UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hi all,  the workman I employed to carry out a repair in my rental property recently told me the house including bathroom was filthy.  I manage the property myself and on the odd occasion I have had to go to the door to talk to the tenant - from what I could see from the doorway it looked dirty.  I haven't carried out regular inspections - right to enjoyment and all that - but I am now worried as to the state the house is in and how much worse it could possibly get. tenants are DSS and have lived their a while now.  what would you do? leave them to it and deep clean once they move out or try and do something now eg a letter? . to be honest I think they are the are the type of people who are literally happy as pigs in muck.  the mortgage is paid off and I don;t want to rent again after they move out  but I dont need to sell right now

'Right to enjoyment and all that'?

Schedule quarterly inspections.

Starting with a disclaimer - as a day old landlord there are people on this forum with much more experience than me - take this with a huge pinch of salt.

I would schedule an inspection so you can see the degree of dirt for yourself and then decide what action to take.  Perhaps mention in your notice that concerns have been expressed about the state of the property in regards to cleanliness.  I don't know what kind of people they are - or how responsive, I presume you have an idea of that but:

A) They may clean the place a little before you arrive and it won't seem that bad
B) It might be messy and dirty but nothing some paint, bleach / deep clean and emptying the place won't solve
C) It might be so filthy if you don't act soon you'll be dealing with insect / rodent issues and potentially higher repair bills

If your mortgage is paid off, your tenants are settled and pay regularly on time then I can see why you may not want to rock the boat.  I guess I'd let them live in a dirty mess so long as it wasn't going to attract expensive problems down the line.

I also imagine letters / notices would strengthen your position re deposit at the end of the tenancy. 

Believe it or not... a Landlord doesn't truly have a right to control how a Tenant lives their life. What matters is that the property is handed back in the same state of repair it was at the beginning of the tenancy, minus fair wear-and-tear. If not, then other remedies are available post tenancy.

You can conduct inspections, for sure... but a savvy Tenant (and they do exist) can surely tell you to sling your hook when you complain about cleanliness. There's a very simple reason for this - if you think about it...

There can be no objective scale of cleanliness. There isn't one. It's an entirely subjective measure. One person's clean is another person's dirty. One person's very clean is another person's very dirty. No two people have the same view as to what is clean and what is dirty, you see? So, if you accept that a Landlord does not have the right to control how cleanly the Tenants may live their life, then you also accept that there can never be actual agreement as there is no objective scale of cleanliness in existence.

I wonder if a Landlord evicting a Tenant for "living dirtily" could be challenged. If the arbiter of whether that is allowed or not is a Judge, or a Jury (it wouldn't be, I just stretch this for a better example) then you are likely to just get another subjective view of what is clean and what is dirty.

Of course, a grey area might well be if the lifestyle of the Tenant was evidentially causing issues with vermin or something like that.

This is why you have to grit your teeth and take control of the property at tenancy-end. While the property is rented from you it is the Tenant's property (to do with as they wish, mostly). The question for the OP is whether to bring the tenancy to an end... a question that's been raised before.

Regarding deposit and cleaning...

This was the exact situation I've just helped a Tenant out of.

This Tenant cleaned the flat as she left. She showed me a video - to me it looked fine - even good. She assured me it was cleaner at her departure than it had been when she took it on. I have no cause to disbelieve her. I could see in my mind how it could be dirtier at the beginning of the tenancy and I struggled to see how it could be cleaner than what she showed me. Her Landlord wanted £170 for cleaning. Said that the cleaning wasn't up to "his standard" - case in point. She asked him what was wrong with what she'd done, per se - but he couldn't quantify it, just that it wasn't "good enough" - case in point. She said that she could employ the building Cleaner for £20 (obviously that is counted as professional cleaning, right?) and she could go in - the Landlord allowed that, but then still said it wasn't good enough. She was pulling out her hair at this stage... she suspected, and I agreed, that he just wanted easy money and thought she'd roll over. One letter (PDF via WhatsApp) from me disabused him of this notion and he replied - "I'll be happy to refund your deposit to end this discussion. I will arrange for my own cleaning." - Landlords and what they try to pull, ey? I suspect he will not be doing any cleaning at all. 

She's still unnecessarily down £20, but it's better than £170. I wanted to push for that and I advised she could push for non-protection of her deposit, but she relented.

Would be interested to learn how an intransigent landlord, demanding monies for the hell of it can be liable for non protection of deposit.

Could you expand a bit ?

Which bit wasn't clear?

Ive been on the other side of it when I was a tenant and even tho house was left immaculate I was charged £330 for the grass being 3 inches long even tho it had rained for the previous fortnight and most annoyingly accused of leaving urine in the toilets which was in fact parazone bleach and yellow in colour. if the idiots had flushed them they would have seen the bleach froth up. Obviously they werent au fait with cleaning products. lesson learned for me stick to clear domestos ha ha.  I was incandescent but solicitor said depended what mood judge was in as to who he sided with. thats why it really riles me how to see how some tenants treat properties.  By the way, the worst thing is with this tenant and why I am trying to stop the rot - there is no bond.  the agent I employed , now managing myself intended to get a paper bond with them being DSS but failed to get one. so they can do what they like and no repercussions. grrrrr

The deposit is not the b-all-and-end-all of everything, of course... I mean, if your property is completely trashed then the deposit will be a drop in the ocean and the only proper satisfaction you might be likely to get would be via a Court anyway. However, in your case, it really could be worthwhile reconsidering the eviction route - just to reset yourself and get back on an even keel. I realise this is someone's home we're talking about... but you seem bothered by what is going on, and you have no deposit to even help out... roll on the new year, I think.

yeah hippogriff I think you are right it would probably be a drop in the ocean. a deposit I mean.  maybe I need to stress less