Sherwood tenants continue to fight no-fault evictions from landlords

Sherwood tenants are continuing to fight the no-fault evictions they received to make space for the homeless.

Sherwood residents living within three separate apartment complexes, Warwick Towers, Warwick Mount, and Warwick House, on Mansfield Road, all received section 21s, known as no-fault evictions, in May of this year.

Since then, the remaining tenants fighting the evictions have been battling with both the council and the landlords of the houses to keep their homes.

The landlords use a rent-to-rent scheme, and the properties are intended to become for-profit homeless accommodations, but as a result, they risk rendering the current tenants homeless.

David Stanley, 36, a self-employed resident of Warwick Mount, said: “I only found out because one of my neighbours, out of the three buildings, asked if I was being evicted.

“By the time I’d managed to get all the information together and organise it, a lot of the people had already gone. It’s been a rush to get everyone together.”

He added that the situation is “really appalling to be honest”.

“We’re basically fighting this because we’ve got nothing to lose, but it’s affected us all mentally and physically.”

Michael Townend

Michael Townend, 56, a retired tenant of Warwick Mount, said: “A lot of us have been here a long time, I’ve been here for 11 years, and some people have been here longer than me. We’re basically fighting this because we’ve got nothing to lose, but it’s affected us all mentally and physically.

“The experience hasn’t been good for me because I have a heart condition; it’s been extra stress on top of normal stress.”

ACORN Union aims to help protect and advocate for issues affecting low-income people. They focus mainly on tenant’s rights and housing which is why they have been so active with helping all the tenants that face eviction on Mansfield road.

On Friday (17 October), tenants, alongside members of the public and ACORN, gathered in Bestwood to protest and try to talk to Jay Hayes, who is the Councillor for Bestwood as well as the cabinet member for housing and planning.

Clementine Von Doetinchem, 24, a recent graduate and Nottingham local at the protest, said: “It’s super important that we take a stand against these predatory practices by landlords.”

Whilst protesting in the streets of Bestwood, before attempting to approach his surgery, Cllr Hayes walked past so, Mishanth Feinstein, 26, the branch manager of ACORN, and some of the tenants approached him.

Mr Feinstein said: “We want to put this to bed.”

Cllr Hayes agreed to a meeting on Thursday (23 October) where the tenants hope to arrange an agreement shared between themselves, their landlords, and the council.

Mr Stanley said: “My concern is we’ll have this meeting, but he’ll just dismiss this again and double down in the council not having to admit fault.”

Sherwood Councillor AJ Matsiko said to prevent these issues affecting tenants: “We need to tackle rent-to-rent. There are very good landlords and very good agencies but the ones that are bringing everyone down, they need to get gone.”