Wilsons in court again

Harry_Powell

Graham_Devon wrote: »

E) I'd take on MY responsibility of lending him that car.

You see, your examples are not including the fact you have not lent the place. But loaned it as a business arrangement.

Now, I would not lend my car with leather seats to someone who's gonna fill it up with wood. I would not loan if for payment for that purpose either.

I may loan a van for the purpose of carrying wood around however.

I'd be loaning the van knowing it's being used for a purpose and something could go wrong.

Please don't rubbish my examples and then use a leather BMW loaned to a mate to carry wood around in!

Sorry Graham, I forgot that you're such a pedant . The wood example is real-world, because I lent my car to my brother and he popped to B&Q to get some wood for his flat and scratched my car fascia and glove compartment. I let it go and it's still scratched to this day. People don't always look after your stuff as well as you would, or indeed as well as you'd like them to do, nor do they use them as you expected them to.

Imagine that you have hired an expensive car to go to a wedding, you are running late and have to get home to change for the big day. You jump into the car and the rivet from your jeans back pocket scratches across the leather, same set of answers, except that it's the hire company. Do you really think they'll just suck up the damage because "you're a nice guy and the hire company is loaded anyway and can afford it"?

Graham_Devon

It's not about being pedantic.

It's a completely different scenario.

Even the hire car thing doesn't really live up to what the Wilsons are doing in any way.

lostinrates

Isn't there such thing as ceramic paint?

they could get an avocado lid and turn it into a design statement. Depending on the bathroom one could conceal the cistern for an awful lot less than £3k.

I'm trying to put myself in a LLs position and assume that the insurance one should have doesn't over such thing. Yes: I would want replacement, but not the whole bathroom. In the event that a rplacement is not available I'd consider replacing the cistern only, or the loo (there must be other peach loos about, even secondhand?). The other thing of course, is that I'd be unlikely to be able to fit a replacement loo/cistern myself (although I could plonk a replaceent lid on) so that would add to the cost slightly.

Although I can see a new bathroom might cost £3k plus, it seems this would be a considereable improvement on an outdated one for which no ''parts'' were available, and I would have thought a less expensive line would be more suitable for rental property. If no major changes other than bathroom furniture and sealant are being done even including a plumbers time then it could be done at a substantially lower cost.

Zandoni

JayScottGreenspan wrote: »

Clearly replacing the entire bathroom suite would be betterment - putting the Wilsons in a much better position than they were in before. How old was the bathroom? Over what period is depreciation taken into account? 10 years?

The insurance analogy is a useful one. One of the fundamental principles if insurance is indemnity - to restore the position before the loss occurred.

Suppose you've got accidental damage cover under your household insurance policy. You break your peach sistern lid. You dispatch your insurance claim for a new £3000 bathroom suite. What sort of reply would you expect?

IMO the best resolution here would be to estimate the damages suffered by the Wilson's, as they claim their house is worth less as a result of the damage. £200 sounds about right. If I were the judge I'd offer the Wilson's the original tenant offer of £212.75 damages and make them pay all the court costs.

I agree with you £200 is a pretty good figure. If the judge was to come to that same conclusion, do the defendants automatically pay the court costs or is it at the judges discretion.

chucknorris

Zandoni wrote: »

I agree with you £200 is a pretty good figure. If the judge was to come to that same conclusion, do the defendants automatically pay the court costs or is it at the judges discretion.

It will be in the small claims court (<5k) so there will not be any real costs to speak of, in fact in this case the judge may very well make a decision against the Wilsons based on the paperwork before any hearing

Zandoni

chucknorris wrote: »

It will be in the small claims court (<5k) so there will not be any real costs to speak of, in fact in this case the judge may very well make a decision against the Wilsons based on the paperwork before any hearing

The hearing as already taken place, i believe the costs on a £3000 claim can be about £400.

chucknorris

Zandoni wrote: »

The hearing as already taken place, i believe the costs on a £3000 claim can be about £400.

Exactly, only about £400, although my costs only came to about £200 for a similar amount claimed (yes I won). Bringing the action would cost about £120, plus travel expenses, you can claim very limited legal ex's (up to around £100 I think in certain circumstances) plus you can claim ex's up to a certain amount for an expert witness (but I do not see how an expert witness could be of any use here, maybe a loss adjuster commenting on the wear and tear perhaps?)

