It’s a Catch 22 isn’t it.
Exploitation of tenants by landlords
Or … exploitation of the tax payer by scroungers.
2 Likes
Homelessness doesn’t always mean sleeping on the street, but sometimes it still does 
1 Like
I just googled him. He was a monster who took advantage of a terrible situation.
1 Like
I noticed this part of the article that Omah posted.
I’m certainly not in favour of that.
I’ve known a few layabouts scroungers over the years that would be gleeful over that.
1 Like
It’s Dickensian stuff.
As with anything else you need to ensure legislation to protect both the tenant AND the landlord.
2 Likes
Only by choice.
Selling off the council houses and now the housing association houses was a stupid idea when it was Thatchers and it’s a stupid idea now
We need decent accommodation for people who will never be able to buy and selling it off and not replacing it just leaves them desperate and without
Just trying to buy votes from the people who rent now to try to make himself less unpopular with no thought of who it will hurt and who had to pay
Self-serving, lying snake oil salesman
1 Like
I hope it doesn’t ever go back to that. 
And yes, legislation is key.
1 Like
He filled a market need. In addition he got unjustified bad press.
Surely, having a Mortgage paid for by benefits, disincentivizes folks to get out of the benefit system???
2 Likes
The work shy spoil it for those in genuine need.
1 Like
And Universal Credit just subsidises employers who are making big profits and paying large dividends to shareholders but pay such low wages that their employees have to be subsidised with taxpayers money
Instead of counting Universal Credit in the income for a mortgage they should raise the minimum wage so workers have real income to count towards a mortgage
I think the best way to help renters would be with government backed no deposit mortgages or with loans for a deposit, a bit like student loans
Because there are lots of people who are paying out more rent than a mortgage would cost them but are in a Catch 22 because while they are paying that rent, they can’t afford to save for a deposit
2 Likes
I remember your admiration of Rachman from a previous thread.
Why was the bad press unjustified?
What was good about his actions?
The prime minister also said those receiving Universal Credit would be given the choice to spend their benefits on rent or put them towards a mortgage.
The government will explore discounting Lifetime ISA and Help to Buy ISA savings from Universal Credit eligibility rules, Mr Johnson said.
Currently, claimants are only eligible for Universal Credit if they have savings below £16,000 and Lifetime ISAs are included in this limit.
These policies “will help millions realise the dream of home ownership”, Mr Johnson said.
Millions … 
BJ’s talking ballcocks again … 
![Analysis by Reality Check|1536x306.11957796014065]
It’s not entirely clear how the government’s right-to-buy policy is going to work:
- There is already a shortage of social housing without selling properties - 1.1 million people are on waiting lists
- The government has not revealed who will be able to take advantage of the scheme, how much it will cost and whether it will be capped
- It’s the third such pilot scheme - previous ones found that some housing association properties were not eligible to be sold and there was concern about the financial risks being taken on by participants
- While the government has said that there will be funding for housing associations to replace each home sold, previous pilots have had problems with replacements coming quickly enough or being like-for-like
- The policy depends on negotiations with housing associations, which will not necessarily want to take part.
I couldn’t have put it better myself.
In fact … why don’t they just cut to the chase and GIVE anyone on benefits the council house they live in for free.
That is what it amounts to.
What annoys me is, as with so many of these ideas, the poor low wage worker just above the poverty line who struggles along without any benefits or subsidies gets landed with the bill.
1 Like
https://www.rbkc.gov.uk/vmpeople/infamous/peterrachman.asp
If you want to describe an unpleasant aspect of the property rental business, Rachmanism is the word. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as the exploitation and intimidation of tenants by unscrupulous landlords.
It was a Royal Borough landlord who gave his name to the word. Perec or Peter Rachman came to England during the war as a refugee from Poland. He died a millionaire in 1962.
Rachman started work in an estate agency in Shepherds Bush but soon branched out on his own to exploit the post-war housing shortage.
From 1957 onward he bought up many run down old houses in Paddington and North Kensington, using loans from his building society.
To maximise his profits he wanted to get rid of sitting tenants and relet the properties at much higher rents. He developed an effective three step approach to dealing with “unprofitable tenants”.
1. tenants were offered a modest sum to leave
> 2. tenants’ lives were made intolerable with all night music and parties in the rooms next door
> 3. Rachman’s henchmen would go in and cut off electricity and water and break locks and lavatoriesIt was an effective strategy. The new tenants were usually immigrant families from the West Indies who had nowhere else to go and had to pay extortionate rents for tiny squalid rooms.
By 1959, a special police squad was set up to investigate Rachman who by then lived in Hampstead and travelled in a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce.
Detectives discovered a network of at least 33 Rachman-owned companies controlling his property empire. They also uncovered his sideline, prostitution. Rachman was prosecuted twice for brothel-keeping.
In 1960 he suddenly disposed of his Notting Hill property interests. Whether this was because the police were creating too much heat or he had made more money than he knew what to do with is unclear.
Of course it does. So does so many things in the “Benefits” system.
Did you actually know him then?
And a refugee as well … the mind boggles.
Rachman was depicted as a sleazy foreigner, a stateless Jew, willing to rent properties to blacks and prostitutes who undermined the lives of decent white English people. All of this flowed into the undertow of what was understood by “Rachmanism.”
On November 29, 1962, at 9:45, Rachman suffered a heart attack and his wife, Audrey, called for an ambulance. Rachman was admitted to Edgware General Hospital; at 4:45 PM, he suffered a second, this time fatal, heart attack. He was 43 years old.
The rest of the article contains details of The Sunday People splash and the BBC episode of its flagship investigative program Panorama which exposed the “reality” to the British public but it also contains offensive language (from Rachman) which prevents inclusion here.