Every Malaysian family renting a house in Coventry (and Birmingham) that I know of, has a Pakistani landlord. By Pakistani, I mean British citizen of Pakistani descent or ethnicity.
I guess there is a perfectly simple reason for that. It's a symbiotic relationship - their rents are among the lowest here and the Malaysian don't like to make much of a fuss.
Our own landlord's father was born in Pakistani Kashmir (called Pakistan occupied Kashmir by the Indians and Azad (free) Kashmir by the Pakistanis. Every one tells us that we are really lucky to have a nice landlord and I guess we are, after hearing some of the horror stories.
I just wonder whether this is the same in other parts of the UK.
NOTE: In the UK, the term "Paki" is considered derogatory, offensive and racist when spoken by non-Pakistanis. However, this term is commonly used by a lot of whites to refer to anyone from the South-Asia including Indians and Bangladeshis and as one of my friends found out, even Malays are included.
Tags: Coventry Landlord Pakistani
7 comments:
I suppose you really are lucky.. pakis are quite common as landlords and do alot of house rentals to overseas student. I wouldn't call it symbiotic really.
While I was studying in Sheffield, the pakis rent were actually the highest about (one guy actually owned an entire block of houses, i stayed there), and they monopolize it. And the landowner was a real a**hole. Caused 101 problems for my house.
My opinion, best landlord ranking are follows:
1. White (especially those old ladies.. seriously nice people, and cheap rent)
2. Chinese (makes alot of noise, but they get things done)
3. Others (not many of these, but I've seen Sikhs and Indian homeowners before)
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10000000. Pakis (the worse of the lot)
Wow, so you judge a whole group of people by your experience with a minority of them.
Rented from a British Asian before and although the rent was high, at least the house was decent to live in. The worst I have been to was actually owned by a Chinese who can't speak English.
Had an Iranian landlord when I was a student in US. Mean old man. He owned the whole apartment block and controlled the heating to save on electricity. He would shut the heater off before winter was over claiming that it was already spring and warmer. Warmer my foot! I had ice forming on my window! Not only that, he had only the dimmest lights installed so we had to buy our own lights or else live in darkness at night. I hated him so much that I wrote him one long, nasty letter before I graduated. He called to straighten things out, I answered the call but pretended to be someone else and told him that "I" had gone home for good hehehe!! Call me chicken but after reading the letter, he was one angry man so I'd better take cover :-)
jon, it really depends, actually
i try not to be judgmental, but i speak not only of my personal experience, but what my friends went through as well.
i suppose 10 paki homeowners renting 10 houses (malaysians, asians, and brits) is a very small minority, but its still 10/10 in my books.
I am so sorry to hear all that. However, my houseowner is really nice. More of a friend than a landlord really. Gave us a lot of tips and advice on living here. He gave us a free Sky box and even loaned us his laptop. If we have any complaints, he will also get it fixed asap.
I'm a British Pakistani and a landlord. I was introduced to the idea of becoming a landlord by a friend who is white and a owner a multi story flats.
What I would say there are good and bad landlords out there, like with any race there are good and bad Pakistani.
If you don't like the landlord or the property move out! I'm sure these better elese were if you took the time a look first time around.
Is there a perfect landlord? End of the day I need to make a profit as a business. Also the bills need to be paid. I guess that post lodgers want the property as cheap as possible and all problems fixed next working day.
You get what you pay for, if not vote with your feet.
By the way, paki is a degotory word and shows that you can't express your self without resulting to using these kinds words.
I agree with Anonymous. We cannot generalise. Also please refrain from using the derogatory term "paki" or I will have to delete your comments.
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