UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hello

Any advice appreciated! We have recently vacated a property that was let via an estate agent. All has gone well during the tenancy and we were given notice as landlords wanted to move back in. So we vacated on the date the landlord specified and left the property spotless - spent hundreds of pounds on professional carpet cleaning and other cleaning. The estate agents did the check out the day we left, said all looked great. A few days later had email from agents saying the landlords want to view the property before releasing the deposit but they are abroad at the moment and not back for a week. Since we moved out there have been builders in the house doing work (that was started when we were there... a whole other thread!) and my point to the agents is that how can the landlords judge the condition of the place when there have been builders in since we left. Any damage and/or mess could have been done by the builders and we could get blamed for it. I am very unhappy about this. Please can anyone advise if I have a leg to stand on legally to object to this (never mind having to wait for our deposit even though we moved out on the date that the landlords gave us so I would have assumed they would be around if they wanted to check the property themselves).

Thank you in advance

First things first... a delay, while not right, does not necessarily equate to anything bad that's going to happen. For example, if the Landlords do check, and find nothing, then all you will have suffered is a delay... whether right, or not (it's not)... and you might just accept that and move on. No harm, no foul. No point kicking-up a fuss until a real problem exists.

That said, if the Landlord comes back and says "well, upon reviewing it ourselves we would like to make deductions for x and y" you have a massive big fat ugly leg to stand on. Their Agent has already told you everything was fine at the Check-Out - the Agent acts on behalf of the Landlord - what they say is what the Landlord says - to the Tenant they are effectively one and the same entity. You can't do 2 Check-Outs... that would be insane. Sure, a Landlord would love to do a Check-Out 6 months after you've no longer had access to the property back in Summer and, oh no, there's some damp from the Autumn / Winter weather... it's your fault. No.

But if you can rest easy and wait, then I would (for the time-being).

If the worst happens then you just suggest raising a Dispute with the Scheme where the Deposit was protected... which did happen, of course?

Thank you very much for your reply, I have told the estate agents I am not happy about it for the reasons I have said here, and they say they are going to relay my points to the landlords, but as you say, if they do make any issue then is probably the time to make a fuss. It just seems a bit of a pointless delaying of our deposit repayment if nothing else!

Yes it is with a deposit scheme

I should also add I don't have anything in writing from the agents saying the property is fine, was just verbal....

Doesn't matter. If and when you dispute any proposed deductions, hopefully you took your own photos of the condition of the property you left, but even if not, you can still make the argument that the landlord's checkout cannot be relied on given the landlord have given access to the builders after tenancy ended but before checkout.

Presumably you also have receipts for the cleaning services that you hired.If the landlords are no longer needing to use the agents,it will not benefit the latter to lie in order to back up the landlord if he disputes your deposit.Hopefully the landlord will not try to cheat you.Some of are decent and honest!

Thank you, I am a landlord myself so I do appreciate many landlords are honest and considerate (as I try to be myself to my tenants!) My issue is that these landlords haven't been great - they started having building work done after giving us notice, and I was actually organising some of this for them before they gave us notice as I thought it would benefit us (new windows etc) but it turned out they were getting it fixed up for when they moved back in, but thought they'd get the work done whilst we were there to save them the inconvenience. It will just be a drag if they now contest anything that they may see following the builders being in. But hopefully it will all be ok!

Quote from: Flossy on July 03, 2019, 04:22:59 PM(as I try to be myself to my tenants!)

Yoda - "Do. Or do not. There is no try."