UPDATE: Need some help again please! The landlord would not provide his address, so we have had no legal notice to leave. I spoke with him at length to say that we would move out as soon as financially possible, and arrange how/when arrears could be paid then. We have saved sufficient funds now to move out, but not to repay arrears from the beginning of the tenancy (2009/10 - during an illness I ended up applying for LHA but having no account to pay it into - I have not received these funds since having an account. My GP now says he will provide medical evidence if I submit an appeal, but I don't know the right way to make this). The landlord, reneging on the informal agreement, has now sent us messages saying that his 'American cousin' will be moving into our room on the 20th October. This has happened as I was about to transfer rent to him: I'm now waiting for advice before paying/not paying, since we cannot afford to lose the money if we are to be forced out. Could someone please advise us how to proceed? To repeat from earlier in the thread, the contract has no landlord address on it, and when asked to provide one, the landlord refused. The housing officer at Camden Council would not assist us with acquiring his address (we have seen letters here addressed to the landlord showing that he owes over £10 000 in service fees to Camden Council). There is no deposit protection registered. The landlord initially asked us to leave after taking the side of another tenant who had been obstructive and aggressive toward the friend I share the contract with. This tenant harangued both the housing officer and the landlord to force us to leave. So we are only now able to look for a new flat - to minimise argument over the exact moving date, we have offered to find a replacement tenant for the room here. The landlord agreed to this when the proposal was made, but now harangues us to leave within a couple of days. Thanks for any advice! UPDATE: Housing officer's emails are particularly unhelpful - today's says 'Bottom line is you need to agree with landlord when you vacate'.

The current situation is that we have informally agreed to leave at the end of September. We don't yet have the means to move out then, so my friend asks what should be our approach to the rent - pay as normal, or agree some plan to repay after we leave, so that we have enough money for the new flat? (We have arrears from early in the tenancy owing to a period of illness - the situation is quite complex, so I might need a new thread for that one.)

Thanks Mr.Shed. I will post updates as they come.

padja: The housing officer feels that changing the room lock would inflame the situation at this stage, and I'm inclined to agree. I think he is not used to have people dealing with him authoritatively, and if the police were called he would be afraid of the consequences to his 'reputation'.

My friend had a call from the LL this morning. He had just received a call from the council housing case officer assisting us. The LL apparently first pretended he had not spoken with the case officer, and then said that the deposit was protected (yet wasn't able to provide the name of the protection scheme) and said that he did not want to provide his address. I took over the phone call and explained the situation to him and agreed to email him about the information he needs. We then spoke to the housing officer by phone (who also remarked on how agitated and difficult to deal with the LL is - hence why I want to make it clear to the LL that it's not in his own interest to speak to us face-to-face). This is the email I have sent the LL: "As you have heard we need a valid notice. Regarding the deposit protection, for the notice to be legal you need to provide the name of the deposit scheme, its address and the reference number. You will need to provide your residential address for the notice to be legally valid. To repeat, after a legal notice has been served, we will then be be able to work from the basis of a valid notice. Further communication can take place via email or in writing only, since we will need a record of each communication. I am including Mr xxxxxxx, the housing officer assisting with the case, in the recipients." My friend wanted to take a conciliatory tone, offering that we would look for a new place, and so may be leaving earlier than the notice period. But I think this only plays into his need to find a weakness. (I presume he won't give his address so far because he has something hidden from the bank/insurance about this property?)

We haven't texted the landlord yet - he has a history of sending barrages of texts, so we want the council officer's feedback first. I'll look into the lock issue and thanks again for all your help.

Ok - the man we saw (not sure if he was a housing officer - the appointment was pretty rushed) was very clear, saying that since the deposit is not protected, no valid notice can be given. He referred to something called Section 1, about obtaining the landlord's address... The outcome is that he will write to us in the morning, and has offered to write to the landlord. We're relieved about this as I want to make everything as impersonal as possible, and for the landlord to know that officials are supporting our side and we're not playing around. Both you and he recommended changing the lock - but of course as this is a shared flat, this would just be the lock to our room, so we could still be locked out of the flat. How should we prepare for that possibility? Is my friend right that we should keep a passport/contract with us to prove identity to police if this happens? (I don't suppose you know the kind of cost for a plain Yale lock fitting we should expect? Don't want to be conned by another London 'businessman'...)

