End of Tenancy - £1800 bill.. please provide advice?

[120]

Hello,
We ended a 5 year tenancy with a large bill after never missing payments and spending £500 on cleaning!


- We singed a small mark on a carpet, we will happily help pay for replacement, but he is saying we can claim no deduction for wear and tear on a singe (5 year tenancy), is this true?
- He says the tiler says the tile cant be replaced on its own and needs to be all replaced, we small scratched one black floor tile (not crack) - these are real tiles with groute between them, can he ask for us to pay for everything to be retiled?
- The paint is a single coat white unwashable, I am ok to help pay to repaint, but is £400 for a 2.3m x 2.6m room not high? and should we be paying 50%..?
- He says we need to replace 3 'standard' bulbs with 'kitchin/bathroom' grade bulbs? they are LED spotlights.. is there such a thing as kitchin grade bulbs?
- The vent fell down, its a vent cover not a machine, just needs gluing up, is 150 normal?
- The door to a patio is warped, so is stiff to open, he claims we must have slammed it - we never opened the door as it opens onto a main road and has spiders outside (arachnaphob). The checkout says they dont know how it could have happened. What can we do about this, anything?

Carpets £750 (actual quote for 2 rooms) speak to the checkout people or small claims that due to the burns etc a wear tear deduction will not apply as we are now forced to replace this carpet -rather than keep it which was our intention
Tiling £400 less 25% wear & tear = £300
Door £250
Painting £400 less 50% £200
Lights 3 replacements £75
Kitchen Vent £150

[JamesHopeful]

Fair wear and tear on a 5-year tenancy could be fairly extensive. Without firsthand viewing of the issues a lot of that looks excessive.

I would take this to arbitration if I were you.

[sam_cat]

Landlord will struggle to claim full new replacement... What the guidelines is based around:

How long is it expected to last? Eg - A carpet is between 5 and 10 years (let say 10 years for this example)
How old is it? (lets say 5 years for this example)

So for this example carpet cost £1000 5 years ago, expected life is 10 years so £1000 / 10 years = £100 a year
times by the 5 years life left = £500

The maximum the landlord could claim is £500 in this example, and only if the carpet was totally destroyed... Generally its just a bit more worn, so they get a 'loss of lifetime' amount..

But what if the same carpet would NOW cost the landlord £2500 to fit?
Tough, its loss of life against original purchase.


Take it to arbitration, the deposit services will calculate much like I have above... they will look at inventory/SOC on move in against inventory/SOC on move out and figure it out. This is assuming the landlord did an inventory/SOC on move in... If they didnt, they will struggle to claim a penny.

Good luck.

[jpkeates]

The landlord is entitled to compensation for any loss in value of their asset(s) beyond fair wear and tear that occurred during the lease.

The formula that they should use, and a court (and the protecting company ADR process) will use is:

(Cost of the original item and any installation/fitting (not the cost of a replacement) / expected lifetime) * (expected lifetime - actual lifetime).
That is, compensation for the lost value (life of use) of the item.

That presumes that the item is entirely ruined and the landlord can show that it happened during the lease.

Alternatively, an actual repair cost might be claimed, but again, this should be adjusted to reflect the tenant's share of the lifetime (but sometimes this is just meaningless).

- We singed a small mark on a carpet, we will happily help pay for replacement, but he is saying we can claim no deduction for wear and tear on a singe (5 year tenancy), is this true?

That's nonsense. The landlord can charge for their loss, but it must accomodate fair wear and tear - after five years there will be lot. The compensation is based on the loss in value of the five year old carpet based on the cost of that, not it's replacement.

- He says the tiler says the tile cant be replaced on its own and needs to be all replaced, we small scratched one black floor tile (not crack) - these are real tiles with groute between them, can he ask for us to pay for everything to be retiled?

The claim is for the loss and cosmetic damage is going to be a very small loss. There's no chance of claiming a complete replacement floor.

- The paint is a single coat white unwashable, I am ok to help pay to repaint, but is £400 for a 2.3m x 2.6m room not high? and should we be paying 50%..?

Unless the paint is damaged beyond use, the landlord would probably have to paint anyway after 5 years. I'd challenge that as well.

- He says we need to replace 3 'standard' bulbs with 'kitchin/bathroom' grade bulbs? they are LED spotlights.. is there such a thing as kitchin grade bulbs?

That's also a load of b****cks. And, again, there's no loss.

- The vent fell down, its a vent cover not a machine, just needs gluing up, is 150 normal?

I'd query that as well.

- The door to a patio is warped, so is stiff to open, he claims we must have slammed it - we never opened the door as it opens onto a main road and has spiders outside (arachnaphob). The checkout says they dont know how it could have happened. What can we do about this, anything?

He can claim if he can show it was your negligence or you caused the damage. But the onus is on them, not for you to prove you didn't do it.

As above, don't accept anything you're not happy with and ask the deposit protection company to adjudicate if you are not able to come to an agreement with the landlord.

