Julian Richer - the founder of Richer Sounds, the UK's largest hi-fi retailer - says he may set up a landlord accreditation service to help reform the private rental sector in favour of tenants.
Richer, writing over the weekend in the Sunday Times, says millions of people in the UK now “live with the fear of arbitrary eviction” and “rents rising beyond their reach.”
As part of a manifesto “to put things right” in the housing market, Richer says number one would be “priority reform for renters” including the banning of what he calls “revenge evictions”, the extension of should-hold tenancies for up to five years “byv mutual agreement”, tenants being evicted only for unspecified “major contract breaches” and the statutory inspection of private sector rental properties “with councils taking tough action against rogue landlords”.
Richer’s second manifesto commitment reads: “We need a responsible landlords charter or accreditation scheme in the meantime, which would include ‘voluntary’ adherence to the above [number one]. I am happy to set this up myself if the response is favourable.”
The rest of his 10 point manifesto - not solely about the rental side of the housing market - includes scrapping Right To Buy, avoiding explotiation of Permitted Development Rights to create shoddy housing, and higher quality standards for new homes.
You can read the full piece here - although for some Landlord Today readers, the Times piece may be behind a paywall.
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He really should stick to a business he knows about. He may have founded a good hi-fi business but some of the stuff mentioned above shows very little awareness of the PRS or housing in general.
Accreditation schemes are only worth being a part of if they are recognised by the Local Authority and gain discounts on HMO or selective licence fees. As LAs only currently recognise a few of the existing landlords association accreditation schemes, what is the likelihood they would recognise one run by a bloke who founded a hi-fi business?
“Accreditation schemes are only worth being a part of if they are recognised by the Local Authority and gain discounts on HMO or selective licence fees.”
Are you sure about that, Jo? The NRLA have gained their mass of membership because of exactly this, therefore that legitimises everything young Ben Beadle says. It’s almost a form of financial blackmail. Many landlords will continue to pay for membership of NRLA because of the discount it gives off licence fees, all whilst legitimising an organisation they don’t agree with. The solution is a difficult choice for landlords to make…
WHO ELECTED HIM? 😡
Revenge evictions? The man is delusional and obviously knows nothing about the PRS or the housing problems in the UK.😠
Propertymark will soon deal with him for treading on their toes. 😂
I used to buy stuff from them
After this , never again
This fool can sniff my boombox..!
I also will no longer be buying anything from this clown.
More outsiders as said knows nothing about our business and here he comes with 10 point plan manifesto, ridiculous nonsense and I would have thought The Sunday Times was a quality paper how wrong I was. All popular propaganda they all want to be on it.
What’s wrong with Government allowing all this to happen we are being kicked around like a football.
I have property vacant for ages because of all those lies and ever increasing adverse legalisation, too scared to let for the first time in 46 years a Landlord while paying double C/tax for a non Service does that not tell you something.
Why would I buy a property for someone else ?. I was recently asked if I was interested in buying a House the answer was definitely not, why would I when I already have property idle.
Richer’s is off the Richter Scale.
Maybe since everything’s on line these days he’d like to convert his shops into housing for the homeless ?
I do not recognise this situation of tenants facing arbitrary eviction. My tenants all know they can stay as long as they like as long as they pay their rent & look after the house. What I do know is plenty of tenants are being evicted by LLs who want to sell because they no longer want to be part of this brave new PRS.
LLs are being made the scapegoat for decades of poor housing policy by successive Govt's, but picking on the easy target is just making things worse for tenants as properties become harder to find & more expensive.
This guy so obviously doesn’t have a clue about the PRS. The more aggro people like him lay on the PRS the fewer rental homes there will be.
He is an ignorant irrelevance.
Would be nice if someone thought about Landords facing ever increasing legislation and costs and the awful realisation that their only choice is to evict their tenants because the rent does not recoup the running costs
What a knob!.
Stay away, we already have enough people that have no idea what they’re doing!
5 year tenancies -by mutual agreement- is what many renters wanted, so they could be sure of living in the same home while children at school.
But then we got the Renters (Reform) Bill which will allow tenants to stay as long as they like, unless we sell or accommodate a CLOSE relative.
I know which of the two I'd prefer (and probably wouldn't mind a 5 year, after an initial 6 month 'test' one first).
My house tenants recently left just before their S21 period expired, after 8 years: but the state they left it I assume to be Revenge For Eviction, not Revenge Eviction. Lazy idiots. If you had a new tenancy comprising a family of three adults all with posh German cars in coastal West Sussex in March...
There really ought to be a rogue tenants database, to go along with the RRB one for rogue landlords: that's discrimination for you.
I've never known any tenant want a 5 year tenancy. Some stay a lot longer than that but they certainly don't want to commit to such a long contract. Any of life's major events can happen - birth of triplets, death of partner, infirmity of parents, inheritance, divorce, redundancy, fantastic job offer, etc. One of the main attractions of the PRS is the ease of ending a tenancy and moving within a few weeks.
Henry your right There really ought to be a rogue tenants database, to go along with the RRB one for rogue landlords: that's discrimination for you.
A number were set up but they failed due to Data protection wheres the data protection for private landlords None
I fact it law you must supply full name and address,s contact numbers on all HMSs even though its on the contact otherwise its a fine
Just imagine if being a landlord was unrestricted and profitable with a sensible exit plan. Imagine renters having lots of choice in choosing a property, easy for them to leave and find a different property if it was better. Then the tenants would have all the power!
Exactly and wouldn't that work well for renters
More paperwork’s drawn up by an idiot that will tie up things. As said above stick to what you know. Don’t interfere when u have no f idea. Try as said above to convert your houses to renters and see how long u last. W a Dim Wit.
What the heck has it got to do with this guy?!
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