A double blog:

It’s getting colder. Contacting the council through MySandwell

It’s that time of year again. No, not Christmas, but the time for our annual reminder on getting your property winter proof, making sure your tenants stay safe and warm and you don’t end up with horrendous repair bills.

Checking everything is in proper working order now could potentially safe you a fortune if we get really cold weather again. Even if you think your insurance has got it all covered, do you really want to be trying to deal with emergency plumbers for a frozen or burst pipe late one night when you could be busy watching Christmas repeats on the telly or ploughing through that tin of Quality Street? Over-eating with my feet up wins it for me every time.

You should of course be confident that your tenant’s boiler is in tip top condition because you’ve had your annual gas safety check, (that’s if you don’t fancy a whopping fine for non-compliance with the gas safety regulations).

But there are still a lot of things to consider:

• Is all of the central heating system working properly and will you tenants have it on enough?
• Do they plan to go away over the winter and if so will they be leaving the heating on a timer? All it takes for is one bad cold snap in an empty cold house for you to have a serious and horribly expensive issue with burst pipes.
• If the property free from damp and condensation or do your tenants perhaps need some education on the best preventative measures?
• Are gutters and drains clear of obstructions? It’s at this time of year when you can easily find your guttering is full of fallen leaves.

These are just a few of the things to think about. I won’t try and give you a comprehensive list as you will find some much better ones out there on the websites of the various professional landlord organisations or landlord insurers. So get googling. Please don’t leave this issue till it actually gets really cold; get ready now. Inaction could result in horrible bills, endless hassle and very unhappy tenants in only a few weeks time; or maybe sooner. Who knows what the weather has in store for us?

Also, you might have seen our blog last week which talked about LEAP. A service which if your tenant is eligible might be able to offer grants to landlords to help with the cost of a new boiler or heating. I won’t repeat myself here – please see last week’s blog https://sandwelllandlords.wordpress.com/2020/12/01/grants-on-energy-efficiency-and-our-latest-successful-landlord-forum/

MySandwell

My next topic is about contacting the council via MySandwell. There’s a wide range of council forms that our residents and businesses need to fill in for their various interactions with us. Increasingly, you will find that the best and sometimes the only way to access them is through our MySandwell online facility; for which you need an account. Opening a MySandwell account is quick and easy and of course free. Landlords should note that to report a change of tenant in one of their properties, you must now have a MySandwell account and if your tenant wants to contact us themselves to tell us they have moved into a new property they must also do it via MySandwell.

To open a MySandwell account; just go to https://my.sandwell.gov.uk click on ‘Register’ in the top right hand corner and follow the instructions from there.

Oliver

It’s not too late for a cold weather warning

I’m looking out of the window by my desk at a beautiful blue clear sky (even Housing Benefit officers can appreciate a nice day), but that doesn’t mean that we wont be having more bad weather before we get to spring.

Burst pipes, condensation, flooding, frost damage are all problems for landlords. Although you might think yourself well informed on these issues, it doesn’t mean that your tenant is. Have you had a conversation with them about all of these? If not, do you need to do so?

There’s a good website from the Northern Ireland Housing authority – covering cold weather issues that you might find worth looking at, or getting your tenants to look at. It probably won’t contain anything new for an experienced landlord but makes a handy check-list.

Keep warm.

Oliver