Letting agents who ban all children are breaching equality rules, says ombudsman

Unjustified blanket bans on letting properties to families with children will no longer be allowed under Property Ombudsman rules.

The ruling comes after a mother-of-four won a landmark case against an estate agent who discriminated against her family.

Nurse Lexi Levens, 33, and her family were handed a Section 21 no-fault eviction on Christmas Eve - and later found no landlords or letting agents would rent to a family with four children.

Ms Levens, working with the housing charity Shelter, brought her case to the Property Ombudsman and succeeded.

As a result, the Property Ombudsman has concluded that blanket bans by landlords or letting agents on renting to families are in breach of equality rules in its Code of Practice.

One in five families have been unable to rent somewhere in England because they have children, new data from Shelter shows.

In future, no letting agents who are members of the Property Ombudsman will be able to include blanket bans without reasonable evidence or justification. If they do, they face having to pay compensation to anyone they've discriminated against.

Property agents in the UK are required to sign up to a redress scheme, of which there are two: the Property Ombudsman and the Property Redress Scheme.

Families struggling to find places to live

Thousands of private renting families in England have been impacted by "no kids" discrimination - and figures show the bans disproportionately affect women.

Data released by Shelter shows one in five (19%) parents - equating to almost 300,000 families in England - have been unable to rent somewhere they wanted in the last five years because they have children.

The charity is now urging the government to go further and set up its long-promised Renters' Reform Bill, which would help make this kind of blanket discrimination directly unlawful.

'Our children were being discriminated against'

When looking for a new private rental, Ms Levens said she was shocked when no landlords or letting agents would rent to a family with four children.

Despite both Ms Levens and her husband passing affordability checks, they had no choice but to register with the council as homeless.

"The fact kids could be discriminated against is abhorrent and should never have been able to happen," Ms Levens said.

"I couldn't believe this was happening to me, yet the more I talked about it, the more people came forward saying they'd experienced the same or knew someone who had.

"My situation was nothing short of distressing and humiliating. Our children were being discriminated against and no one was listening or taking me seriously, so I went to Shelter, and they offered to help me challenge this with the Property Ombudsman."

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She said she was "thrilled" by the outcome of the challenge and hoped it would put a stop to families being "treated unfairly".

Rose Arnall, a solicitor at Shelter, said: "No one should be barred from finding a safe and stable home simply because they have children. Whether you can secure a home must not be based on a landlord or letting agent's baseless prejudices about the 'type' of tenant you might be...

"This is a great step forward in addressing the power imbalance which sees tenants hitting unfair barriers and being forced to jump through ridiculous hoops."