Against Landlords - by Nick Bano

About the Book

"Nick Bano demonstrates that Britain's housing crisis is not the product of happenstance or political incompetence. Government policy has intentionally split British citizens into homeowners and renters, two classes set on very different financial paths. In the UK, one out of every twenty-one adults is a landlord, and it is this group, and those who aspire to join it, who are represented by the political class. It is a tragic schism in the country's body politic"--

Book Synopsis

The controversial case for why building more housing will not solve the housing problem

Against Landlords overturns the stale assumptions and YIMBY delusions as to why housing in the UK is so poor, and why rent is so high. Bano lays the blame squarely at the feet of landlordism, which boosts house prices and makes tenancy unaffordable. Furthermore, building more housing is not the solution. It is firstly a problem of the law, and legal reforms must sweep away the rot at the heart of the housing crisis and British political life.

Review Quotes

"One of the best and most rigorous explanations of how the current system is rigged in favour of landlords and why that needs to change."
--Vicky Spratt, author of Tenants

"A powerful weapon against those who think that building is the answer to everything"
--Rowan Moore, Observer

"A devastating, forensic, careful, considered attack on the bustard landlords and every lie, nastiness and evil that they represent."
--Danny Dorling, author of Shattered Nation

"This is a really important contribution to the debate and a vital corrective. Nick Bano lays out in clear and succinct language the real cause of the housing crisis, which is that it is, above all, a crisis of price caused by high rents."
--Anna Minton, author of Big Capital

"So much more than 'another book about the housing crisis', Against Landlords is a book which takes aim at lazy thinking on all sides of the housing debate. Rooted in a deep knowledge of housing law - and its effects on those whose lives are made miserable by Britain's housing system - Bano combines histories from both below and above. He describes with controlled anger how the British state consciously created a landlord's paradise, and how easily things could be otherwise. Indeed, as he makes clear against fashionable fatalism, we've solved this problem before, and could so again."
--Owen Hatherley, author of Clean Living in Difficult Circumstances

"Incisive and righteously indignant. With the experience of a barrister and the sensibility of an activist, Nick Bano helps us imagine an alternative social and economic order: a world without landlordism."
--David Madden, author of In Defense of Housing

"Essential reading for everyone in the housing movement, and anyone else who wants to understand the central role of housing-wealth generation and exploitation in the British economy. Debunking conventional thinking about the housing system, Against Landlords offers a clear and convincing explanation of how we got into the current crisis, and, most importantly, how we can begin to get out of it."
--Alva Gotby, author of They Call It Love

"Against Landlords is an incisive and engaging take on the housing crisis, with some crucial commentary that anyone interested in housing would benefit from reading."
--Kate Bradley, rs21

"Uncomfortably relevant ... reading Against Landlords right now is rather like flipping through Peter Benchley's Jaws while sitting in a rapidly deflating rubber dingy and being circled by some very pointy fins ... Bano has proven he has the courage to show some much-needed imagination, while most commentary and debate around housing in the UK is typified by a depressing lack thereof."
--Sean Bell, Heckle

"We are in a total mess. We stole the future prospects, security, health and mental wellbeing of an entire generation in order to create an extractive paradise for a handful of rentiers. Bano paints this bleak, bleak, bleak picture with admirable clarity."
--Keiran Goddard, Representology

"Timely ... will send a chill down the backs of landlords everywhere"
--Brian Pelan, View Digital

"Excellent ... Bano sets out clearly and convincingly how we have all been hoodwinked into thinking that house price rises are due to lack of supply and therefore the solution to the housing crisis is to build more houses."
--Graham Kirkwood, Counterfire

"A refreshing alternative to the droning hymns of free-market proselytisers ... Bano's salient and ardent analysis confronts the realities of the law, regulation and capitalism itself."
--Eilidh Keay, Red Pepper

"Excellent ... highly recommended"
--Martin Graham, Morning Star

About the Author

Nick Bano is an author and Barrister who specialises in representing homeless people, residential occupiers, and destitute and migrant households. he has written in Tribune, the New Socialist, and Jacobin.