Foreign tenants stage disappearing acts

Building and house owners are now suffering headaches over disappearing acts made by their tenants, usually foreign workers.

However, they did not make police reports because their tenants had reasons for disappearing such as their inability to pay their rentals.

"They disappeared not because they were kidnapped or lost. It was purposely done. When it was time to collect the rentals, I discovered that their accommodations were totally bare which suggested they purposely disappeared," said a building owner.

The owners said even though they required two months deposit and a month advance rental, many of his tenants had not paid them months worth of rentals.

The tenants attributed the non-payments to late salaries up to several months.

The owners had exercised patience over non-payments of rentals for several months because they knew the economic situation of this country had caused many tenants to do so.

"I could not just kick them out as they had reasons for not paying rentals. My tenants said they had not received their salaries. However, I believed some of them just disappeared after they had been paid. These people might be in their home countries by now," they said.

The owners said even though they knew where their disappeared tenants work but they would not go to their offices since they believed It was not proper to do so.

"Unless the accommodations were rented by their employers then we would go to their offices. Otherwise, we did not want to create a scene," they said.

However, some owners were very strict and particular. They had been cases where tenants found their accommodations locked from outside by owners.

Owners meanwhile could not afford to screen their tenants before they moved in since if they did so their buildings or houses would continue to be empty.

"At this time of non-favourable economic situation we could not afford to be selective," they said.

Properties in Brunei Darussalam are currently experiencing an oversupply against declining demand.

The rental of houses dropped as much as 20 percent to 30 percent for those located within a 10 kilometre radius from the town centre while houses located further off the town centre have suffered up to a 50 percent drop in rent.

In isolated cases, some property owners offer furnished double-storey houses at around $800 per month each as against $2,000 to $3,000 during the boom time, several years before 1997.