Strange clauses in tenancy (AST) agreements

smallpurplepill

Hi all

Going through some paperwork I have come across my old Lease Agreement (this relates to a property we no longer live in) which contained some strange (imo) clauses which I never managed to resolve at the time. Can anyone shed any light on the clauses below? - are they 'valid' / enforceable etc - so I know what to look out for in the future? (Obviously this isn't the full AST as most of it is just the standard stuff such as returning the property in a reasonable state etc!)

'Special Tenancy Conditions'

The Tenant shall agree not to use any washing machine or tumble dryer unless otherwise approved by the landlord. Furthermore the tenants shall not use or seek to use any appliance that may cause any damage to the structure of the building. (We didn't ask for permission as didn't want to be perceived as 'trouble makers' or evicted on some other excuse - This was just a bog standard freehold terraced house in a row of about 20 houses the same, all the other houses in the row had a washing machine or washer/dryer. We had to go to the launderette for over 2 years which as you know is very expensive and as we worked long hours and shifts, the laundrette is only open 'office' hours usually resulting in being unable to wash clothes for 3-4 weeks sometimes and incurring a lot of extra expense. The house was advertised for 'professionals' so surely a professional would normally expect to be able to use a washing machine?! I wasn't expecting one to be provided - happy to buy and maintain it myself - but was not allowed. All the pipework etc was in place for a washing machine, as the previous owner had had one as did all the other houses in the street! I understand if it's something like a leasehold flat where there may be joint laundry facilities or some restriction in the freeholder's lease to the LL though...)

The tenant must inform the landlord and the landlords agents of any change in circumstances which may have an effect on the income of the tenant. (This is very unclear as lots of things can affect the income of the tenant - obviously things like redundancy, long term SSP etc but also something like an unpaid day off or even a pay rise would need to be 'informed' to them under a strict interpretation of this wording! - As it happens we did have one redundancy and reported it to the agent accordingly - were asked "will it affect your ability to pay" - answer no (as we both worked and rent was quite low) and they seemed happy with that so I think perhaps it's more of a technicality that they can evict you for non payment if you lose a job and can't pay etc but then I would have thought if you don't pay rent you will be chucked out anyway so this clause doesn't add anything!)

The tenant(s) hereby agree not to change any locks, not to make copies of any key to the premises, or to issue any such keys to unauthorised persons. (This caused us quite a lot of grief as mentioned above we did odd shifts and hours, so often one person would come home first and have to wait several hours for the key as the other person had left later in the morning and so needed to lock up! On one occasion when OH was doing nights he had had to leave a little earlier than usual so he had left when I got home in the evening and I had to sleep in the car! Could have left the key with a neighbour I suppose but we thought this would come under "issue to unauthorised persons") (We did eventually get a key cut after moaning at the agency that this wasn't acceptable and they seemed to think it was odd that we'd asked - as in 'I wouldn't worry about it just go and get a 2nd key cut' - At least they didn't ask us to get a spare set cut and given to them free of charge "for your convenience in case you lock yourself out" as a previous agency had!)

'Additional Clauses'

The purpose of this tenancy is to confer on the tenant the right to occupy the premises for a holiday. (I asked about this and was told it's about "abandonment" of the tenancy if the house is left unoccupied for 30 (?) days and this clause would prevent that from happening. It reads to me more that the house is being let as a "holiday home" though and the agent hadn't understood it - it was just a normal residential house!!)

THe landlord hereby gives the tenant notice that possession of the premises might be recovered on Ground 1 (a) of Part 1 of Schedule 2 to the Housing Act 1988 namely that at sometime before the beginning of this tenancy the landlord seeking possession or in the case of joint tenants seeking possession of at least one of them occupied the premises as his only or principle [sic] home. (I couldn't quite make sense of this but I think it is referring to the law (?) that if the landlord previously lived in the house as their main home then they can repossess it on that basis. Not true in the case of this tenancy as I know for a fact that the house was specifically bought as an investment and the landlord or any of his family have never lived in it)

The contract was drawn up through a letting agent but due to having to move in a hurry, when we went in to sign it the lettings people weren't available so we only had an estate agent (as the company also does sales) to do the paperwork rather than a letting agent.

There were a couple of other clauses which I don't have a record of so can't put the exact wording but the gist is as below.

The property is being let as a private residential dwelling for not more than two people including children. (House was let to OH and me ie 2 people, so this clause effectively prevents you from having any kids! - not that I want any at this stage but still.)

