Should I have to pay for my landlord's carpet?

vaporate

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Morally I think you should leave the carpet as you wanted it changing and you didn't make it clear this was a temporary change - you were expecting the landlord to send someone out to remove the old carpet, find a winter-proof storage space AND then pay someone to refit the carpet at the end of the tenancy? If I was your landlord I would have taken the change as permanent, the fact that he said he might use the carpet elsewhere is a strong indication of that. Legally you did pay for the carpet and the landlord may have difficulty proving what was and was not in the property when you took occupancy as there is no dual signed inventory.

Rubbish. Why should the OP 'morally' leave the carpet, a new expensive one at that.

Cobblers, take back what is yours. Leave the house/flat as it was when you first moved in.

rufusgizmo

mlz1413 - ideally I would like to sell them the carpet that we put down - this seems to me the sensible solution, as we save the hassle of removing the carpet and they don't have to spend on fitting a different carpet. As discussed before it's a big room (50 sq m) and the carpet cost us about £1,000 inc fitting. They'd be getting a much better carpet, in terms of quality and general condition, than they'd had before. Morally I can see both sides, but since it seems legally we have the upper hand I would hope they'd be pragmatic and just buy it off us, but I don't know if they're going to be sensible enough to see that unfortunately...

vaporate

Just take the carpet. it is yours after all. Why give the LL a free ride?

With the threads on here lately it is quite obvious LL's tend to take the pi$$ when possible.

phlash

mlz1413 wrote: »

I'm a bit confused on what you actually want.

Do you want to remove the carpet you purchased and use it else where and leave the LL with the underlay he provided?

Or do you just want to leave the LL with underlay as he has a carpet already - ignoring that it may or may not have been used else where? what will you do with the carpet you bought, freecycle it?

If I asked a LL to remove a carpet as I didn't like the one they had I would expect to leave the carpet I purchased as it was my request and choice. But as you both didn't discuss the detail then I guess its open to discussion now.

I guess the middle ground is that you pay for the old carpet to be refitted as the LL paid for it to be removed. If of course said carpet is still available, which it probably isn't because LL is asking you to provide carpeting.

If before a tenancy starts, a LL agrees to do something, it is their choice to incur the cost. The LL could have refused and found another tenant who didn't want carpet removing. The removing of the carpet is a cost of the LL in securing a tenancy, and not a cost of the tenancy itself. If his next tenant wants a carpet, and the LL agrees to provide one, then it is the LL's cost once again. There are separate agreements between LL and tenant 1 and Landlord and tenant 2. Tenant 1 has no obligation to tenant 2, in terms of leaving their personal carpet.

The tenant came with terms, i.e. no carpet in lounge please. If LL agrees, then it is his choice, his cost. When the tenant leaves, the house is returned to original state.

You can understand this better if you replace 'carpet' for 'bed'. A potential tenant might ask for a bed to be removed so that they can use their own. The tenant would not be expected to leave the bed at the end of the tenancy, as it is of course their own bed. There is no difference with the carpet scenario, it is just people struggle with it more conceptually because it is seen as a permanent fixture when it is not.

mlz1413

rufusgizmo wrote: »

mlz1413 - ideally I would like to sell them the carpet that we put down - this seems to me the sensible solution, as we save the hassle of removing the carpet and they don't have to spend on fitting a different carpet. As discussed before it's a big room (50 sq m) and the carpet cost us about £1,000 inc fitting. They'd be getting a much better carpet, in terms of quality and general condition, than they'd had before. Morally I can see both sides, but since it seems legally we have the upper hand I would hope they'd be pragmatic and just buy it off us, but I don't know if they're going to be sensible enough to see that unfortunately...

How long has this carpet been down and how much are you expecting for it?

2nd hand its nearly worthless as you have a very limited market, ie your LL or the local paper.

A really cheap carpet, say £4.99 per sq m will only cost £250 plus fitting (which could be done DIY) so the LL is unlikely to pay you much more than that because regardless of the carpets quality.

Also if you do remove do you have something to transport it? 50sq m is going to be very very heavy, I've moved 20sq m and ended up cutting that into pieces.

rufusgizmo

phlash - That's basically what I thought but thank you for putting it down so clearly.

mlz1413 - I agree with what you're saying, we are in quite a weak bargaining position because if we don't sell it we have to figure out the logistics of moving it. But then on the other hand by buying ours, we are saving them the hassle and cost of getting it measured, selecting a carpet, getting it fitted etc, plus they'd getting better value for money in terms of quality that they would if they bought from a retailer. And it seems that legally we could get our own way if it came to that. That's why I'd like them to realise what the mutually beneficial outcome is. I accept that we're probably going to have to take a reasonable loss from what we paid for it, but we only have ourselves to blame for that.

kmmr

I'll be impressed if you manage to take negotiations from Landlord asking for you to pay for new carpet to landlord paying you for leaving the carpet there!

Good luck!

Blackpool_Saver

I have never heard anything like it, it's one carpet !!!!!!, ONE, leave the darned thing, suck it up and move on.
Money saving is one thing, obsessive is another.
I left carpets I put all through my last rental house and have put down carpets all through at this one, of course I will leave them here too.

vaporate

Blackpool_Saver wrote: »

I have never heard anything like it, it's one carpet !!!!!!, ONE, leave the darned thing, suck it up and move on.
Money saving is one thing, obsessive is another.
I left carpets I put all through my last rental house and have put down carpets all through at this one, of course I will leave them here too.

Even if it cost you £500 quid?

pff I know what I would do.

rufusgizmo

blackpool_saver - you really put carpets down everywhere when renting? I'm surprised at that. Maybe it is just a carpet, but it's a big carpet that cost a grand a year ago. I don't think it's obsessive to want something back on that.