Local rent dodgers to be named and shamed...

Tenants not keeping up with the rent could end up with giant signs in the garden telling the world they’ve failed to pay.



A property firm has taken matters into its own hands to tackle rent evasion and is threatening to name and shame culprits.

Staff at the Coventry branch of 1st Choice Property Management have made blue and white boards with the words “Rent Evasion. The tenant of this property will not pay their rent” printed in large letters.

They say they will be putting the signs in people’s front gardens if they fail to pay up the money owed to their landlord.

The boards are designed to be placed outside a rented property and humiliate the occupier who has not been paying their rent.

The idea is the sign will then shame the tenant into moving out of the house.

Frank Pointon, regional director of the firm, said: “We have few problems with most of the tenants we deal with, but there are the odd ones who don’t pay their rent on time.

“We try every way to call them and visit them and then we find a few weeks later they have been relaxing on holiday in the Seychelles.

“There is only about one per cent of people in Coventry and Warwickshire who we have trouble with but this problem needs to be addressed.

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One of the biggest mistakes made by the government was paying Local Housing Allowance direct to tenants instead of to their landlords. As a result, many private landlords are now reluctant to accept tenants in receipt of LHA.