A recurring conflict in politics is the rights of a landlord vs. those of his tenants. The overall issue is very complex and will (for now, at least) go untreated. However, some aspects of it are also a good illustration of how the government intervenes in the wrong place, e.g. by failing to protect “good” (law-abiding, ethical, conscientious, whatnot) customers in favor of “bad” (criminal, unethical, negligent, whatnot) businesses and business practices—while, at the same time, failing to protect “good” businesses against “bad” customers. Moreover, this is a good illustration of how two opposing groups can have legitimate and seemingly contradictory complaints (e.g. that protections for the tenants resp. landlords are too weak), which can be resolved by applying the right perspective. (Here, by noting that certain government interventions or non-interventions favor the “bad” over the “good” and that we, on at least a sub-set of issues, have a conflict between these groups—not between landlords and tenants. We should then strengthen the protections of the “good” against the “bad”, regardless of whether they are landlords or tenants.)
In Germany, for instance, we have problems like the infamous “Kaution”, which very unfairly favors the landlord over the tenants and gives the many “bad” landlords great opportunities for abuse:
This Kaution amounts to a “safety deposit” of three (3!) months’ rent. It is nominally kept in the name of the tenant, but is, for all practical purposes, under the control of the landlord. That it is paid back at all after the tenant leaves (even when the apartment is left in a contractually satisfactory state) is not a given, and delays of more than a year (!) are not uncommon.
Indeed, such delays have partially been blessed by the courts with an eye at utility bills, administration costs, and the like, which are pre-paid by the tenant according to an estimate and on a monthly basis (in addition to the “regular” rent). Once a year, a proper and retrospective calculation is made and either a refund or a residual payment follows to “even the accounts”.
Superficially, this might seem like a justification to delay the repayment of the Kaution, to ensure that no tenant simply refuses to pay this residual amount. However, refunds have, in my experiences, been far more likely than residual payments (if in doubt, because the monthly estimate contains a buffer) and the likelihood that a residual payment would come even close to three months’ rent is negligible—a typical size is a few dozen Euro.
When applied to the full Kaution and so long time intervals, it is clear that it is just an excuse—not a legitimate reason. Indeed, it is often the case that the Kaution is kept until such a point that the tenant threatens to sue for payment; indeed, I do not rule out that many landlords systematically hope that the tenant at hand will find it less of a hassle to simply sacrifice the Kaution than to hire a lawyer, go through court proceedings, etc.
Also, with an eye at actual landlord behavior in Germany, why would there be a supposition that the tenant is more likely to not pay than the landlord? After all, such trickery by landlords is rampant, while the (pseudo-)justification of a residual payment presupposes not only that a residual payment actually is needed—but that the tenant neglects or refuses to pay it.
A particular sub-complication is that if the tenant has used his legally ensured right to reduce the rent in light of contract violations by the landlord (that the landlord refuses to fix), the landlord will ultimately just recoup his losses out of the safety deposit. (This very sensible regulation has the purpose of moving even a negligent landlord to correct problems that he would otherwise simply ignore, but is rendered void through the Kaution.) In principle, it should be that the tenant makes a reduction and that the landlord has to go to court, should he neither be willing to accept it, nor to solve the problem; in practice, he just confiscates the safety deposit and it is the tenant who, post-move, has to go to court to redeem his safety deposit.
However, in the other direction, we have problems like landlords being faced with extreme obstacles when trying to evict even tenants who willfully and “in bad faith” do not pay their rent. (To be contrasted with e.g. those who wish to pay but are broke and those who withhold payment due to unconscionable contract violations.) The road to a termination of contract is comparatively short, requiring two missed payments (but this is still at least a month between the first non-payment and the termination); however, the actual eviction (should the tenant not voluntarily comply) can take a court order, needs to be executed by specific officials (“Gerichtsvollzieher”), and can cause a very lengthy delay.
Should the tenants be broke, there is no guarantee that the costs involved, be it loss of rent, lawyer’s fees, court costs, storage costs for the contents of the apartment, whatnot, will ever be recovered—and, here, the Kaution is of only limited help, because the overall costs will be far larger (in an interesting reversal the situation with utilities and whatnots).
To boot, the eviction can be denied or considerably delayed by a court, notably, when the tenant can convince (be it through real arguments or a faked sob-story) the court that the effects of an eviction would be too harsh.
Two, I suspect, strongly contributing problems to the overall situation in Germany are:
Firstly, German law, customs, whatnot, largely arose at a time when moves from one apartment (or other residence) to another were rare and tenants were potentially supposed to stay put for decades, while many in the modern world, at least in their younger years, might move every few years instead of every few decades. Contrast e.g. the size of the Kaution relative overall rent payments over a period of three resp. thirty years, and note what the implications can be.
Secondly, a very large part of the German apartments are in the hands of individuals who own one or several apartments on an own-to-let basis, as a form of investment, and many of these appear to have been horrifyingly naive about this investment. They seem to have an attitude (possibly, aided by some sales-pushing real-estate agent) that all they have to do is come up with the money to buy an apartment, sit down and relax, and the money will just roll in. In reality, there are costs, repairs, administration, taxes (and tax declarations...), the risk that an apartment stands empty for a few months between tenants, and other complications, which cut into both profits and the relaxation. (Even the risk of “bad” tenants aside.)
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