Thanks again, We're just getting ready to leave for the council housing appointment, but will send the text message to the LL this afternoon. The question of violence - I don't know for sure. There was a time when he came to the flat unannounced to collect rent, despite my friend having informed him that she wouldn't be in that evening. When he knocked on the door I told him that we were expecting him several days later, yet he became agitated and didn't leave. I told him I had to get back to work, and he raised his voice and ranted about having driven over here and how we are meant to pay. There was also an incident months back when, on being told we were a few days' late paying, he sent eviction-threatening messages. His casual, friendly unprofessionalism seems to quickly flip over into agitated hotheadedness if he doesn't get what he wants. My feeling is that changing the lock on the door to our room will be seen as surprising aggression toward him. I don't know anything of the law in this area - might he not claim this is damage to his property etc? What would happen if, say, he turns up to insist that he gets confirmation from us that we leave at the end of the month? He refuses to leave the flat until he gets this from us. I presume the police have no interest in that, so what's the correct approach? I work freelance so I can be in the property on those days. I feel that the LL will not want anything carried out in writing and try to harass us until we agree something on the phone/to his face. I'm perhaps better than my friend at dealing with arguments and calming people down, but the difference is that I'm male and he may feel justified in being physically aggressive toward me. And could you tell me what the law is regarding the landlord coming around unannounced - can we tell him 'You must give us 24hrs (etc) notice'? Will write more after the appointment in a few hours. thanks --- apologies - formatting is not working for me on this post.

The only contact address we have for him is the school where he worked as deputy head. He no longer works at this school since the investigation. How best to protect ourselves from an unlawful eviction? Thanks again (just to add info - the contract began September 2009 - the landlord has initialled 'Deposit paid' at the top.)

Mr Shed - Yes we have the original tenancy agreement. My friend has made photocopies in case we need to provide them to police etc as proof of present residence in the event of an unlawful eviction. The contract does not have the landlord's address on it, and we do not have his address. It appears to be that he wishes to have himself listed as resident at this flat - would this be mortgage-related perhaps? Would you advise that we text him to send us his address - and what shall we do if he makes excuses not to provide it? (The LL, some time after we moved in, was the object of a national story in the media - found guilty of forging documents. Because of this we should be careful about how he might react.) My friend has printed all email correspondance between her and the LL since the dispute arose. Her emails are conciliatory and acknowledge that she got overheated in responding to the woman's aggravating and controlling behaviour. The woman seems to expect my friend to 'bow down' to her, and will accept no fault herself. r.e. the deposit - he seems to have returned it to previous tenants, albeit with quibbles over how. We paid the deposit just as an extra 2 weeks' rent, and have a signed receipt for it. (We have receipts for each month's rent, since I did not like paying in cash.) Thanks

