A London council has revealed that a social housing tenant claimed their property was a private one, and fraudulently sub-let it to innocent renters.
Lewisham council says its tenancy audit team ended 80 tenancies in the past 12 months that were either sub-let, abandoned or otherwise fraudulent.
In one case, the team was approached by a sub-tenant because their landlord - who in fact was renting the property directly from the council - had fraudulently let it out and the. evicted the renters from the property.
The sub-tenant in this case became aware of the property through friends and believed it was a private one for rent. Following a dispute, they were told to leave the property without notice.
They contacted the council which helped the innocent renters collect their belongings; the council then began proceedings to take possession of the property.
Now the council is appealing to its own tenants to ‘grass’ on neighbours who may be fraudulently sub-letting.
A statement from the council says “our experience shows that residents are best placed to know what is taking place on the estates they live on.”
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Sub-letting will become much more common when lifetime tenancies are introduced. Apparently this is common in Sweden with tenants making a lot of money this way. Landlords will need to e vigilant and regularly inspect their properties.
The solution may simply be to put a small sign on the building stating that it's property of the Council....
This scam however has been operating for a long time in various forms including Tourists being handed the keys to Air BnBs and other properties or simply scammed out of a deposit for non existing homes. It's a problem that's extremely difficult to tackle whilst people use casual advertising sites to find accommodation.
This is not new. This was happening in social housing when I worked in it thirty years ago! Then the private rented sector was tiny, mainly shared houses, and ASTs were introduced to boost the PRS!
Goes on a lot and has done so for years
If they get caught 👮🏻♀️ Then they should have a lifetime ban on access to any other social properties.
Course they won’t get banned from social housing, it’s their human rights being abused
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