samjam

Hi all

Weve recently moved out of a property that we have rented for a year with our four children.
Our private landlords are now insisting that we pay for painting of rooms that had blue tac marks left over plus the replacement of a vanity that showed water damage.
They already have our bond money as there was a misunderstanding with weekly/ monthly repayments.
We feel that wear and tear is involved and have offered to pay half.
Anyone any suggestions?
We dont want to pay for all this as we left the house in a good state
Thanks
Martin

binbird

I sympathise as we moved out of our rental exactly a month ago and were asked to go back and clean some more after hubby and I had already spent 10 man hours between us giving the place a thorough going over. As far as we were concerned, the things they picked us up on were wear and tear but we were advised to sugar soap the walls to remove scuff marks. Obviously I cannot see the state of the vanity but if this showed water damage it doesn't sound to me as though it was up for the job it was intended! I think you have been more than generous in offering to meet them half way and I would suggest that you now stand your ground.

Good luck.

B

DebraH

too right
we're renting through an agent and was told that we couldn't move in until the house had been cleaned - no problem really we just stayed longer in our holiday home. We moved in and found the place to be pretty unclean - it hadn't been lived in for a while. the annoying thing is we could have moved in 4 days earlier but they insisted that their cleaner had to come in and clean for us first. Well they hadn't been in at all, there was cobwebs, dust and dirt, dead insects etc. not much of a problem but still.

We were also told that we were expected to clean all the windows at the end of our lease as the windows would be cleaned for us, fair enough - but they weren't, some of the downstairs ones were clean, but none of the upstair ones were. oh well

iPom

I suppose if your lease agreement said not to put anything on the walls, and you did (who can help that with 4 children!!!) then they might be in their rights to ask you to make that 'damage' good.

However, you have to expect reasonable 'wear and tear' for renting out your property, and this sort of thing is normal.
Water damage on the vanity sounds like a typical rental to me - does anything fit properly in these things?

I would put your case to them and if they're going to get stroppy, say you'll paint the walls yourselves as this will be cheaper than hiring someone and should only take you a morning.
If they're going to get really really stroppy then they'd look at taking you to court (I once knew an Aussie landlord who pursued a couple around the world to the UK for 10 lousy UK pounds in rent!) and that could get more expensive.

Weigh up how likely they are to do this, and also whether they can adversely affect your future rental status (a bad rental reference can be a kiss of death if you wish to rent further) unless of course, you're going to buy something, then it won't necessarily matter (I don't think you need their reference if you're going to buy) .
IMO, I think you're being absolutely personable about this whole thing and that they should take your offer gracefully. Stick to your guns as long as it's not stressful. When it gets stressful, paint the walls or pay someone to do it and leave it all behind you. Life's too short to deal with wa*kers like that.