Here is a message from Emily Rogers, who is a journalist:

Are you a lodger landlord who accommodates lodgers on housing benefit? Would you be prepared to share your experiences with me? (anonymously, if that’s more comfortable)

I’m a journalist who’s written a piece about the impact of one of the Government’s housing benefit cuts – extending the shared accommodation allowance to people under 35, which will force tens of thousands of people to move from one-bedroom flats into rooms in shared houses.

There is widespread concern that there isn’t enough shared housing to accommodate all these people and in response, a government minister has said he hopes lots of people will help by letting out spare rooms in their homes.

Given that the Government is keen to encourage thousands more people to help prevent a further increase in homelessness by opening up their homes to those on housing benefit, I’m keen to speak to those who already let rooms in their homes to people in this situation, as well as to the lodgers themselves, if possible. It would be interesting to see how such arrangements can benefit both parties, what kind of problems they can create and how they can be made to work. And is there anything the government could do to incentivise people opening up their homes to those in need?

Anyone interested can email me on gremily2001uk@yahoo.co.uk and I’ll get straight back to them.

The Doctor is a lodger

It will not have escaped the Whovians among you that the Doctor recently served a spell as a lodger.  But could your lodger be the timelord?  Consider the following:

• Did he turn up out of the blue, before your card had gone into the Post Office window?
• Did he appear not to really know the value of all that money in the paper bag he gave you?
• Does he keep forgetting which century he is in?
• Did he seem rather vague about what football was, but then play brilliantly in the match (irritatingly much better than you)?
• Did he save your life, and then take your place at work for the morning? (And eat all your biscuits?)
• Does he talk to cats?

Also:

• Is there a strange dark patch on your kitchen ceiling?
• Have people been mysteriously disappearing?
• Do you really know who lives in the upstairs flat?
• Are you really, really sure there IS an upstairs flat?

You never know …

If you like the sound of this, but all your lodgers are depressingly terrestrial, this might cheer you up
(affiliate link).

Lodgers are generally nice ..

I have written quite a bit here about problem lodgers, eviction and the like, as these are things which worry people, and which have therefore been popular topics on the blog. However it is important to remember that most lodgers are lovely.

I had six years of taking in lodgers, before I got married. Most of them were charming. They were mainly students from our local university (UEA), although later I put up a few new staff members from my firm (this was before I went solo) at the request of the HR people.

I had a great time with them. With the foreign students (mostly Spanish, Austrian and German) who were here on English language courses, I had to provide meals and talk to them, which was great. Many of them also borrowed my books – Winnie-the-Pooh was very popular I remember, and most of them bought a copy to take home with them. Some of them took me out for a meal before they left to say thank you.

So I am really glad I got them all to write in my visitors book before they went. They enjoyed it too, and always read what my other visitors had written before.

The guest, or visitors book

You may be able to get a visitors, or guest book at your local stationers or department store. However if you can’t find one don’t worry. Any hardback notebook will do. You will need to have four columns, one for the date, one for their name, one for their address and one (the biggest) for comments. For a small book you will need to take it across both pages or you will not have enough room.

I used to bring out the book the day before they left, and leave it with them for a while.

Have you had good experiences with your lodgers? Do you keep a visitors book to remember them by? What sorts of things did they write?

PS I had a quick look on Amazon and found this >> Visitor Book which you might want to consider – there is a recommendation from a landlord!

Welcome to this first post on the Lodger Landlord website and blog.

From 1 February, I will start of my ’21 days of tips for Lodger Landlords’ series, which will be published in the blog section of this site.

This will feature a different post every day for 21 days, on different aspects of renting a room to lodgers. Starting with a legal definition of what a lodger is, the tips will take you through the whole process, through checking that you are legally entitled to rent out a room to a lodger, information about your legal obligations, preparing for your lodger, finding one and checking him out before offering him the room, looking after him while he is with you, and getting rid of him if he proves unsatisfactory.

I hope you will read and enjoy the posts.  I also hope you will add your comments, stories and your own tips.  Although you will find all the posts here, why not sign up to my Lodger Landlord mailing list?  Then you will not miss any, and will be able to keep them all on your computer for easy access.  Signing up is easy (and completely free) – just fill in the form below (or the one on the right if you prefer not to give your name) and then follow the on screen instructions.

In the meantime I will be tweeting lodger landlord related twitter tips which you can track by searching against #lodgerlandlord.

If there is anything particular you will want me to cover in my 21 days series, please leave a comment and I will try to include it.