AS a software engineering student with a bright future, Xander Wickham should have been concentrating on his integrated Masters degree at Heriot-Watt University.
Instead, his mental health has been suffering because of his struggle to find a flat in Edinburgh.
He was dealt a further blow when he thought he’d finally found a place at a reasonable price – until the landlord hiked the rent by £400 a month because of a loophole in the rent freeze and rent cap.
He is just one of the many people caught out by the loophole which campaigners are calling on the Scottish Government to close.
It allows landlords to increase rents between tenancies and, partly because of this, new rent averages have surpassed £1000 a month for the first time in Scotland – a 12.4% increase from last year.
Under current legislation, when one tenant moves out of a flatshare, any remaining tenants are forced to end the collective tenancy agreement too. For tenants that want to remain in the property, landlords are able to offer the tenants a new tenancy agreement and in doing so increase the rent.
This means that when Xander agreed to move in with two friends when their flatmate was moving out, the landlord took the chance to hike the rent, even though the Gorgie property was in poor condition.
“The paintwork in the bathroom was peeling off and the fan was covered in fungus,” said Xander. “It was clearly a two-bedroom flat that had been made into three bedrooms and was in poor condition, but when I looked at it, the price was £466 and as I am a student I decided to move in.”
However, once he had completed the paperwork, the letting agent then told the trio that the landlord was putting up the rent from £1400 a month to £1800.
“I couldn’t justify paying £600 a month for that property so I let it go and the two others had to move out,” said Xander. “It was really unreasonable.”
He managed to find another flat last week but is speaking out because he doesn’t want others to be caught out by the loophole.
“It means that if anyone wants to do a tenancy swap, the landlord is likely to put up the rent,” said Xander, who has autism. “I don’t want anyone else to go through what I’ve been going through as I’ve had to move a significant amount in the last few years and it’s stressful and upsetting. Trying to find a flat is mentally exhausting and this did not improve my mental health.”
As well as more controls over landlords, he feels the universities in Edinburgh have a responsibility to tell prospective students about the shortage of accommodation in the city.
“There are very good universities here but they should tell students that it’s really hard to get a flat and they’re probably not going to be living in a nice place after they’ve been in student halls,” he said.
Tenants’ union Living Rent say that the majority of requests for support they have received since the rent freeze started is for information on the legality of landlords increasing rents in joint tenancies when one person moves out.
The six-month rent freeze was brought in by the Scottish Government in September 2022 as a response to the cost of living crisis and landlords increasing rent over the previous six months.
The rent freeze in the private rented sector was renewed in January 2023 to extend to September 2023, with the rent cap increased from 0% to 3%. The Government halted the freeze for the social rented sector saying that social housing providers had agreed to keep rent increases to an average of 6.1%. The eviction ban was extended until September 2023.
Aditi Jehangir, secretary of Living Rent, said: “Landlords are complaining that tenants are getting too much power – but this is clearly not the reality. Landlords are still forcing tenants out of their homes by pushing up already unaffordable rents to sky-high levels.
“We need the rent cap and subsequent rent controls tied to the property, not the tenancy, so that landlords cannot increase rents for tenants that remain in joint tenancies and prospective tenants are not priced out of cities by sky-high rents.”
Minister for Tenants’ Rights Patrick Harvie said: “Our emergency legislation has been protecting tenants from significant rent rises and created a temporary pause on the enforcement of most evictions. Since April 1 2023, private landlords have been able to increase a tenant’s rent mid-tenancy by up to 3% and increases will remain at that level until at least 30 September 2023.
“However as emergency legislation we always acknowledged that it could not achieve everything that’s needed in rental sector reform.
“That is why we consulted on the New Deal for Tenants, and the new Housing Bill will deliver rent controls on a longer term basis and other tenancy reforms.”
