Fixed-term lease - landlord being useless

confusticated

Hey, I know similar things have been covered here before but answers on what to do seem to vary. Hopefully someone could give me a bit of advice. We moved into a flat last September, on a 12 month lease. There were a few problems with the place when we moved in, but we found out after we moved in that the flat hadn't actually been inspected between tenants. I know, bit of a warning sign, but we'd the lease signed by the time we found this out.

Since then, we have never not had a problem of some sort. There have been several leaks, some of the windows didn't close properly (turned out the hinges needed to be replaced and were then fine), bins haven't been collected and they're in the landlord's name so we couldn't contact the bin company ourselves, rubbish left outside hadn't been removed. The thing is that the flat is lovely, we really like it and would like to stay here long-term if the landlord was decent. However, even the simplest problems take weeks to solve. We're dealing with a letting agency rather than the landlord himself, and have to email or call in at least 3 times a week. They never update us about it or respond unless we pester them a bit.

So my question is, do we have any way out of the lease? I know problems like rubbish not being collected and that are relatively minor, but the leaks are starting to look fairly serious and nothing's been done about one since we reported it a fortnight ago. Any advice much appreciated...

Barracuda1

confusticated wrote: »

Hey, I know similar things have been covered here before but answers on what to do seem to vary. Hopefully someone could give me a bit of advice. We moved into a flat last September, on a 12 month lease. There were a few problems with the place when we moved in, but we found out after we moved in that the flat hadn't actually been inspected between tenants. I know, bit of a warning sign, but we'd the lease signed by the time we found this out.

Since then, we have never not had a problem of some sort. There have been several leaks, some of the windows didn't close properly (turned out the hinges needed to be replaced and were then fine), bins haven't been collected and they're in the landlord's name so we couldn't contact the bin company ourselves, rubbish left outside hadn't been removed. The thing is that the flat is lovely, we really like it and would like to stay here long-term if the landlord was decent. However, even the simplest problems take weeks to solve. We're dealing with a letting agency rather than the landlord himself, and have to email or call in at least 3 times a week. They never update us about it or respond unless we pester them a bit.

So my question is, do we have any way out of the lease? I know problems like rubbish not being collected and that are relatively minor, but the leaks are starting to look fairly serious and nothing's been done about one since we reported it a fortnight ago. Any advice much appreciated...

You could stop paying the rent and see what happens. Is there any other flats in the same area up for rent and threaten to leave

confusticated

I don't really want to do that...the agency has a policy where you're charged for every day your rent is late too, so it would end up costing us more than our deposit, as well as being illegal.

Giblet

Don't do that, but the "policy" sounds illegal.

confusticated

It's in the lease, we pay our rent on time, so it's not an issue for us really.

djimi

Just because it's in the lease doesn't make it legal. They have no legal right to charge you a daily fee for late rent; if they want to pursue for late rent then the steps they must follow are clearly set out in the tenancy act.

That said, I don't agree with withholding rent as a means of sorting an issue. Put all of your issues in writing to the landlord/agent, outline the attempts that you gave made so far to have the issues resolved, and inform them that you would like a prompt date to be given by which a resolution to said problems will be put in place. If you get no response to this, or the issues go unresolved, write again giving another deadline and informing them of your intention to get the PRTB involved if the issues are not sorted.

confusticated

Thanks for that. We've done this before and they have come out and fixed some of the things...unfortunately the "repairs" are makeshift at best - two leaks which we were assured had been fixed have started again in the last few days.

We're going to go in tomorrow and ask if there's any way we can leave before the lease is up, because according to the PRTB website a lease can be terminated if a building has damp or is in poor structural repair. I assume that water coming down the wall is a fairly clear example of poor structural repair, but PRTB cases take so long that our lease would be up anyway and we could leave before it would be heard.

To be honest we've given up on the place being put to rights, it's fairly clear the landlord doesn't give a damn about his property or tenants once they keep paying rent. Just trying to find out if it's possible to leave the lease early, and if anyone has done it (legally!) in a similar situation before.

