International student accommodation tenants in financial difficulty

{Note from mods - this thread split from here: Tenant Financial Hardship Application}

Hi adprom, I have been reading your posts with interest. We run a Student Accommodation Rooming house. They are all international students. Generally, they come and stay with us on average from 6 months to one year, and then either go back home or share a house with new found friends. We have been approached by every single student in the house, saying they have lost their job and are having difficulty in paying their rent. They are not permanent residents and so do not qualify for any government assistance. Our place is run as a business. It is our responsibility to maintain the common areas. We pay a cleaner to clean all the common areas and the students bathrooms, weekly. We also pay all the electricity, gas, water, rates ,internet, insurances. licences and council fees. We pay a gardener and maintenance person to maintain the gardens and external areas. We own the building but have a large mortgage. We have already approached our bank who has offered a 6 month deferrment of loan repayment with capitalizing interest. Our problem is that we cannot afford to continue paying all the expenses of running this business, cleaner, gardener, electricity, gas, water, insurance, internet. The students have also complained that the internet needs to be upgraded as they are now all at home having online lessons- another expense. I cannot believe that they all are having financial hardship.The irony of the situation is that they can go along for the free ride and then at the end of the 6 months go back home, as they would normally have done. I would appreciate your insight and anyone else's opinion on our situation.

 

It sounds like there has been a internal memo amongst them all saying "oh I've heard that due to the corona virus, if we all simply say we can't afford it were going to get a discount or free pass", so let's all say it

 

Well, one student sent the same email on behalf of all the students claiming this, and copied each student into the email.

 

What's stopping you evicting them and getting new tenants in?

 

In short, not much you can do. Whether you believe them or not is irrelevant - although if an international student is in share housing it is likely that they are in hardship without income. The ones whose parents fund them, tend not to be in a student accom rooming house I would have thought.

Regardless of that, they all effectively have 6 months amnesty - and if they are students, they are likely smart enough to figure that out.

Not a lot you can do other than negotiate loans etc. Of course anything like internet upgrades wouldn't be happening right now.

 

You could grab a tenant hardship application form and get them to fill it out , (almost every agent has one, PM me if you want a copy of mine)
And if they are telling pokies, they won't fill it in.

Oh and dont tell a few forum members on here, they might have "shock horror" flashes

 

Can't imagine the stress Anne, that is horrible :/

Is the Gov. interest-free loan to cover cash flow issue a viable option? Also, any chance of LL insurance paying any of the short fall from the Tenants?

 

We cannot evict them and they know this. They know all their entitlements.

 

...why can't you evict them?

 

How are you going to evict them right now?

 

...the normal way?

The only place where that's modified right now is Tasmania.

 

Good luck. You would need to get local police to enact that when they refuse to leave. No police service will do an eviction given the govt announcement.

The legislation is still coming, but the intent is already there. You can't practically evict them while the governance catches up.

 

Police don't enforce possession orders. Do you know much about the process at all?

Lol. You can exactly evict them while the government "catches up".

I deal with this at work daily.

 

Possession orders (eviction)

1. You need to give them notice
2. By the time notice has been given the laws will be in place
3. I quote: Landlords or owners cannot personally use force to remove a tenant or resident if they refuse to leave the property. Only Victoria Police can carry out a forcible eviction, and only when they are acting on a VCAT order.

You do this every day for work? Yet the process is exactly what I just stated.

So you would need to go through VCAT first for an eviction (or xCAT in your state). Which of those will give an eviction order in the next week?

 

wrong, until the moratorium comes in, they can be evicted, ( except for Tas according to @thatbum )

 

So where are you going to get a VCAT order from and the police power to enforce that order?

How do you intend to evict them?

You can't. Just sillyness.

 

Yes VCAT. Who have the apply the laws as they currently are. Capiche?

 

Dear Tenants

I am unable to upgrade the internet as I am not in a financial position to do so as my income has ceased also. Unfortunately, I am in such financial strain that I have had to let the cleaners and ground maintenance go. The electricity and gas companies may also turn off these services as I can’t pay them either. You are well within your rights to take me to VCAT - they will likely order me to compensate you with a rent reduction or a few weeks free rent until I can get this rectified. If you wish to break your lease and find alternative accommodation or return home - I understand.

LL

 

Anne what a crummy situation - hopefully this forum will assist with ideas to get you through this.