Your LBSU elected officers SU President, Dhruv, and Welfare Officer, Harry, recently met with Alex Sobel, MP for Leeds Central and Headingley, alongside elected officers from LUU. Sobel began his political careers at Leeds University Union (LUU), just up the road from us here and he has consistently defended and upheld the voices of students on a national scale.

At their meeting, your elected officers and Sobel discussed how letting agencies and landlords require a guarantor when a student is signing their housing contract. This is stopping many students from accessing affordable, good quality housing. The conversation was prompted by the National Union of Students (NUS) launching a ‘No More Guarantors’ campaign, calling for an end to guarantors across the country. 

Requiring a housing guarantor stops international, estranged, and low-income background students from having fair access to housing whilst they study. Sometimes, students must pay a company to act as their guarantor or pay several months’ rent upfront, which discriminates against these groups of students. 

Leeds Beckett students told us about their experiences:  

• ‘My experience with requiring a guarantor was mentally exhausting and financially draining.’ 
• ‘I had to hide at my friend's place for shelter until I finalised my accommodations after 5 months in UK.’ 
• ‘Horrible, unjust and bullied -, these were the only feelings while searching for accommodation.’ 

We need passionate students like you to help support this issue and sign petitions.  You can get involved with NUS’ campaigns Fix Student Housing Petition and Support International Students! which aim to address the struggles students face with poor quality, expensive housing and guarantors.  

Sobel tells us more about his proposed amendments for the Renter’s Rights Bill, how he feels they will benefit students, and how he is urging other MPs across the country to support these changes. You can read Sobel’s full letter to all students in his constituency below. 

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As an MP representing students in all the Universities in Leeds, I hear so many issues about student housing, sadly some of which were happening when I was on the Executive of Leeds University Union many years ago. Some like the ever earlier attempt to let out homes and rising Rent in advance as well as the need for guarantors have become supercharged. Last year I attended an event organised by Leeds University Union where I heard from many students about these issues especially guarantors and the expensive need for a guarantor service. 

As a longstanding member of the APPG on Students which the National Union of Students holds the Secretariat for, I fully appreciate the crucial role in ensuring that the voices and needs of students are heard and represented in Parliament. In the last Parliament following meetings in local student unions like the one in Leeds there were two APPG meetings on student housing, the first looking at the last government’s Renters’ Reform Bill, and the second looking at the issue of student housing more broadly.  

These meetings, and the discussions they facilitated, highlighted the pressing need for fair and affordable housing for students and a lightning rod issue that quickly came to the fore was the struggle students face with the widespread practice of asking for rent up front and guarantors.  

What came out of the APPG meetings and NUS’s work is just how discriminatory demands for rent up front and guarantors can be. Students from deprived socio-economic backgrounds, those estranged from family, those who’ve come from care, and international students in particular, struggle to meet these requirements.  

But it is not just the renters themselves who are impacted by these requirements: it has an impact on their family too. A guarantor is typically expected to be a parent or relative who owns property in the UK and/or earns a substantial income. So, even if a student renter who comes from one of the groups mentioned above does manage to find someone suitable, the responsibility can be onerous. The guarantor must pay the rent should a tenant default – but they can also be expected to pay for other costs, such as any damage to the property. Indeed, in a shared property as student houses most often are, a guarantor can find themselves liable for damage caused by another tenant other than the person they are responsible for. While parents with means are likely to be able to shoulder this burden, those who only just meet the threshold could well be pushed into financial difficulty should things go wrong. 

It is not uncommon for student renters to be asked for non-refundable holding fees while guarantors are vetted. For those who can’t secure a guarantor there are guarantor schemes, where private companies act as a guarantor for a tenant, but of course this is not a free service: what we see here is the most vulnerable renters financially penalised, because their parents live overseas, or they come from a background where finding a guarantor is impossible like care leavers. 

Rent in advance is another common landlord ask, and one which often goes hand-in-hand with the demand for a guarantor – or be used where someone is not able to provide an approved guarantor.  Students can be asked for six to twelve months’ rent upfront, a practice which is particularly common with international students.  

The last government’s Renters’ Rights Bill was a flawed piece of legislation, which did nothing to address these concerns. Labour’s new Renters’ Rights Bill is a vast improvement, and a huge opportunity to take action on rent upfront and guarantor requirements.  

The cost-of-living crisis has had a devastating effect on students, as it has on many people, and there is evidence financial pressures are putting people off from studying. According to UCAS, 66% of applicants are worried about the cost of living, 75% are worried about starting university, while 73% said their concerns were financial. Research from the Sutton Trust shows that 14% of students were reconsidering their choices due to the cost of accommodation. Student housing is a major slice of students’ outgoings and so addressing the costs which afflict the most vulnerable students is one sure way to break down barriers to opportunity. 

There are alternatives to the poor practices currently pursued by landlords, who can subscribe to rental insurance, ask for references, and of course deposits which are the norm. We should encourage this and move to get rid of the need for guarantor requirements for the most vulnerable renters. 

I hope my colleagues will give serious consideration to students’ arguments and help make the necessary changes to the Renters Rights Bill.