Chris_5339762

You need to send a registered letter to the landlord stating the problems and stating a reasonable length of time for a fix before you can get out of your tenancy for this reason I'm afraid. Try it though! But don't with-hold rent.

confusticated

Yeah, I've seen that on a few sites, but who defines a reasonable length of time? As I've said, we're not going to withhold rent. We want to do this by the book, but the book isn't that specific!

quietsailor

confusticated wrote: »

Hey, I know similar things have been covered here before but answers on what to do seem to vary. Hopefully someone could give me a bit of advice. We moved into a flat last September, on a 12 month lease. There were a few problems with the place when we moved in, but we found out after we moved in that the flat hadn't actually been inspected between tenants. I know, bit of a warning sign, but we'd the lease signed by the time we found this out.

Since then, we have never not had a problem of some sort. There have been several leaks, some of the windows didn't close properly (turned out the hinges needed to be replaced and were then fine), bins haven't been collected and they're in the landlord's name so we couldn't contact the bin company ourselves, rubbish left outside hadn't been removed. The thing is that the flat is lovely, we really like it and would like to stay here long-term if the landlord was decent. However, even the simplest problems take weeks to solve. We're dealing with a letting agency rather than the landlord himself, and have to email or call in at least 3 times a week. They never update us about it or respond unless we pester them a bit.

So my question is, do we have any way out of the lease? I know problems like rubbish not being collected and that are relatively minor, but the leaks are starting to look fairly serious and nothing's been done about one since we reported it a fortnight ago. Any advice much appreciated...

bins haven't been collected and they're in the landlord's name so we couldn't contact the bin company ourselves,
There is nothing to stop you setting up a bin collection service in your own name, the only problem with that is if the bin collection is included in your rent? Then your double paying for rubbish collection.

As for the rest of the problems
You need to send them a letter outlining the problems and a reasonable time frame to get them fixed
for example;

• Leak coming through the ceiling - 24 hrs
• airlocked radiator 3 days

- the more serious the problem the shorter the time period.

If they don't reply to that letter send a 2nd letter saying that you will be getting 3 written quotes from tradesmen to carry out the work and will deduct the cost from the rent. That usually gets most LL's attention .

If they don't reply to the letters/don't fix things I would go ahead and get the 3 quotes and then get someone to carry out the repairs.

BUT be prepared for trouble and strife as a result of this - the LL is not going to be happy the rent is short and more than likely they will try to keep the deposit at the end of your lease,

keep a diary of all the contact you make trying to sort this out, register all the letters or send emails so you have proof of trying to deal with the situation. Take and include photos of the issues.

More than likely if the LL is as bad as your OP makes out you'll end up going to the PRTB either to get your deposit back so start making "a book of evidence" (I know very Law & Order isn't it :eek:)

confusticated

Thanks for the detailed advice – bins are included in rent and we wouldn’t have space to store another set anyway.

We actually did all that stuff with the registered letter before Christmas, saying we’d get a quote etc., and he sent a man out to fix the problems. Unfortunately the leaks reappeared about three months later, so technically he’s fixing it, but not permanently. We stopped ringing them a good while back, contact by email or letter only and if we go in to speak to the agency we email afterwards to confirm it happened. It’s Law & Order alright, but it’s a headwreck really.

The good news is when we went in yesterday, the agency said we should be able to leave the lease without losing our deposit. They support it, we have to get confirmation from the landlord but hopefully we’ll be out soon enough. We’re hoping we’re too much hassle for him and that he’ll want rid of us because we keep complaining…

Thanks again.

quietsailor

The best of luck with it, I wish there was a better system in this country for renting, it's annoying to people like me who try to get things right, no-one is perfect but your lad sounds like a right muppet

confusticated

quietsailor wrote: »

The best of luck with it, I wish there was a better system in this country for renting, it's annoying to people like me who try to get things right, no-one is perfect but your lad sounds like a right muppet

Yeah I know. Should be able to ask a landlord for references, not just the tenants!