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Dealing with Bad Tenants:
Due to the time it can take to remove a bad tenant from your property it is imperative that you start the legal process as quickly as possible. If you have a tenant that’s late with the rent, It is actually also in your tenants best interest that you do this in order to avoid the arrears escalating out of control. For example, by serving a Section 8 notice on the tenant as soon as possible may have the effect of helping them to re-prioritise their expenditure and ensure they pay their rent on time in future. Tenants will come up with all sorts of seemingly good reasons why they are late with the rent, and they may be true, but start the repossession process anyway. Remember that the law favours the tenant and that it will take you several months to get your property back through the courts if your tenant does stop paying or has gone bad in any other way.

If you do end up having to start court proceedings against a tenant, from personal experience, I do not recommend representing yourself. This is because the law favours the tenant and it is so easy for you to trip yourself up if you don’t follow the prescribed process to the letter, for example not completing the section 8 notice correctly, and then there is the fact that Judges are not experts on housing act law and will again favour the tenant if in doubt. This means that in a possession hearing, if you are there without a solicitor or barrister who knows housing act law inside out, then you are at high risk of the Judge turning over your case in favour of the tenant. According to the Residential Landlords Association help desk this is becoming a regular occurrence and it has happened to me recently where a Judge wrongly adjourned a possession hearing for 3 months because she told me that the section 8 notice I had served on the tenant was invalid when in fact it wasn’t - the notice was correctly constructed and served.

> DIY On-Line services from Her Majesty’s Courts Service (HMCS):

Money Claim Online
Money Claim Online (MCOL) is Her Majesty's Courts Service Internet based service for claimants and defendants. MCOL is a simple, convenient and secure way of making or responding to a money claim on the internet.

Possession Claim Online
Possession Claim Online (PCOL) is Her Majesty's Courts Service's Internet based service for claimants and defendants. PCOL is a simple, convenient and secure way of making or responding to certain types of possession claim, including claims on the grounds of rent arrears where the appropriate notices have been served.

HMCS Information for Landlords
Guidance for the landlord on Housing matters, how you may use a county court to recover your land or property and how to issue proceedings.

> Debt Recovery & Eviction Specialists:

Landlord Action
Specialists in Debt Recovery and Eviction. Recommended by the NLA and the RLA.
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