Not to store any explosives, flammables or chemicals in the property (Seems ok in principle (where did I put my dynamite?!) but does this even include the normal household stuff such as nail polish, deodorant car antifreeze etc all of which are explosive/flammable!)

Does anyone have any similar terms (or reasonable interpretation of them!) or any other 'strange' tenancy clauses to look out for?

Annisele

Assuming you're not winding us up, I think you're taking those clauses *way* too literally.

In general parties to a contract can only (successfully) sue for breach of contract if they've actually suffered a loss.

So, to take the locks clause as an example. If you changed the locks without permission, you'd be in breach of your tenancy agreement. If at some point in the future the landlord had a legal right to enter the property, but couldn't because you hadn't given him keys, then your breach of contract might mean that he could claim the cost of a locksmith from you.

We had a clause like that in one of our previous tenancy agreements. My handbag - containing my keys - was stolen, and I was fairly sure that I knew who'd stolen it and that he knew where I lived. Rather than mess about asking the landlord's permission, I got the locks changed *first*, and then the next day told my landlord what I'd done and asked him where he'd like me to send the keys. My landlord was perfectly happy with that; he didn't want a thief to have the keys and the address of his flat any more than I did - and he didn't particularly want to be woken up at 2am to give permission to change the locks.

Technically I'd breached my tenancy agreement, because I'd changed the locks without permission. But in the circumstances, can you really see a court awarding damages to my landlord? And can you really see any (decent) LL making a fuss about what I'd done?

And anything that says "T must not do X without LL's permission" usually means that LL will consider giving permission - otherwise it would just say "T must not do X". So, asking for permission (to so something reasonable) does not equal being a trouble maker!

clutton_2

i think you are taking these things faaaar too literally.... no one would expect you to sleep in the car rather than get another key cut....

you would be fine to have a washing machine..... especially if there was already plumbing in there...

this is clearly a very old agreement and none of the above clauses would be deemed as Fair in my view if you took it to the OFT

explosive nail polish..... just buy some, use it, enjoy it,

smallpurplepill

Thanks for the response Annisele,

Annisele wrote: »

Assuming you're not winding us up, I think you're taking those clauses *way* too literally.

Not a wind up, we had this agreement for about 2 years and the bits I quoted (other than the general ones at the bottom which I don't have a record of) are printed on the agreement!

Annisele wrote: »

In general parties to a contract can only (successfully) sue for breach of contract if they've actually suffered a loss.

So, to take the locks clause as an example. If you changed the locks without permission, you'd be in breach of your tenancy agreement. If at some point in the future the landlord had a legal right to enter the property, but couldn't because you hadn't given him keys, then your breach of contract might mean that he could claim the cost of a locksmith from you.

OK, understand about being in breach of agreement and causing a loss by a locksmith having to come out or (in worst case) the door being broken down! - We had inferred (though now that I re-read it, it doesn't actually say explicitly that I can spot) that any breach of the conditions regardless of whether it resulted in losses or not would be cause for being evicted - having already had to move quickly once from the previous house due to circumstances that were not our fault I am subsequently very wary! :eek:

Annisele wrote: »

And anything that says "T must not do X without LL's permission" usually means that LL will consider giving permission - otherwise it would just say "T must not do X". So, asking for permission (to so something reasonable) does not equal being a trouble maker!

Thanks, I think rationally I understood/understand that but didn't want to jeopardise anything by asking - Actually I am not sure if he'd read the wording on the agreement word for word (it was managed through an agency and signed on his behalf by them, so he may not have got involved in the detail of it) as he is a perfectly normal and rational person!! By that stage I was so terrified and paranoid about ending up homeless or whatever though that I just didn't have the courage or get-up-ability to do anything about any of these things - still don't actually! :mad:

DVardysShadow

Bear in mind that any agent will use boiler plate text and should tailor the agreement from that to suit the actual tenancy. For example, some old dear may have been scared once to let tenants use a washing machine, so it got added as a clause to the template rather than just to the one agreement. Similarly, the holiday clause may be a strike out or leave clause which never got struck out.

smallpurplepill

clutton wrote: »

i think you are taking these things faaaar too literally.... no one would expect you to sleep in the car rather than get another key cut....

you would be fine to have a washing machine..... especially if there was already plumbing in there...

this is clearly a very old agreement and none of the above clauses would be deemed as Fair in my view if you took it to the OFT

explosive nail polish..... just buy some, use it, enjoy it,

Thank you clutton,

I do feel a bit silly now as if everyone has odd clauses like this and I'm the only one who has taken them seriously! Viewing the house we are in now I asked the agent (different agency) about the washing machine issue and he thought that was really strange and said for this house it's just a normal agreement and of course you can have a washing machine - hmmm. (We still don't have one though!)

