Rising unpaid rent arrears across the UK has resulted in an increase in private landlords seeking rent protection insurance, according to recent data.
Rental costs are now 10 per cent higher compared to 2021 and combined with rising utility bills and spiralling food prices, this has fuelled a rise in unpaid rent arrears.
Most rental insurance policies help to cover legal costs associated with evictions or the recovery of rent arrears. They also ensure landlords can receive income whilst properties involved in any disputes are vacant.
Typically, the recovery of unpaid rent arrears can be extremely challenging and unruly tenants can make for notoriously difficult debtors - especially in the current climate. The lower down the scale you go, and the harder rent arrears become to collect. The debt collection industry has seen a sharp rise in landlords requesting information on how to recover unpaid private housing rent and it is now a well sought after service.
The varying situations of a tenant falling into arrears can be tricky to navigate, especially if the tenant has fallen into financial difficulty. This was the case for many tenants throughout the pandemic. However, as a result of a softening of debt collection actions during the pandemic, thousands of landlords and letting agents found a proportion tenants used the restrictions placed on landlords to avoid paying their rent, even when they had the means to do so. According to Landlord Action, the restrictions also mean that the amount of private rent arrears in the UK is now higher than ever.
Whereas in the past there was a tendency for some landlords to write arrears off as a bad experience, under the assumption that recovering the debt would be too difficult, many landlords can no longer afford to write off such large sums of money. There are now many routes to recovery of former tenant arrears, and litigation – which can be costly, is not the only option.
A housing survey found that with an estimated 13 million people in the UK renting from a private landlord, approximately 52,000 were in rent arrears between 2020 and 2021.
When efforts have been exhausted and a tenant is still not paying money that is owed to a landlord, the landlord can refer the case to a debt collection agency. Here at Sinclair Taylor, we have the expertise to get results, utilising our dedicated trace investigation team who are used to reconnecting our clients with their former tenants, using various investigative methods to give the best chance of the recovery of rent arrears.
If you are struggling to collect former tenant arrears, sundry debts or rechargeables, contact the team for a no obligation quote. All our debt recovery is on a no collect, no fee basis with no set-up charges.
