Dear Editor
The current Landlord/Tenant laws are due for a complete overhaul. Laws that were written to protect hardworking tenants from unscrupulous landlords are being manipulated by lazy, shiftless bums, parasites who are working and using the laws to circumvent paying their rent and utility bills. No one should be allowed to use someone’s property free of charge. No one should be allowed to use utilities free of charge. Yet this is exactly what these con-artists are doing.
Because a landlord cannot lock a paying tenant out of his rented house, the same rule is being exploited by non-paying bums who call the police, and the non-payer must be let back into the house. This law needs to be revised. The landlord is also not allowed to turn off the utilities on a non-paying renter. Thus, GEBE comes in after two months and everyone is left in darkness.
Even going to the Rent Commission gives these people at least three months of rent-free living. By the time the case is called for a hearing, another two months have gone by. When the case is heard another month goes by before a decision is rendered. Then the renter gets another three months to find a place. That is almost a year of living rent-free. In the end, the landlord is out of months of income, plus he/she is left with a hefty utility bill which must be paid to get the utilities turned back on.
The non-payer has moved to another victim and is not held accountable. I am positive the law was not written with these intentions in mind, and they need to be amended as soon as possible. They must indicate that they apply to pay tenants ONLY. If you do not pay your rent, you can be locked out. You do not pay utilities; they are turned off. If the rent commission agrees with the landlord, besides being evicted, the non-paying renter should also be made to pay the outstanding rental and utility bills balance or go to jail. After all, it is stealing and that is a crime. If the laws are not changed then the Rent Commission should have a budget to reimburse the landlords for their losses by abiding by their rules.
What these con-artists are doing is criminal and crime should not pay. It is even more frustrating when a policeman who has sworn to uphold the law has to aid and abet these crooks in their criminal procedures by making the landlord open the door for these criminals.
I ask that you withhold my name in the event you deem it fit to print this letter.
Name Withheld upon Authors Request.