A couple and their four children could be on the streets if they do not find a home before their emergency accommodation expires. After a four-year ordeal of eviction notices, rent rises and rows over repairs they vacated the property on their eviction date but lost their entitlement to help because they left before the case went to court.
The family of six who had been privately renting a three-bedroom flat for almost 10 years claim that they were being harassed by the landlord who they claim had been trying to evict them since 2018 after they refused to pay rent increases. Ms Essono told Bristol Live she made the decision for her family to leave the property because her husband was on the brink of suicide.
Despite being currently homeless and having four children, aged between one and ten, the family have not been given priority for social housing. Although there are plenty of properties available for private rent in Bristol, they are rarely offered viewings and have so far been rejected by landlords and agencies.
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Ms Essono, who is currently staying in a hotel room with her family, claims that her husband was told by a housing officer that they had “made [themselves] intentionally homeless” because they left the property prior to a possession order being issued. But Bristol City Council said it cannot find any evidence of the family being labelled 'intentionally homeless' despite a letter outlining that after 56 days the family will no longer be eligible for support.
On May 6, 2022, the family were sent a letter from the authority informing them that ‘the council’s duty to try to prevent you from becoming homeless has now come to an end. This is because you are now homeless.
‘You were under a Sec 21 notice but chose to leave your privately-rented accommodation prior to a Possession Order being granted due to experiencing harassment from your landlord. You felt that it was no longer possible for you to have peaceful enjoyment of your rental property due to the way you were being treated by your landlord.’
The letter goes on to say that the council now has a ‘relief duty’ and will take ‘reasonable steps’ to secure Ms Essono and her family accommodation in the next 56 days. However there is no duty to ‘ensure’ that housing is available and the letter also states that there is ‘a very limited supply of council and housing association properties available in Bristol'.
There are currently around 16,000 people on the waiting list for social housing in Bristol, with Ms Essono and her family placed in band three on the waiting list, according to the council, they will not be given housing in ‘the foreseeable future'.
Ms Essono, who was advised by the council to remain in the property, said that she decided to leave on the day of the eviction notice because of her husband’s deteriorating mental health. She said: “My husband just got so unwell, just completely disengaged.
“He wouldn’t talk and if he did talk it was often to make references to suicide and how to find different ways of killing himself. You are working and you’re paying rent but you’re still unable to support your family and that really got to him.
“On the last day of our eviction notice, I decided that I’d rather be homeless than widowed, I can replace a house but I can’t replace a husband. I had to leave for his mental and physical health because [when he went to work] I didn’t know if he was going to come back.”
On April 27, a family friend persuaded her husband, Mr Havas, to visit his GP and he was prescribed medication the same day. It was that day that the family decided not to return to the property, they ended up leaving most of their belongings behind and informed the council of their decision.
Ms Essono said that the situation was causing anxiety for the whole family who were constantly on edge because they never knew when the landlord would turn up, she said her children would run into the kitchen every time there was a knock on the door and they had received upsetting text messages from the landlord late at night.
The landlord, Gerry Brooks has denied any wrongdoing. He claims that the property had got into a state of disrepair because the tenants did not look after it and for years they were not paying the correct rent.
Mr Brooks said: “Most of the problems were the children damaging things. People who rent seem to think that if something breaks, call the landlord and he’ll fix it. If you’ve got a property and things are constantly being broken, as a business, you can’t afford to keep replacing oven knobs every time a child takes one off and that was what was happening.”
Mr Brooks said that the damp in the property was due to Ms Essono drying her clothes indoors and that he had to replace the doors because the children were slamming them. The landlord who rents several properties in Bristol said that in all of his properties he does an inspection every six months as a standard and that he prides himself on keeping his properties in good condition.
Up until the date of their eviction, the family had been following advice from Bristol City Council’s private renting team and said that Mr Brooks had carried out minimal repairs on the property, only after being asked to do so by the council. Mr Brooks, who admits trying to evict them four times, was only able to secure a legally-binding Section 21 eviction notice this year due to unfulfilled legal requirements on his part.
