Family who rent our house are causing so much stress and are emotionally blackmailing us
DEAR DEIDRE: THE family who rent our house are causing us so much stress, we feel like packing our business up.
My wife and I run a property firm. We have a studio, which we did up, then we bought a flat and with the money we made on renting that, we bought a terraced house.
We thought we’d found ideal tenants, a couple with a teenage daughter.
Because we are nice people, they then started messing us around and didn’t pay us one month’s rent. We eventually got half.
I got a solicitor to write to them and they replied saying the stress we were causing was affecting their daughter’s school work.
It was like emotional blackmail. Another two months went by with no rent. Our solicitor wrote again giving them notice to leave.
Get in touch with the Dear Deidre team
Every problem gets a personal reply from one of our trained counsellors.
Fill out and submit our easy-to-use and and the Dear Deidre team will get back to you.
You can also send a private message on the Facebook page.
Close to their leaving date, they phoned my wife saying if we make them homeless, they’ll have to move to a rough area and will be forced to give up their pets.
My wife said if they paid us what they owe, they could stay. We are still waiting. We are both 63 and we could do without this stress in our lives.
READ MORE FROM DEAR DEIDRE
DEIDRE SAYS: You’ve given them plenty of opportunities to pay their rent. From what you’ve written they haven’t explained why they are behind or when they might be able to pay.
You have tried to be flexible but their debt is now mounting up without any prospect of them settling what they owe.
You can find out how to be firm but fair and process their eviction legally and properly through housingrights.org.uk.
It would be a shame to give up your business venture when you’ve worked so hard.
Using a lettings agent the next time to collect the rent may help ease these issues.
My Stress support pack will show you natural ways to relax.