Edit: to anyone contemplating a small claims action do not worry about it, go ahead, it is quite a simple procedure

Zandoni

Common sense reigns.......
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1209013/Property-tycoons-worth-70m-demand-3-000-bathroom-suite-tenants---replace-200-broken-toilet-lid.html#ixzz0PEDaeCQJ

They are the maths teachers who did their sums right and created a multi-million property empire.
But despite amassing a £70 million fortune, and a 700-strong portfolio of buy-to let properties, Judith and Alan Wilson still count the pennies.
Right down to the very last toilet lid.
The couple, who are the 34th richest couple in the Sunday Times Rich List, have been embroiled in an extraordinary court saga over a broken peach cistern lid - estimated replacement cost £212.75.
Mrs Wilson took two tenants to court seeking £3,000 for an entire new bathroom suite all because the lid was accidentally broken and the particular 'colour and design' had been discontinued.
But yesterday a county court judge branded Mrs Wilson's claim 'exaggerated', pointing out that a replacement lid, installed by the Wilsons before the case even reached court, was an 'acceptable replacement'.
Trainee accounts technician Miss Jackson and her boyfriend Mr Hall, a mechanic, were excited at moving into their first home together, a two-bedroom house, in Hawkinge, near Folkestone, in December 2007.
Miss Jackson's mother Heather helped them with the £1,200 deposit on the £700-a-month house.
'It was a nice house and it was the first big step away from home,' she said.
The toilet lid saga began when the couple were asked to move out.
Unknown to them a well-meaning friend had broken the lid and put it in the rubbish.

It was only after repeated attempts over two months to get their deposit back that they were told the cistern lid was missing.
The couple, both 24, then spoke with a friend and discovered what had happened.
Anxious to resolve the matter, they returned to the house, by then let to new tenants, so they could investigate finding a replacement.
When they arrived they found a replacement cistern lid already in place, which to the casual eye appeared not far removed in colour from the rest of the suite.
Nevertheless, they went next door, where the bathroom suite was identical, to get the serial number.
But they discovered the actual suite had been discontinued.
Anxious Mrs Jackson, a divorced mother-of-two, set about finding a match and came up with three close colours.
She obtained samples of the paintwork for the Wilsons to see and even put a £50 deposit on one lid.
But the matter has ended up in court last month, where even Mrs Wilson admitted the house had been left in immaculate condition.
Paul Stevenson, acting for the younger couple, told the court: 'It is absurd for the claimant to contend that she's entitled to a perfectly new bathroom solely on the grounds of replacing a broken cistern lid.'
He said it was for the Wilsons to replace the lid and deduct the cost from the deposit.
But Mrs Wilson's solicitor Jolyon Holden said the figure was realistic, saying: 'She is entitled to have the house in the same state as she let it. She wanted her bathroom to be the same uniform colour.
'If she can't have a replacement lid she's entitled to have a new bathroom suite.'
He said Mrs Wilson had temporarily replaced the peach-coloured lid with a 'white' one but that to have the bathroom - sink, toilet and bath - all the same colour and shade would cost an estimated £3,000.
Mrs Wilson said: 'If we wanted to sell the house we would have to replace the bathroom if we wanted to replace the lid.'
But yesterday Judge Christopher Cagney, in a written judgment, ruled against Mrs Wilson, who had been supported in court by her husband,
'The only photographic evidence that I have seen, produced by the defendants, gives me the clear indication that the replacement lid is very similar in quality and colour to the remainder of the cistern and the bathroom suite,' he said.
Branding the claim exaggerated he said he had 'doubts' that work to replace the bathroom suite would ever be carried out.
Miss Jackson, who was signed off work with stress in the wake of the wrangle, said: 'I'm just so relieved that things have finally sorted themselves out. I never dreamed it would come to this.'
She said she and her partner, who has lost his job, were now sharing a small flat in Folkestone.
Solicitor Donna Payne, of Paynes Solicitors, said: 'It's wonderful to see that the judge could see through everything the landlords were saying. They tried to bully these tenants and failed.'
Described as the 'king and queen' of the buy-to-let market the Wilsons' climbed the property ladder faster than anyone in Britain over the last 10 years.
Sometimes buying several houses a day the couple, both in their 60s, amassed £180million at their highest point in 2008 - before the housing market crash more than halved their fortune.

tomstickland

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1209013/Property-tycoons-worth-70m-demand-3-000-bathroom-suite-tenants---replace-200-broken-toilet-lid.html

One thing that isn't very clear is that the tenants were "asked to move out". They were then replaced with new tenants.

The toilet lid saga began when the couple were asked to move out.

BettiePage

I love the comment that says he looks like a coach driver and she looks like Rupert the Bear :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: