Our Motorhome’s Languishing in Storage, But We’re Out and About Folks
Zagan the motorhome’s sat waiting, in storage about a mile up the road, and hasn’t moved for a few weeks now. We’ve done a bit of fettling here and there, replacing a broken sink plug and trying (and failing) to find a water leak in the bathroom, which has magically fixed itself. His water system’s drained down and the solar panel’s keeping both the starter and leisure batteries recharged (we nip up every now and again to check the voltages are above 12.6V, and no mice have made the van their home). We’ll whip him outta there this week for an MOT and then he’ll be back in stasis for at least another month.
So, what’s cracking off in Team Zagan while we’re not in the van? To be honest, probably not as much as we’d like but we’re still getting stuff done. We made the decision over six months ago to sell our old house and gave notice to the tenants after they decided they couldn’t buy it, but they’re still there.
I don’t know why. We use management agents to let our houses out so the tenants are well looked after if we head off travelling and to help us stay 100% legal. This means we don’t tend to talk directly with tenants. In this case the tenant hasn’t been communicative with the agent, they ignore emails and calls, so we don’t know why they’re not able to find another property. I just did a quick check and there are 34 three-bed rentals available at the moment within five miles of where they live, so it doesn’t seem to be a lack of options. Although the ones available are all around £100 more per month. Maybe we’ve shot ourselves in the foot by not increasing the rent for a couple of years as we didn’t want the tenants to struggle during the pandemic. We’re now having to go through the legal motions to regain access to the house so we can sell it.
It’s looking like the end-to-end process might take a year or more (without COVID it would likely have been quicker). The property will need at least redecorating, the garden sorted out, and an as-yet unknown amount more work will probably be needed before we can put it on the market. After that it’ll be months of sales and conveyancing. We’ll need to be here to either do the prep work ourselves, or arrange trades to come in and do it, but we’ve no idea when we might get access.
We’re not moaning, it is what it is and it’s not keeping us pinned down. We’re just explaining why we’re not heading off into the wild blue yonder (also known as Southern Europe) in the van. We’re wanting to be honest too: residential rental income has powered a pretty great life for us for the past decade, but being a landlord’s not all roses folks. That’s one reason we’ve opted to sell the house and move the capital into shares instead.
Although we’re not in the van we have been out and about. Our mates told us a while back they’d rented a house in Borth for a week’s holiday (in Wales, just north of Aberystwyth). We talked about us heading over in the van and meeting them during the day, and there’s a parking area a couple of miles along the coast adjacent to the sea for £10 a night without services. However, they house had an extra room they didn’t need, so they invited us to share the house. It turned out to be a beautifully-renovated place backing directly into the beach all of about 20m from the sea, with balconies to sit and watch the sunset from, hard to refuse! Last week we headed over there in our Mini, the boot and rear seat loaded up with stuff, and we really enjoyed seven days of luxury.
Borth’s a small town, strung out along the coast and backed by a large peat bog, Wale’s only UNESCO biosphere reserve. Other than running alongside the peat, we didn’t see much of it, spending more time prodding around the fascinating 4,500-year-old tree stumps which emerge from the sea at low tide. The weather flip-flopped between sunshine and hammering rain and we saw more rainbows than we’ve done in years.
Dodging showers, we enjoyed the impressive gorge hike around the Devil’s Bridge waterfalls, wandering around Aberystwyth, running the undulating coastal path, exploring sand dunes, rock-pooling, kite flying and beach dam building. Our mate’s cooking (so much better than ours!), the local chippy and cafe all kept us well fed and we entertained ourselves at night with TV and games. One night our mates nipped to the town’s boutique cinema, which also has a great quality restuarant. It was a cracking week.
We’re now back home for a couple of weeks before heading out to Nerja, where we’ve stayed for months in Zagan. Nope, we can’t get enough of that place, an idyllic spot between the mountains and the Med on the eastern end of Spain’s Costa del Sol. We’re not driving there this time though, we’re grabbing a Ryanair from East Mids to Malaga, and we’ve an AirBnB booked in central Nerja for a couple of weeks. We’re yet to decide whether to rent a car, or just grab the bus from the airport to Malaga and then along the coast to Nerja.
We’re staying close to the town’s athletics stadium and we’ve 10k and half marathon races lined up for when we’re back, so I’m hoping to get in a few ‘speed sessions’ legging it about on ‘la pista’ (the track). The weather *should* be pretty cracking too (it’s a steady 23°C daytime max at the moment). Ju’s already eyeing up the gelateria and I’d be very happy to retrace some of the hikes I’ve done in the mountains and enjoy some al fresco tapas.
