Women share horrifying experiences of landlords asking for sex as rent

Finding a new house on rent can be a challenging task when you move to a new city or move out of your parents’ house. Apart from finding a place that you can afford, several rules and regulations along with the kind of neighbourhood can also be aspects which may cause issues and hence need to be taken care of.

Even as online portals seem to have made this task simpler, there’s another side to it as a shocking new trend in the rented sector is making the already dreadful task even more dangerous. Girls are left vulnerable to the risk of being asked for sex as rent for a place to live by creepy landlords.

The risks are high since even as some landlords are open about what they want, others hide and house hunting involves going to unknown neighbourhoods and guided around houses by complete strangers who might take signing a rental agreement as an opportunity to demand sex.

One woman experienced this when the landlord who had first said he would be moving out to stay with his girlfriend, he later changed the track and said that she’s not really his girlfriend and asked if it would be ok for him to visit, a question that prompted the woman to leave.

Another woman moved out of her place when her landlord said he would reduce rent if she was “nice” to him, and even went after her later for the money he had lost after the woman left. Another incident involved a woman calling a landlord after getting a positive response online, only to be asked if she wanted “male company”.

It doesn’t end there, while one woman recounts being terrified after she was contacted by a landlord to be told that he doesn’t want rent and instead enjoys “light, consensual and anal intercourse”, another said that a house owner asked if she can “pay sex twice a week”.