If you rent house shares to singles, students or young professionals, what advice are you offering them about dealing with coronavirus?
See the official guidance here but in summary for shared homes, the following applies:
- if you live with others and you are the first in the household to have symptoms of coronavirus, then you must stay at home for 7 days, but all other household members who remain well must stay at home and not leave the house for 14 days. The 14-day period starts from the day when the first person in the house became ill.
- for anyone else in the household who starts displaying symptoms, they need to stay at home for 7 days from when the symptoms appeared, regardless of what day they are on in the original 14 day isolation period.
- it is likely that people living within a household will infect each other or be infected already. Staying at home for 14 days will greatly reduce the overall amount of infection the household could pass on to others in the community
- when cleaning you should use your usual household products, like detergents and bleach, as these will be very effective at getting rid of the virus on surfaces. Clean frequently touched surfaces such as door handles, handrails, remote controls and table tops. This is particularly important if you have an older or vulnerable person in the house
- personal waste (such as used tissues) and disposable cleaning cloths can be stored securely within disposable rubbish bags. These bags should be placed into another bag, tied securely and kept separate from other waste. This should be put aside for at least 72 hours before being put in your usual external household waste bin
The epidemic is raging across the world, with more than 300 cases and three deaths reported in the UK already at the time of writing.
Currently, neither Public Health England nor the Department of Health have issued instructions to landlords, but this is a fast-changing scenario and needs active monitoring.
For house share landlords, it’s probably good practise to implement basic hygiene guidance for tenants.
Public Health England has published the following advice:
Contents
Returning travellers
Stay indoors and avoid contact with other people if you’ve travelled to the UK from the following places in the last 14 days, even if you do not have symptoms:
- Iran
- Hubei province in China
- Special care zones in South Korea (Daegu, Cheongdo, Gyeongsan)
Stay indoors and avoid contact with other people if you’ve travelled to the UK from the following places, even if you do not have symptoms:
- Italy (since 09 March)
Stay indoors and avoid contact with other people if you’ve travelled to the UK from the following places in the last 14 days and have a cough, high temperature or shortness of breath, even if your symptoms are mild:
- mainland China outside of Hubei province
- South Korea outside of the special care zones
- Cambodia
- Hong Kong
- Japan
- Laos
- Macau
- Malaysia
- Myanmar
- Singapore
- Taiwan
- Thailand
- Vietnam
Sharing a bathroom
If a self-isolated renter shares a loo, then set up a rota so that self-isolated person uses the bathroom last for washing. They should not use towels anyone else uses and should the clean the bathroom thoroughly before leaving.
Sharing a kitchen
The self-isolated person should wear a face mask, use the kitchen after everyone else and take their food back to their room. The best way to wash up is with a dishwasher. Crockery should not be shared.
Who’s infected?
The good news is the risk of exposure and suffering a serious bout of coronavirus seems less for the under 25s than for the older population, with the elderly especially vulnerable.
Only 8% of reported cases in China were aged between 20 and 30 years old, according to the World Health Organisation.
It should not be the Landlords duty to give medical and hygiene advice to tenants it is their personal duty to keep themselves safe and the minute we start giving advice we leave ourselves open to being sued
If a tenants has conflict with another tenant on this matter then perhaps step in but each individual must be responsible for their own actions not their landlord
Two out of four tenants have lost their job due to the virus. They are EU workers working in a language school and in construction.
Is there any central help they can access to pay their rent?
I’m not in the job of making people homeless, and I want to help them, would I need to look at rent reductions, rent deferrals etc. What is the best line to take?
Nobody is looking for accommodation at the moment and tenants are unable to travel home because of travel restrictions.
This is definitely becoming an issue across my small portfolio of HMO young professional and student houses. Out of 8 houses and 44 tenants I have 1 house on 14 day isolation due to 2 symptomatic housemates and another with a single no-symptomatic housemate on 7 day isolation due to recent close contact. I also have a tenant just lose her job due to COVID-19, a tenant due to arrive from France cancel and a tenant decided to return to China as her parents feel she will be safer there!
For the above reasons I have now started a spreadsheet of all my houses so I know who is self isolating and how long for so I can plan maintenance. I have also issued an email which I have decided to share in case it can be of any assistance to other landlords:
Hi all
As you are all aware shared accommodation presents particular challenges due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the official guidelines for self-isolation and social distancing. There is a significant chance that at some point in the near future one of you or everyone in your house will be required to self-isolate. I already have self-isolation occurring in 2 houses.
Because you are all living in close proximity and sharing communal spaces and I regularly visit the house for maintenance it is particularly important that you keep me and any of your housemates informed of any of the following:
Any close contact you have recently had with a person displaying COVID-19 symptoms: “fever, cough, shortness of breath and breathing difficulties.” WHO
If you display any symptoms yourself – under Government guidelines everyone else in the house will need to self-isolate for 14 days too.
If you have any underlying health conditions such as diabetes or a weak immune system which make you more vulnerable
Your self-isolation time-frame: If you decide to self-isolate keep me and all your housemates informed of when you plan to finish and if and when you develop any symptoms
If you have not yet done so please familiarise yourself with the following official UK Government guidance:
Stay at home: guidance for households with possible coronavirus (COVID-19) infection – https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-stay-at-home-guidance/stay-at-home-guidance-for-households-with-possible-coronavirus-covid-19-infection
In particular shared accommodation is advised of some of the following practical measures – I have added some of my own thoughts too:
• agree a separate bathroom if possible for anyone with symptoms
• avoid using a shared kitchen while others are using it if you have symptoms
• set aside an area of kitchen worktop for anyone with symptoms
• use separate towels – probably best to keep your own in your room from now on
• eat your meals in your room if you have symptoms
• use a dishwasher if you have one
• use separate tea towels, crockery and cutlery etc and personally I’d use a separate sponge/brush for washing, maybe have some labelled saucers on the kitchen windowsill
• use a disinfectant spray to regularly wipe down bathroom and kitchen surfaces, door handles and hand rails etc
• do not shake dirty laundry
• and of course be very thorough with regular handwashing as we all know
We don’t believe a landlord needs to know (nor has a right to know) if or what symptoms an occupier has. That is a personal medical issue. If a landlord intends to attend for some “essential” reason, all a landlord (or agent) needs to know in our view is whether the house is under self-isolation (not why or by whom it was started) and when isolation either started or is likely to end. Current guidance is to avoid all “non-essential contact” and so attending a property should be avoided generally unless “essential” whether or not there is isolation (such as repairs at the tenants request or legally required periodic inspections such as gas or electric).