We can’t plan much for the longer-term until the legal process with the house completes. We’ll have a chat with the estate agents we plan to use (they’re only a few doors away) about just how much we’ll need to be around during the sales and conveyancing processes. Depending on that and what else is happening, we might be able to get in the van and head south for a while to avoid the worst of the winter at the start of next year.
With the Spain-Morocco border still closed, and the 90-in-180 days rule in force, full-timers seem to be mainly heading for Turkey this winter. That’s going to be a tad beyond us this year so if we do get out, we’d likely tour southern Spain then come back to the UK in March. Realistically I suspect the house will keep us closer to home, so more flexible, short-term AirBnB style travelling might be on the cards, watch this space folks.
Cheers, Jay
How we feel your pain! We returned home in 2019 after 2yrs of moho-ing to tenants who didn’t like paying their rent (people really need to lock their accounts on Facebook …. they spent it on a holiday in the US, a hot-tub, new car and loads of bottles of gin whilst pleading poverty on court papers! Even the father-in-law died and came back to life six months later as a fresh excuse for non-payment… lol!). We started the eviction process (thankfully, they moved out voluntarily) and chased then through the Small Claims Court for monies owed (they used every stalling tactic possible!). If we can help in any way by sharing our experience in more detail just shout. We thoroughly enjoyed our day in court …. we even got paid!
Crikey, sounds like you went through the mill there Carol! We’re just letting our management guys run through the process here and hopefully it won’t get that bad but we’ll take up your offer if things go really south! Many thanks, Jay
Just a few quick thoughts:
You may have Landlord’s Legal Protection with your buildings insurance? Having a specialist legal service on the case could make all the difference: getting all the nitty gritty absolutely spot on is essential nowadays. There are so many minor things a landlord can omit to do at various points in the tenancy that’ll prevent them getting possession when it gets to court.
Alternatively / in addition, the NRLA has an advice helpline for members if that’s useful at any point.
Finally, your tenancy agreement probably allows for your managing agent to carry out inspections at appropriate intervals. An inspection now could at least give you an idea of what condition the property might be in when you do regain possession?
Not a nice situation to be in and we hope it’ll all be resolved quickly and amicably. I’ve only been down the possession route once and I don’t recall having to do anything at all between handing it over to the legal folk to sort out and the bailiff coming out to enforce the possession order.
Hi Jay,
I live in Nerja and would recommend the bus service to Nerja which is easy and takes around an hour. There is a slightly faster bus service which you could look out for which is direct to Tore del Mar as its first stop then on to Torrox then Nerja. The reason for the above is parking has become very difficult as the new health centre construction has started on the big parking area. There is a local car hire company based at La Raqueta should you wish.
Safe travels
Stuart.
Good information, much appreciated Stuart. Jay
I had a bad tenant once and the new dispute procedure goes to arbitration about who gets to keep the damage deposite, eventually.
It maybe cheaper and less hassle to ‘pay’ them to vacate. Only one winner when it gets legal and that’s the legal profession.
Thanks Max, useful info. Jay
Wow – I feel your pain with the tenant issue. Fingers crossed that it resolves itself quickly and that you can get access and get the sale through smoothly.
I am hoping that when I come to sell my rental and I give notice the tenant does not become a nightmare. I have legal insurance to help cover this and also use a management agent so hope that will help to move them on when the time comes. I put a comment on one of my blog posts about selling up and someone said sell it with a sitting tenant but I am not sure you can do that anymore.
Enjoy the Spanish sunshine in the meantime and keep training….
Sometimes renting out a property becomes a lot of hassle and not the route to easy money that many tenants think is the landlord’s lot.
My (ex) tenant was ok but declined to accept the new market rent I suggested via a section 13 notice so he moved out. The property was in an ok condition but the garden had been neglected and has taken some clearing.
Hope you can take back possession soon and your tenant continues paying rent whilst that is happening
Ah, that’s funny – we are flying to Nerja for a couple of weeks in mid-November too. We just couldn’t resist Spain for any longer and Nerja has a very special place in our hearts having spent so much time there in our motorhome over the last four years. May see you there as we’ll be regularly running along the promenade! Have a fab time. I feel your pain with the house sale – we had to do that last year and it wasn’t fun although we had a better experience with our tenants. The important thing is that you did the right thing and you were kind – it’s so sad that didn’t serve you well don’t let that stop you being the people you are!
Hi , advice please , we live not to far from you and wondered who you use for MOT and repairs please on your B544 ? Thanks
Hi Garry
We use Essex Street Garage in Eastwood.
Cheers, Jay