and could care less about any criminal activities or how they were raising the money to pay their rent.

I think also that on reading my original question people do not grasp what I am asking and what my intentions are by wanting to contact the mortgage company.I do not know or care wether he has a buy to let mortgage or not if he has nt more fool him its not a case of my wanting to dob him in.I think it will be punishment enough to the landlord when the property is taken over and shut down for a period of time when the landlord will be unable to collect any rent or to enter his own property.I would just like to inform the lenders of what has been going on at what is basically their property be it part ownership or not,put it in the bin after if they want but I would like to have my say.Maybe they might even take him to task which is what happened in the case I had heard about and is what inspired me to ask on here if anybody had heard of a similar thing happening.

I understand this must be very difficult situation for you but I'm trying to add a little perspective from the Landlords point of view. How do you know that the tenants have broken the terms of the tenancy agreement? How do you know the landlord has a written tenancy agreement? How much does the landlord know about the alleged criminal activities? It may well be that the landlords has no reasonable grounds to apply for possession of his property. In this case he would have to give the tenants 2 months notice to quit, if they failed after that to leave he would have to apply for a Possession Order, (probably 2-3 months for a court date), the judge would probably give them 28 days to move, if they didn't then it's bailiffs another month. 6-7 months minimum. Does the landlord know about the Councils intended actions. Maybe the landlord wants the Council to gain possession so that he is at arms length from it.

Maybe the landlord has been threatened by these people (I've been threatened by former tenants) and is scared of them. Perhaps the landlord is just as you say, happy that his rent is being paid and unconcerned about where the money comes from - it's not his responsibility to question his tenant about the source of any money paid to him. Have you spoken to him and if you have what does he say?

With respect the mortgage company, I was simply trying to explain that I don't think anything will be gained by involving them - unless he doesn't have their permission to let the property. I just don't think a lender would wish to get involved - as long as the landlord is paying his mortgage to them. But definitely write to them you won't be wasting your time because at the very least you'll feel good about it because you've done something proactive.

Finley

I worked with someone years ago that had problem tenants next door and had to endure months of agro.

In the end she got to the end of her tether and phoned the police with an annonymous tip-off that drugs were being dealt with from the property. She did not know this was true, but had suspicions due to their behaviour.

Anyway a few days later, presumably after some surveillance, the police raided the property and the tenants were not seen again. Presumably the police found something to make a case. The landlord was forced to take action and the problem was solved.

Huckster

Yes indeed the landlord does know everything that is going on and its appearing that the tenant may have something on him(possible I suppose that she knows something about him and the mortgage maybe that we do not)he seems willing to let the council take over but seems afraid to give the tenants notice himself.The authorities went from questioning why we had so many problems with him eg promising to contact me to discuss matters and never ever turning up yet hiding his car around the corner hoping we would nt see him after creeping into see the tenants.

The authorities after having had just a short spell of dealing with him now no longer keep him informed as to what is going on as he has informed the tenants when he has been told not to of things that are happening regarding measures to stop the behaviour of the tenants.He is only contacted by the authorities now via letter or e mail as they refuse to have any personal contact with him which speaks volumes does nt it.

Yep it does. One of the consequences of the 'buy to let' revolution is a lot of inexperienced private landlords - if this was the local authority or a housing association I imagine your problems would be over. The tenants do appear to have something over him or maybe he is genuinely scared. Do you know how to carry out a title search at the Land Registry so you can find out who his mortgage company are?

I have been told its possible to do it yourself which I have nt looked into yet or there are companies on the net that do it for you.I'm currently waiting to see where we are with the authorities at this present moment as I dont want to rock the boat and upset anything that the police/council have in mind.