Thanks for the fantastic advice and information so far - we really appreciate it. To answer questions:- mariner51: " OP states they occupy a room with a friend. Is the friend a joint T on AST or just a long-term visitor?" - my friend and I are on the same contract for the room - we have both our signatures on it and split the rent between us "OP suggests other female's room is the living room. Is the living room described as a communal area in OPs AST?" - When built the flat had a living room - but the landlord has always rented this out as a bedroom (hence the aggravation is partly caused by having so little space). The room has thin walls, which has been a major contribution to the woman's annoyance - she said she is woken up by even the noise of the fridge door opening. To revenge this, she has been consistently passive-aggressive toward other tenants. Mr.Sheds questions: "- Has your deposit been placed in a tenancy deposit scheme, and have you had formal notification of such? - How many people in total reside in the property, and how many floors does it have?" - No the deposit is two weeks' rent - The property has 5 present residents in total, and is a flat(ie., one storey) in an ex-council block. I've spoken today to a London housing law centre, and made an appointment with the housing options department of the council that the law centre recommended for tomorrow. A few minutes ago the LL sent us a text message that reads: "Just confirming that you are leaving on 31 July. I have someone moving in on the first. THanks." Since he has not shown anyone the room, we suspect that the woman has arranged with him that she take over our room (the rent is less and the room is not affected by the proximity to the kitchen). My friend reports that the woman has been walking around with a big smile on her face. I'd guess the best thing is not to reply to this message (ie. "the notice is not legal") until after the appointment tomorrow? Thanks to everyone again so far.... (Just to add: - We are both receiving Local Housing Allowance at the moment. - We are not wishing to stay here long-term, but we need adequate time/finances to move. The LL has a history of dealing with tenants in an unprofessional manner - wanting rent paid in cash ("if you're not in, just leave it in your room"), not to his bank account, not providing his address despite bills in his name arriving at the flat, failing to make repairs, and turning up without notice).

The landlord lives at a different address in London. How do you recommend that we express this is not a valid notice period, and would it worsen our position to propose a different notice period? I do not accept that the other woman did not initiate the aggression toward my friend - who was apprehended at 2am by a raging ball of anger toward her.

thanks - padja. To clarify a little - we have been here for over a year and have always been able to resolve issues with any other tenant up til now. The landlord has accepted the line that my friend was the aggressor and seems to prioritise the other woman's position as a 'victim' (my friend is late 20s and the other woman is about ten years' older). I stayed out of the argument as it happened, to avoid intensifying the woman's sense of being the victim, and to avoid expressing aggression myself. I will take your advice and speak to the CAB... thanks again.

Hello, We're looking for advice as to how to proceed from this situation, and would be very grateful. We are two friends sharing a room in a shared flat - a fixed term tenancy which continued after the tenancy's period ended, so currently a periodic tenancy I believe. The situation is this: A new tenant moved into the flat some weeks ago, from the start she behaved in an offhand and rude manner to my (also female) friend - making demands about how people lived in the flat, and complaining that my friend used the kitchen as a study space in the evening (there is no other available space since the flat's living room is rented out as this woman's room). Owing to her room having thin walls, she was apparently kept awake by people using the kitchen for any purpose after she had gone to bed. We tried to accomodate her on this, and minimised the use of the room. She continued to behave resentfully toward my friend (ie moving other tenants' washing-up over to her food area, damaging her cooking pots etc). This came to a head in a late-night row - my friend's washing being turned off mid-cycle by the woman, despite washing often been done late at night in the flat by every tenant. In defending herself, my friend became extremely aggravated by the woman, and made a kind of fingerpointing/handwaving gesture toward her, miscalculating the distance between them and brushing her chin with the back of her fingertips. The woman claimed that she had been hit, insisting it was a deliberate attack. Several minutes later the woman returned from her own room to ask that they be 'civilised' and my friend apologised for touching her. She appeared to accept the apology. I spoke to the woman by myself the next day. I described how her actions to date had aggravated relations - and to no purpose, since we had no dispute with any of her requests regarding the flat. I explained how her actions had been taken to be aggressive and uncooperative by both of us, and that led to their argument. I let her answer each of the points and she seemed satisfied by the agreements we reached. But she then proclaimed regarding my friend - "I wont accept anyone being disrespectful to me..." I said that thats a personal thing between the two of them. The next day, the landlord messaged my friend asking her to reconcile. When my friend next saw the woman - 2-3 days later, she explained her aggravation and repeated her apology for touching her and calling her names. The woman would not accept the apology, saying it was not 'from the heart'. She has since insisted that the landlord ask us to leave, claiming that my friend was the aggressor in the dispute. The landlord has emailed us to say he's sorry but since 'you guys cannot get on', we must leave in less than two weeks, offering his apology. How should we respond to this? We are both in financial difficulty and will find it very difficult to move at such short notice. Thanks for reading this long request...