The relationship between the landlord and the tenants started to deteriorate towards the end of 2018. At the time Mr Brooks suggested that if the family were able to vacate the property for six months, he would refurbish the flat. It was at this point that Ms Essono and Mr Havas began to communicate with the council and became informed about the law and their rights as tenants.
Ms Essono said that the landlord initially suggested that the council could give them temporary housing for six months while the landlord fixed the house, she viewed this suggestion as a way of informally evicting them from the flat. It was at this point that they began to inform the landlord of his legal obligations.
Ms Essono said: “I informed the landlord of his obligations and he wasn’t happy, there were so many steps to be legal, it just upset him. He was giving eviction notices but he wouldn’t follow through, take us to court or bring the bailiffs.
“What the landlord was doing was just letting the property get into disrepair. We asked him to fix a water leak from the sink that was leaking straight into the socket. In order to do the laundry, we had to bring the washing machine into the middle of the kitchen so we could plug it in a socket that was actually dry.
“Because we’d had so many incidents with the landlord, the council had already been involved, we just didn’t feel that it was even worth telling him what was happening because it was quite clear to us that he didn’t want to fix the property. If he did do any repairs it would be through us complaining to the private renting team and they would write a letter to him.
“Then his behaviour towards us would become worse because he was upset about whatever the council had told him to do. “Then we would go back to the council [which] said we shouldn’t leave without a three-step eviction, otherwise we wouldn’t be entitled to help. As this is happening, the rent everywhere else is increasing, it has become this cycle.”
Mr Brooks said that he had difficulty in carrying out repairs because Mr Havas insisted on being home whenever he entered which was difficult to coordinate with plumbers. The landlord denies allegations of harassment: "I've never put a hand on him, I've never sworn or shouted at him, all I was trying to do was get a reasonable rent for my property."
Ms Essono and her family are currently staying in emergency accommodation provided by the council but in less than two months if they are unable to secure housing in the private sector, they will no longer be entitled to any housing support. Ms Essono, has made enquiries about hundreds of rentals without any luck.
She said: “It’s rare that I get a viewing and if I do, the first if not the second question is, ‘how many children?’ They are very expensive and generally, they don’t want children, they’d rather have professionals."
Since Ms Essono and her family moved into their flat in 2013, the average rent has almost tripled, while the family say their income has remained the same. Most of the three bedroom properties available for rent in Bristol are around £1,500 per month while the housing benefit cap set by the government is currently £950 despite there being no properties of that size available at that price.
“I genuinely don’t know what to do,” said Ms Essono. “I don’t feel like I’m at fault, I’m doing everything that I’m being asked to do.
“I thought that social housing was for situations like this, when someone has rented a property and things haven’t gone well. Now I’m left wondering, what has to happen for me to be entitled to any help?
“There are homes in Bristol, there are lots of empty houses but a lot of people can’t afford to live in them. Landlords are running a business, so why would they rent for less money?”
Mr Brooks said it was never his intention to leave any family on the street and told Bristol Live that he would let them move back in after carrying out work on the property.
A council spokesperson said: “Officers are currently supporting the family to find alternative accommodation and have provided temporary accommodation whilst this takes place. We have recently spoken to the family about the circumstances in relation to the previous tenancy and are awaiting further information from them about this.
“Our priority here is to ensure the family have access to suitable accommodation and to support their needs. Whilst a limited amount of temporary accommodation is available for when people are made homeless, our focus is on trying to avoid this situation arising and trying to find alternative options for those facing losing their home.
“We continue to invest in services that are aimed at supporting people facing homelessness and we encourage anyone who is being harassed by their landlord or think they’re being evicted illegally to contact us so they can receive the advice, guidance and support needed to help avoid losing their home.”
