A MUM was furious when she was booted from her home after being unable to pay soaring rent prices.
Zita Zutic Konak couldn’t believe it when her landlord told her the two-bedroom home in North London she was renting would be going up from £1,800 to £2,700, i reported.
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The mum-of-one, who shares the property with her husband and young daughter, was told that all renters would be coughing up the same fee.
She said: “I was flabbergasted and just so angry.
“The woman explained to me that this was what other units in the building were going for, but for us, that price was just absolutely not possible.”
The family have since moved out and now live in a flat in East London, but are still paying an eye-watering £2,000 a month.
“We do ok, but even if we had the money, on principle alone, we wouldn’t have paid the increase because it felt so shocking,” she continued.
“We were a number to them and they would replace us really easily.”
According to the Office for National Statistics, the average price private rental price spiked by nearly 5% in the year to April 2023 – the highest recorded increase for over a decade.
Richard Donnell, executive director at Zoopla, explained why rent prices are spiralling.
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“One factor is whether your landlord has a mortgage,” he said.
“A large proportion don’t, and they may be less likely to need to up costs.
“But at the same time most landlords don’t want to pay out of their own pocket for their mortgage.
“Those who have a high ratio loan to value (LTV) are maybe going to be the ones that put rents up the most.”
Polly Neate, chief executive of housing charity Shelter, told i that “with genuinely affordable social homes in increasingly short supply, competition for over-priced, and often shoddy, private rentals is fierce.
“Sadly, some landlords are cashing in and hiking up the rent, safe in the knowledge that if their tenants can’t pay, they can just evict them using a no-fault eviction and get a new tenant at a higher rent anyway.”
Can my landlord increase my rent?
Your landlord can increase your rent – but there are rules they should follow.
Firstly, it’s important to know what type of tenancy you’re in – this determines when your landlord increase up your rent.
Your tenancy agreement should have a section on when the price you’re paying will be reviewed.
For a periodic tenancy, which is a rolling on a week-by-week or month-by-month basis, your landlord cannot normally increase the rent more than once a year without your agreement.
Your landlord must give you a minimum of one month’s notice (if you pay rent weekly or monthly).
If you have a yearly tenancy, they must give you 6 months’ notice.
If a tenancy agreement doesn’t include a rent review clause, or it’s expired and the landlord still wishes to raise the rent, a landlord can use a a section 13 notice.
