I am a tenant, I recently noticed that our inventory claimed to have been done ont the 13th June 2021.
Our landlord has been quite unreasonable, and generally irritated that certain maintenance has needed to be done, some of which were serious issues (twice old pipes burst in the kitchen that flooded the carpet in the front room and caused water damage to the kitchen), both upstairs windows couldn’t shut and lock and we have a disabled child in the home etc. The garden gate also has never shut, and the decking completely rotted through. Due to having to bring these things up, our landlord has since been quite nasty in terms of blaming us for these things. I then checked our inventory report as felt like I was loosing my mind, as the gate etc has never shut. I appreciate I should have been a bit more on the ball with double checking the inventory but this move was during lockdown, we had no where to live and two very young children so needed to just get in.
I have since noticed that the pictures were all dated January 2020 and there were two seperate tenants in the property between then and us moving in. Is this inventory still valid? When I brought it up to the landlord (admittedly I had signed it due to above reasons) they essentially said ‘tough’.
@Sugar I think you could ask Shelter or Citizens Advice.
If the inventory wasn’t an accurate record of the state of the property when you moved in and you can evidence that it used years old photos then I expect the deposit protection schemes would take account of that. To claim for damage successfully the LL has to show damage occurred during your tenancy which will be hard as the photos are dated from before you moved in
If LL has acknowledged the photos weren’t taken when you moved in but years earlier then write that down and send LL as a record of your conversation asking them to confirm it is accurate. Perhaps document any items such as the gate and send your comments on these too.
(Without knowing the detailed cause of the burst pipes or the rotten decking it’s hard to know whether LL is right to be aggrieved or not - pipes don’t usually burst just because they are old and decking doesn’t normally rot if maintained. But clearly some disagreements on fault. )
Some of those issues sound dangerous and would, I think be regarded as category 1 hazards under HHSRS. If the landlord doesn’t repair dangerous issues, you may need to consider going to the Council housing/environmental health officer.
Thanks for response - the plumber who sorted the pipes just said they were old (they burst within a few months of us being here). The decking had been up over 25 years, the people who sorted that part said we were very fortunate to not have gone through them. What we have been left with underneath is uneven slabbing, some of which are crumbling with sharp edges and large gaps in between. Landlord said they do not have the money to do anything about this unfortunately. I would hope to avoid souring the relationship further by contacting the council, however my child has tripped out there twice now, badly cutting his knee the last time. I did tell the landlord this, however she said ‘we will have to have a think about money’.
Children do trip over all sorts of things tho’. Whether uneven slabs in a garden counts as a hazard and what sort I’m not sure. HHSRS Category 1 hazards are severe risks to health and safety, such as extreme cold, damp/mould, structural failure, or dangerous stairs, which could cause serious injury or death. Not sure cuts to a knee due to tripping over paving is necessarily in that catrgory
LL.may feel aggrieved that decking wasn’t maintained by a succession of people but as @David122 indicates, LL.does have to make the place safe for the occupants including making child safe if needed.
(If you keep a place sufficiently heated even while away during winter, pipes should not “normally” freeze and burst . So in my insurance it specifies a min temp of 10c if I’m away for example and I use a thermostat to do that. The only time I have ever had a burst pipe in any place I lived in was when I hadn’t set the thermostat and the pipe was in a loftspace and not well insulated (pipe to a shower) and there was a sudden drop in temperature for a couple of days and then it frozen and burst. I learnt my lesson but we do all make mistakes. I can understand a LL maybe feeling a little aggrieved when this sort of thing happens as they will think if you had kept the place well heated there wouldn’t have been an issue. If it wasn’t in winter and they burst then it could well be age - lots of pipework leaks eventually and may burst and it’s nobody’s fsult.
But it is part of the “joys” of being a LL that tenants make mistakes or don’t maintain places as well as an owner might.)
I guess the only thing I can do is ask council as at present my child (especially the disabled one) not able to play outside which is a shame due to the slabbing. Our home has never been below 18c and certainly wasn’t when we first moved in as our child was extremely premature and his first few months the house couldn’t be below 20c as they struggled to maintain their temperature initially so I am not too sure why the pipe went. It was within the first few months. I think it was the water one but plumber did not offer much past it was old.
Of course, I could well being worrying for nothing. When we leave (we are awaiting a new home that needs adaptations for disabled child) LL may well be reasonable, this just has not been my experience with them thus far unfortunately.
Sorry to hear about your difficulties with LLs-.doesnt sound like any obvious reason the pipes burst then.
The only other thing I can say from my observations from fora here is some LLs are caring about tenants needs and try to accommodate them because a good tenant who pays on time and maintains a place properly is worth hanging on to, and some LLs arent.
It may be worth trying discussing a timescale for getting the paving fixed with LL first before approaching the council which is a bit of a nuclear option- after all she hasn’t ruled out fixing it and most LLs really don’t want the council involved. You could reasonably suggest a reduction in the rent until fixed as you don’t have the facilities advertised. Highlight the injuries that have happened. And that they will need to get fixed sometime anyway.