We’ll evict you if baby girl keeps crying at 5.30am, family warned
Private renters are threatened by management over ‘daily complaints’
A FAMILY have been threatened with eviction from their west London home after neighbours complained about their baby daughter’s cries.
Attila Wurth, a vet, and his wife Ildiko, a teacher, live in a private rented flat in Hammersmith with 15-month-old Dora and their son Alexander, three.
The family received a warning from the management company saying other residents had been complaining on a “daily basis” and that if the noise continued they would be given “two weeks’ notice to vacate”.
An email from a managing agent said there had been a “complaint stating that at 05:30 this morning a baby was crying and stamping and then further noise starting again at 06:45, which woke one of the other tenants in the property”.
The couple, who cannot afford to buy, said it was “horrible discrimination” against families renting with children. They said Dora’s crying was not excessive and that they were considerate towards their neighbours.
Mr Wurth, a veterinary surgeon at Companion Care vets in Brentford, told the BBC that he and his wife were shocked by this “heartless and harsh” attitude and deeply upset by the idea of being thrown out of their home.
He added: “We pay our own way, but we have no more to spare. You have to be extremely rich to have children in London.
“We have been very careful about noise. But if landlords rent to a family with young children ... it is unrealistic to think that a baby won’t cry sometimes. We don’t even have a stereo or a TV to make noise with — and we have avoided making any noise with house-
‘They were causing disturbance to the other occupants ... not only relating to noisy children’ Sheraton Management Ltd
hold activities. We felt so scared. We didn’t know what happens next.”
The agent, Sheraton Management Ltd, said the Wurths “were in breach of contract as they were causing disturbance to the other occupants of the building... not only relating to noisy children, but also other noise nuisance.
“Reluctantly, as there was no remission in the problem, it was on this basis that we advised Mrs Wurth that we may be left with no alternative but to serve a notice for possession.”
The firm said it had a responsibility to other tenants in the building and to investigate claims “that their contractual right to quiet enjoyment has been breached”. It said there had also been complaints about “banging, stamping, loud footsteps”, adding: “We manage numerous properties lived in by fami- lies, some with very young children. Our policy is always to avoid the necessity for repossession proceedings.”
The email to the Wurths warns of a Section 8 eviction, referring to the Housing Act of 1988, which allows a landlord to remove tenants before the end of their agreement. Shelter, the housing charity, said a Section 8 was normally for breaches of tenancy such as not paying rent or antisocial behaviour.
Hammersmith and Fulham council estimates that a third of the population of the borough are in private rented accommodation.