Private Landlords: Tenants with Pets

Baroness Gardner of Parkes Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for coming up with practical suggestions for how tenants and landlords could work together to ensure wider pet ownership. It is of course for the landlord to consider each case on its merits.

[Baroness Gardner of Parkes (Con) [V]]

My Lords, pets have done much to help those recovering from medical incidents. This cannot be overestimated. Following the updating of the Government’s model agreement for shorthold assured tenancies in January, to encourage landlords to allow pets, what will the Government do to help allay landlords’ concerns over the inadequacy of a five-week deposit to address any pet damage at the end of the tenancy? Are there plans to allow for a larger deposit to be taken at the outset or, alternatively, a monthly sum to be added to the rent to pay for damage that is refundable at the end of the tenancy to the extent that it is not required? I declare my interest in rental property as in the register, but I have no tenants who have asked to have a pet—although some have them quietly without mentioning it.

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My noble friend is right to point out the impact of the Tenant Fees Act 2019. The Government recommend that the rental deposit of five weeks is a maximum rather than a default. Charging a deposit of four weeks’ rent would provide leeway to expand it to five weeks for such things as pet ownership and also to take up some of the suggestions that we have heard today around insurance or potentially looking at rent levels to accommodate wider pet ownership.