The wording has a copyright date 2005 though I don't know if some of the contents originated before this, (the actual agreement itself was drawn up and signed after this) so perhaps hopefully things have changed a bit

The attitude of the agencies (and almost without fail it is the agent rather than the actual LL!) seems to be that they are vastly superior and how dare we even breathe in their property or think about leaving a single thing out of place when there's an inspection, etc - I guess we (OH and I) have just both got so downhearted over the long term of agreements like this and the attitude of agencies that we will just lie down and say 'ok' without question -

This is actually one of the reasons we are looking to buy rather than rent, but of course mortgages and banks come with their own set of rules, albeit different ones like credit checks! (We had the initial discussion with the mortgage adviser and he was confident but everything changes at the actual application stage when they need to put something in writing, needless to say!)

Nothing against LLs or renting really (other than personally I am fed up with it now!) but starting to think even with silly clauses and so on, perhaps better to stick with it and save up until we can buy outright and not have to worry about banks, LAs etc - Albeit that will take a very long time! :money:

clutton_2

i think for your future peace of mind you might want to read up on the Office of Fair Trading website about unfair terms of contract..... its about - even if something is in your tenancy agreement you dont necessarily have to abide by it - especially if it attempts to take away your rights which have been acccrued under legislation, or if a clause is deemed to be unncessarily partial to one party then it is unfair and cannot be enforced in the courts.....

LittleMissAspie

smallpurplepill wrote: »

This is actually one of the reasons we are looking to buy rather than rent, but of course mortgages and banks come with their own set of rules, albeit different ones like credit checks!

You get credit checked when you rent too.

I'm in the middle of buying and it seems a lot easier than when we applied for our rentals. You don't actually need to DO anything when buying, you just tell other people to do things (ie hire solicitor, hire surveyor).

vyvyan_2

Every tenancy agreement I've had mentions getting the chimneys swept and yet I've never rented a property with an open fire!

Also it always states about getting the gutters cleaned out but I've never done it ~ or been checked up on it.

smallpurplepill

clutton wrote: »

i think for your future peace of mind you might want to read up on the Office of Fair Trading website about unfair terms of contract..... its about - even if something is in your tenancy agreement you dont necessarily have to abide by it - especially if it attempts to take away your rights which have been acccrued under legislation, or if a clause is deemed to be unncessarily partial to one party then it is unfair and cannot be enforced in the courts.....

Thanks, I've just had a look at this on your recommendation... I think I recall looking before actually (some time ago now!) and did find a number of the clauses in that agreement or variants of them listed as 'unfair'... Perhaps a copy of this document should be included with any documents from the agencies - of course this would never happen

We were (mostly me I think) terrified that 'unfair' or not, information would be used against us in a future reference and we would be left homeless and unable to get another place... the funny bit is that whilst jumping through hoops for ridiculous tenancy agreements we were actually paying far more in rent than we would have been for a mortgage, I suppose for the 'privilege' of all these terms (or perhaps to pay for the ink to print all of them...) and of being chucked out at any time!

To be fair to the LL he was generally ok and reasonable, when we eventually did deal with him directly!

smallpurplepill

LittleMissAspie wrote: »

You get credit checked when you rent too.

I'm in the middle of buying and it seems a lot easier than when we applied for our rentals. You don't actually need to DO anything when buying, you just tell other people to do things (ie hire solicitor, hire surveyor).

Thanks, you're right of course - reading this back it does seem like I thought only mortgages needed the checks! - the amount of info and detail requested by agents in the past was quite something, about a 10 page form of personal info per person as I recall. (I don't know if the credit check was ever actually run as such, though I guess their fee is also for checking with employers etc and they did do that.)

From a paperwork point of view it probably is easier (I like the sound of just sitting about barking orders out to others :A) but from a criteria point of view I'm not sure - have got copy of 'Statutory' credit report (the £2 ones) and didn't find anything odd on there but I guess the banks have a more sophisticated method than that!!

Are you finding the buying people (bank or whoever) take a better attitude towards you than the agencies?