quick question - reasonable charge for professional cleaning

london-saver_4

My ex-landlord is saying he's going to withhold £110 of my deposit for cleaning the flat, including getting the carpets professionally cleaned. It's a 1-bed flat, about 40 square metres worth of carpet.

I was just wanting to ask people if they thought the cost was reasonable?

For what it is worth, I believe I left the flat in a good state including cleaning the carpet with a rug doctor so all the marks were out of the carpet, and spent a long time getting the flat clean generally, I have no doubt he is trying it on, but that's a whole different discussion.

tbs624

You can only be asked to return a property in the same condition as it was at the start of the tenancy, fair wear & tear excepted.

Your LL has to notify you in writing of any proposed deductions and you can challenge him if you think you have grounds to do so.

Was a signed inventory completed at the start of the tenancy?

You say that the costs includes other cleaning , as well as the carpet: when you moved in was the property in a good clean condition and had the carpets been professionally cleaned then?

Did your tenancy start after 6 April 2007, and if so did the LL scheme- register your deposit & let you know he had done so?

Keep your receipts for the rug doctor -they may come in handy.

However,if you agree that your cleaning maybe wasn't of a sufficient standard(given that you mention that there were marks) why not ring around & get some quotes to compare with the LLs costings - you can get commercial carpet cleaning for around £1.50 + vat per sq.m.

MoneySavingSpender

Ask for proof that such services are required to clean the flat back to the standard it was provided in minus reasonable wear and tear. Give a deadline and mention if no such proof is forthcoming with say 14days that you'll have no option but to use small claims court etc.

london-saver_4

Thanks for your replies.

There was no inventory, I took photographs of damage caused by previous tenants to cover myself.

I was told the carpets were professionally cleaned before I moved in.

Deposit is held under TPS, yes.

SquatNow

In that case the landlord has no leg to stand on.

No inventory means no deductions - non-negotiable.

Explain this to your landlord in a charming letter entitled "notice before action" giving him 14 days to stump up the cash.

Edit: Is it me or have the vast majority of landlords turnied into complete scumbags since the credit crunch started? I mean... even more than before?

clutton_2

""vast majority of landlords turnied into complete scumbags" - and how do you arrive at this "figure" of the vast majority squatnow ?

SquatNow

clutton wrote: »

""vast majority of landlords turnied into complete scumbags" - and how do you arrive at this "figure" of the vast majority squatnow ?

Present company excepted.

I swear to god, next time someone with BTL property at work tells me that when their mortgage goes up they'll just raise the rent, I'm gonna f*****g thump them.

Thanks to the credit crunch, combined with inflation, everyone is struggling to make ends meet, and despite this, landlords are (trying) to raise rents and steal peoples deposits all over the place.

m1ntie

Is it a reasonable charge? well it depends on the condition of the flat at the start of the lease and the condition you handed it back in. I could easily see professional cleaning including carpet coming to £120 or more. I recently had a small carpet (about 12 sq yds) cleaned by chemdry and it cost £58 - so that doesnt leave much left for general cleaning.

tbs624

london-saver wrote: »

Thanks for your replies.

There was no inventory, I took photographs of damage caused by previous tenants to cover myself.

Good move- keep them safe. Slightly disagree with Squat - no inventory weakens the LL's case, rather than it totally negating his ability to prove condition. ( He too could have photos and/or receipts for cleaning/new items etc)

london-saver wrote: »

T I was told the carpets were professionally cleaned before I moved in.

You can ask the LL to provide evidence of this.

london-saver wrote: »

T Deposit is held under TPS, yes.

Were you also given the "prescribed info" on the scheme? (both the registration of the deposit & the handing over of this info have to be done within 14 days of you paying the LL the deposit)

In that info it should give you info on what to do re a dispute - the three schemes are TDS, DPS, TDSL and contact info is here:
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/TenancyDeposit/DG_066391

Let the appropriate scheme admin folk know asap that it looks like there will be a dispute over your deposit.

tbs624

SquatNow wrote: »

..I swear to god, next time someone with BTL property at work tells me that when their mortgage goes up they'll just raise the rent, I'm gonna f*****g thump them.

Squat - will you also give anyone in control of the supermarkets, the food companies, the petrol stations, the gas and elec companies, in factin any form of business, similar treatment ? Price of computer components goes up , then so will the price of buying a new computer. and so on. All businesses will seek to pass on the costs that they themselves incur to the end user in one form or another.

SquatNow wrote: »

.Thanks to the credit crunch, combined with inflation, everyone is struggling to make ends meet, and despite this, landlords are (trying) to raise rents and steal peoples deposits all over the place.

LLs aren’t immune from the same rising costs either. There are also tenants who seek to screw over LLs - we only hear one side to each story on here and has been said many times before, we just aren’t generally going to get posters who say “my LL/T is fantastic, I’d buy him/her a beer any time”.

I have no time for any LL (or indeed T) who fails to keep to their side of the deal and act in an honourable& fair way, especially when it comes to deposits but let’s not tarnish everyone: there are decent LLs who do return deposits to their tenants ( and always did even prior to the current legislation): some of them even turn a blind eye to things that they could make a justifiable charge for.