[120]

Thanks for the replies, really appreciate it, just having someone say hes pulling a fast one even though we need to wait for adjudicator to run over it, makes me feel like im not mad for thinking some of this is crazy! jpkeates that reply was super detailed and helpful!

[mk1fan]

I can only assume that the bulbs they are referring to need to be 12v (instead of 240v). The fitting also needs to be 12v for them to work. So if the bulbs are currently 240v then so is the fitting. Unless you instslled the fitting then I assume they are what was there when you took the house on. Not your problem.

Yes you can replace just one tile. Colour match (of the tile and grout) is the issue,

As already stated. Dispute the claim on your deposit or defend it in court.

After five years of no voids a rental property is due so decorative attention.

[jpkeates]

It's quite possible that the landlord thinks this is normal, they might not consider this a try on at all.

[buzzard1994]

If you let the landlord get away with this they'll do it every time to every tenant. They are trying it on - resist and either make them what you consider a fair offer or go straight to arbitration.

I hope you have a full inventory, photos from moving in and out and receipts for the cleaning.

[mariner]

LL can use current prof Contractor estimate and then apply FW&T allowance.
T then thinks they could have repaired for less, tough.
Court/ADR may be the way to go?

[MdeB]

The landlord is entitled to compensation for any loss in value of their asset(s) beyond fair wear and tear that occurred during the lease.

I agree entirely with what jpk said in that post.

light bulbs: If the tenancy agreement is not specific on replacement bulbs, then you can replace with any you like, as long as they are correct for the fitting.

Tile: sounds like the LL did not keep any spare tiles, OR the tiles were there when he bought the place. It is definitely possible for a competent tiler to replace a single tile (even I can do that).

Carpet: how old was it when you moved in? It may be that it is now past its useful life anyway.
I work on replacing carpets if they are more than 5 years old when tenant moves out, and painting if it is more than 3 years old when tenant moves out. I am of the opinion that carpets should be replaced more-frequently in a let property than in one's own home because it is other peoples dirt that tenants would have to live with.

Definitely challenge anything you disagree with and take any unresolved dispute to the deposit scheme's arbitration.

[MdeB]

LL can use current prof Contractor estimate

why do you say 'current' whereas others say 'original'?

I use 'current' on the basis that the loss I have suffered is the cost of replacement now, rather than in several years.

[jpkeates]

You can use an estimate for a repair, because that's your loss.
You can't use a replacement item as the basis for a loss - you haven't lost the cost, as the item is worth something, so you haven't lost the cost.

[MdeB]

having thought about it it seems reasonable that the tenant should put the LL back in the position he would have been without the damage.

So, for an asset with an expected 10 year life that needs replacing after 4 years, that would be "obtain replacement, then deduct 4/10 of cost".

[jpkeates]

That's a reasonable point of view, but it's not how it works.

[120]

After receiving a new email from LL I have a few quick questions:

- Is it my responsibility to find a better quote for painting and tiling if we don't want to pay his estimates or is that all on him to do (£400 each before wear and tear) / something arbitration will just handle?
- Is his point about carpet being fully on us still bogus?
Still sounds like we will take it all to arbitration.

His latest response to my email, his responses in red:

- Please do get invoices, but do bear in mind the replacements must be same quality and value as the originals or the deduction must account for the original value and quality.
Totally agree and this what we are doing and in everyones interest to keep the price as low as possible
- Regarding carpets, this may be betterment? So we wont be paying the full amount but a % based on estimated life (usually 5-10 years for carpets) - actual life (~5 years).
I am only going what I have been advised by lawyer and the Inventory comapny - who state that when you are forced to replace the carpet (rather than leave it for an additional 5-7 yrs Then you can claim the full amount - talk to the inventory company
- The lights are the correct lights, the difference between a standard spotlight and a bathroom spotlight is the fixture voltage not the bulb.
Repair man Letting agent sent round said that bathroom and Kitchen bulbs a) need protector in place and are a set specification . Current ones need replacing as cant be let as against the standard
- With research, scratches on the tiles would not require us to pay for them all to be replaced, only the 1 or 2 that ended up scratched + 50% of labour costs.
Give me the details of a tiler who can do this please - as the expert sent round said it was not possible to remove 2 tiles in the center
- Painting the room is fine but that evaluation sounds very high for a small room in a few coats of non-washable white paint.
Again just going by the verbal quote ( of the person the letting agent sent round) - DO you have another firm you would prefer me to use, as still waiting for written quote
We do want to help out as we understand that we caused some damage through regular use - but your estimates seem very high.
As I said just going by verbal estimates at this stage and will take off wear % as advised by letting agent/ inventory company who know what is fair to claim

We will have more idea when the quotes come in but honestly still felt that my original offer (of £1k which is now off the table) was overly optimistic - but lets wait till I have these. Yet as I said please email the details of any firm who will come over to repalce two centrally located tiles and I'll get them over

(We accidentally forgot to cancel our standing order so he had £1000 extra from us which he held ransom saying he will return half if we accept his offer of taking £1000 bill) - till his lawyer told him to return it quickly..)