LANDLORDS BEWARE: Simon Longo - Worst Tenant in Britain
Let's imagine you are renting an apartment. You receive TWO MONTHS NOTICE from your landlord to vacate. You ignore it. Only a few days before your lease ends, you tell your landlord you have no intention of leaving.
You seem surprised when your landlord initiates court proceedings against you, even though you've been told this will happen if you break the lease and ignore the Section 21 eviction notice. You argue when you're told you will be held liable for the court costs - it's not fair - even though you've been told that your actions will have this result.
You demand your full deposit back, even though you still haven't left the flat, you've barred your landlord from entering the property, and you've made clear that you don't consider contracts legally binding. Not only do you demand your full deposit back before you've left, when the court sends you a nice email informing you to bring your good self along to a Repossession Notice, you tell the landlord that actually, you will leave on April 13th (two weeks before the court date) but only if you receive 400 pounds, IN CASH, before you've vacated the flat, and before it's been inspected!!
Tomorrow the worst tenant in the world is meant to be leaving my property. I have refused to give him any money, because I don't think it's right to reward such behavior and my solicitor and the government deposit people have told me not to give him anything until he's out and the locks are changed - plus I simply don't have any money left. Having spent a grand on solicitors and court fees and argued long and hard with Camden Housing Office, having suffered twelve months of abuse, sexual harassment and intimidation from this nasty little man, I don't expect him to leave easily. I'm 6,000 miles away and I still feel like it's not far enough. I've warned my lovely estate agents, Olivers, to have the police on speed dial as we have no idea what he's going to do next. He's already tried to get money out of my retired GP father!
Supposedly unemployed Simon Longo has a huge variety of websites online which detail his occupation as a freelance sound artist. This is a man who claims 866.67 pounds a month in Housing Benefit for a flat he occupies only six months a year (the other six he's "caring for a disable relative in Italy"). This is a man who has threatened me with legal action because I asked him to keep the boiler ticking over to prevent corrosion while he takes another six week holiday. A man who forbade me from entering my own flat. A man who asked me on a date and got so offended I said no he told me I couldn't enter my property in his absence in case I 'stole' his 'extremely expensive sound equipment'. This man, thirty-something, able-bodied, university-educated, having claimed benefits for well over a year, living alone, his only pre-school aged son in Italy with his mother, having had sixty days to find alternative accommodation, chose instead to stay in my flat for as long as he wished.
This man today, 24 hours before he is meant to leave, having had Camden, his solicitor, my estate agent, myself and my father explain to him that his deposit cannot be refunded until the flat is vacated, inspected and the locks changed - tried his luck, and went on The Deposit Protection Scheme website to try and get his FULL deposit back. Despite the fact he's been made aware MULTIPLE TIMES he's now liable for my court costs, the cleaning fees, whatever other damage he's caused and the cost of having the locks changed on the flat.
Landlords, BEWARE THIS MAN. Simon Longo must be one of the worst tenants in Britain. He seems like a nice, charming, down-on-his-luck musician, but as this experience has taught me, he's a total chancer who seems to think he's entitled to everything for free. DO NOT LET HIM IN YOUR PROPERTY. Yes, he - oh, I mean, Camden council - will pay his rent on time every month, but you will never be able to get rid of him without a costly legal battle.
Anyone in the UK have advice on restraining orders to make sure pests don't come near you?
You seem surprised when your landlord initiates court proceedings against you, even though you've been told this will happen if you break the lease and ignore the Section 21 eviction notice. You argue when you're told you will be held liable for the court costs - it's not fair - even though you've been told that your actions will have this result.
You demand your full deposit back, even though you still haven't left the flat, you've barred your landlord from entering the property, and you've made clear that you don't consider contracts legally binding. Not only do you demand your full deposit back before you've left, when the court sends you a nice email informing you to bring your good self along to a Repossession Notice, you tell the landlord that actually, you will leave on April 13th (two weeks before the court date) but only if you receive 400 pounds, IN CASH, before you've vacated the flat, and before it's been inspected!!
Tomorrow the worst tenant in the world is meant to be leaving my property. I have refused to give him any money, because I don't think it's right to reward such behavior and my solicitor and the government deposit people have told me not to give him anything until he's out and the locks are changed - plus I simply don't have any money left. Having spent a grand on solicitors and court fees and argued long and hard with Camden Housing Office, having suffered twelve months of abuse, sexual harassment and intimidation from this nasty little man, I don't expect him to leave easily. I'm 6,000 miles away and I still feel like it's not far enough. I've warned my lovely estate agents, Olivers, to have the police on speed dial as we have no idea what he's going to do next. He's already tried to get money out of my retired GP father!
Supposedly unemployed Simon Longo has a huge variety of websites online which detail his occupation as a freelance sound artist. This is a man who claims 866.67 pounds a month in Housing Benefit for a flat he occupies only six months a year (the other six he's "caring for a disable relative in Italy"). This is a man who has threatened me with legal action because I asked him to keep the boiler ticking over to prevent corrosion while he takes another six week holiday. A man who forbade me from entering my own flat. A man who asked me on a date and got so offended I said no he told me I couldn't enter my property in his absence in case I 'stole' his 'extremely expensive sound equipment'. This man, thirty-something, able-bodied, university-educated, having claimed benefits for well over a year, living alone, his only pre-school aged son in Italy with his mother, having had sixty days to find alternative accommodation, chose instead to stay in my flat for as long as he wished.
This man today, 24 hours before he is meant to leave, having had Camden, his solicitor, my estate agent, myself and my father explain to him that his deposit cannot be refunded until the flat is vacated, inspected and the locks changed - tried his luck, and went on The Deposit Protection Scheme website to try and get his FULL deposit back. Despite the fact he's been made aware MULTIPLE TIMES he's now liable for my court costs, the cleaning fees, whatever other damage he's caused and the cost of having the locks changed on the flat.
Landlords, BEWARE THIS MAN. Simon Longo must be one of the worst tenants in Britain. He seems like a nice, charming, down-on-his-luck musician, but as this experience has taught me, he's a total chancer who seems to think he's entitled to everything for free. DO NOT LET HIM IN YOUR PROPERTY. Yes, he - oh, I mean, Camden council - will pay his rent on time every month, but you will never be able to get rid of him without a costly legal battle.
Anyone in the UK have advice on restraining orders to make sure pests don't come near you?
MIMI IN NY | 3:57 PM |
