Problem with lead tenant

MarkMI6

Hi folks,

This is paraphrased from my girlfriend, but she's read through it and says it's exactly as it happened, so take this as a first hand account. Sorry for the length!

Back in November she moved into a house with four other people (all different nationalities) with one guy acting as a main point of contact between everyone else and the landlord. Now this is only the second time my girlfriend has rented, so she never registered with the tenants board or got a rent book simply because it's somehing she never knew about - the guy seemed trusthworthy anyway and was pretty casual about the arrangement.

Everything was going fine until recently. The main contact, we'll call him John, has been a pretty lazy person turns out. For example, instead of getting bin tags he's been just throwing bags of rubbish into the shed and around the side. There's quite a few at this point and rubbish all over the side of the house from rats and cats getting at the bags. He also has thus far refused to have the lawnmower fixed, resulting in a meadow (which no doubt helps to attract rats).

Anyway, two days ago while John was in Spain attending a wedding there was a problem with the fuse box and there was no electricity downstairs. My gf texted John to ask for the landlord's number so we could ask him to come look at it/call an electrician. About four hours (during which time it turns out a neighbour was handy with electrics and fixed the problem) later John finally replies and said "*gf's name* I am the landlord, any problems you come to me. I will fix this." Which frankly, is insane. My gf replied with something along the lines of "what if the house was on fire or if we needed to ring the landlord immediately?" to which he phoned back saying the same thing, that he is the landlord. Now he's on Meteor and couldn't actually make calls, so he went out of his way to find a phone box to ring. Also he's not the landlord as we found the landlord's name when there was a new washing machine being delivered.

At this point my gf became uneasy and decided to ask for a rent book from John; she figured if he doesn't want to give her the landlord's number then something is up.

When John got back yesterday he and my gf talked where he reiterated the same false statements. She asked for a rent book and he flatly refused to give her one. The gas and electricity bills hadn't been paid previously and my gf brought that up, along with the binbag issue, at which point John snapped, told her to leave and slammed a twenty and a few coins over the gas bill. He said he'd pay for her month's rent and bils and told her to leave by the end of the month.

Now exactly what the heck is my gf supposed to do in a situation like this? Obviously she's getting out of there, but why won't he give her the landlord's number or a rent book? What does he have to lose? She never got angry at him, just asked questions. Is there anything she can do?

Thanks for reading folks, I really appreciate it (:

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

MarkMI6

Yep she claimed rent allowance recently and got the money back about a month ago. Took John about 6 weeks to give her the landlord's PPS. I presume you can only claim rent allowance once a year right?

Thanks for your reply!

Owen

Why in God's name would she want to stay with someone as unprofessional, and confrontational as that? Tell her to go somewhere decent.

nickyjellybaby

HI Mark,

Sounds awful. So you have the landlords PPS number then??

It is extremely important that you try and contact the landlord. Call Threshold and explain to them whats happening and give them the PPS number so that they can check out who it is.

Eastern Region Advice Centre
21 Stoneybatter, Dublin 7.

Tel: (01) 678 6096
Fax: (01) 677 2407

I would also call the PRTB (private residential tenancies board www.prtb.ie) in Grand Canal on 01-8882960 or even call into them. They are next to the Construction Federation Industry on the Grand Canal.

Either way it's a nasty situation to be in and he's probab;y not going to return her deposit either?
I'd say the landlord will be in for some shock when he sees the rubbish all along the side of the house and the shed, thats disgusting

Tell your gf not to lose sight, that this is a pretty isolated incidence and not to be put off sharing a house again. Although sharing with people she can communicate with that are ideally all females should be easier

MarkMI6

Why in God's name would she want to stay with someone as unprofessional, and confrontational as that? Tell her to go somewhere decent.

Oh trust me, she's looking at places But there's no way in hell she's letting the guy get away with it.

nickyjellybaby - she does indeed still have his PPS number, I'll call her now and tell her to get onto Threshold about it. Thanks a million, I'll let you know how it gets on.

She did call the PRTB but all they could confirm is that this guy is the only registered tenant at the house. Couldn't get any info on the landlord and beyond getting a rent book they didn't suggest anything else.

Either way it's a nasty situation to be in and he's probab;y not going to return her deposit either?

He said he will but she's not leaving until she gets it back that's for sure.

MarkMI6

Update:

She rang Threshold and has been talking between them and the PRTB all day, what's going to happen right now is that the PRTB is sending out letters to the landlord and John reminding them of their obligations as landlord and tenant respectively. As of the send date of the letter (which is today I presume) they both have 14 days to reply. She's also applied for tenant registration so she can have access to the landlord's number.

The person at Threshold said that John might be subletting, which would complicate things (as far as I know he's not, or he's never so much as pretended to be subletting, so I'm assuming he isn't) but we won't look into that unless he actually is subletting.

It's not in any way sorted the problem out but it's a start, all we can do right now is wait for the letters and the registration to come through.

patrickolee

Gives me no joy to say this and I hope it doesn't happen, but what I think will happen, is the landlord will say, I have enough of this, give you all notice to leave, John and OP girlfriend (1 month or whatever is required) and re-let the house to another group.

foggy_lad

ok what is happening is that he has leased/rented from the real landlord and is sub-letting most likely without premission so yes he is her landlord technically?

miju

any update on this by any chance Mark ?

Victor

Grab your money and leave.

MarkMI6

Yep that's essentially what happened, Victor. The PRTB and a few other organisations were informed and really we can't do more than that, looks to me that nothing has come of it (or, they never got back with any kind of update beyond saying they'd send off a few letters).

Just another case of a landlord caring less methinks. In future I think my GF is just going to rent from a property company rather than an individual and she'll make sure her name is on the lease, the kind of trouble anything less than that causes is beyond its value.