Landlord wanting to decorate

Rosie75

Our landlady wants to send someone in to decorate our house next week. Can we say we don't want the work done? Ordinarily I would not mind, but the bloke who came round to give the quote was thoroughly obnoxious, had been drinking and clearly thought that people who live in rented houses are scum. I just don't want the guy in my home - and certainly not when we are not there (we will have to leave him in the house alone for some of the time). She knows we are planning to leave soon - I would have thought any work would be best done when we have moved out? Am I being unreasonable? We are having a lot of personal stress at the moment - both working away from home for long periods of time during the week, looking for a new house and having to deal with my parents-in-law who both have dementia and would like to be able to unwind for the short periods when we are at home, not deal with mess and an obnoxious decorator.

Tassotti

You have the 'right to quiet enjoyment' of your home. You can legally refuse entry to the LL or anyone acting for the LL (ie workmen)

Explain your reasons to the LL and try and keep it amicable, as you don't wan't the LL to get difficult about returning your deposit.

LizD_2

Ensure that you get your deposit back BEFORE this guy starts work on the property, just in case something happens and it gets blamed on you!

amboy

She is wanting to decorate now so that prospective tenants have a better first impression, however as Tassoti said you do not have to let them in.

I would advise to be very careful ion how you word your reasons to the LL as the decorater may be one of her family/friends or her regular decorater.

As an aside, from my experience in working in a shop it is frightening how many tradesman drink during the day, they seem to need it to get through the day

Horasio

Tell them about your situation and not feeling comfortable with the tradesman. You pay rent, it is your home. They should do it when you vacate.

Also, I wouldn't trust the tradesman not to damage YOUR property

Debt_Free_Chick

I'm not convinced that the "you are entitled to quiet enjoyment" can be trotted out as a defence against every reasonable request made by a landlord. Yes you are the tenant, yes you have rights. But this is the LL's property and he is entitled to maintain it.

I would be interested to know how this would stand up in a Court. Can a tenant always refuse entry, claiming "I am entitled to quiet enjoyment of the property"?

PoorDave

If she knows you're going to leave soon, she's obviously trying to avoid a void period. However, a house is much easier to decorate when there's nobody there and any furniture left can be moved around and left out of the way overnight.

barnaby-bear

Debt_Free_Chick wrote:

I'm not convinced that the "you are entitled to quiet enjoyment" can be trotted out as a defence against every reasonable request made by a landlord. Yes you are the tenant, yes you have rights. But this is the LL's property and he is entitled to maintain it.

I would be interested to know how this would stand up in a Court. Can a tenant always refuse entry, claiming "I am entitled to quiet enjoyment of the property"?

Again the definition of reasonable - reasonable does not involve having some alcoholic scumbag in your home or the hassle of decorators in - homes are not just property - LL is entitled to enter for emergency repairs e.g. water cascadign through house. Decorating when people living anyway is unreasonable, leaving it for 3 months won't hurt the property no emergency. BTL speculation has forced people into rented situations and the LL gets the profit but the tenant protected because accommodation and home and family life should be a right

Debt_Free_Chick

barnaby-bear wrote:

Decorating when people living anyway is unreasonable

Why? Plenty of homeowners decorate whilst continuing to live in the property I'd like to know what a Court would think

leaving it for 3 months won't hurt the property no emergency.

But the LL has no rental income if they decorate whilst the property is empty. And it delays the time when they can show new tenants around .... that exacerbates the void.

My post was purely a request to understand what a Court would think. There's no point in people posting about "enforcing rights" if they don't stand up in Court. Sooner or later, an MSEer is going to end up in Court on the basis of what's posted here ... so we need to know!

BTL speculation has forced people into rented situations and the LL gets the profit but the tenant protected because accommodation and home and family life should be a right

I think you'll find that there are not a lot of profitable BTLs. No-one is forced into rental accommodation - either you have no choice and then have to live with the consequences of being a tenant; or you can buy. That's it. Tenants do have certain rights and most decent LLs respect that. But it's not a one-way street - the LL has rights too and I would hope that this Board's advice to tenants takes account of the LL's rights.

MyHouse75

We are in the same position. As soon as we handed in our notice the landlord decided that she wants to decorate and wants to bring in a decorator next week to paint the windowframes in all the windows (six big windows in total) and the livingroom doors. The decorator was here today and said it will take about 5 hours over about two days to get all the work done, since the windows are in very bad condition and will need all the old paint peeled and several new layers of paint.

However I am pregnant and we have a 1,5 year old toddler and I don't want to live in paintfumes. Also, how do you keep a toddler from touching freshly painted doors??

I just sent the landlord an e-mail asking whether the work can be carried out when we have moved. We've handed in our two months notice, but we will most likely vacate the property in about a months time, so they'll have a whole month when the flat is empty.

On the grounds that I am pregnant and we have a young child, I am going to refuse them from carrying out this paint work while we live in the flat. Hopefully enough reason for them not to start getting difficult.

What kind of decorating work are you having done? I told them that I don't mind any other kind of decorating (some of the kitchen cabinets are falling to pieces and she wants to fix these as well, which is fine by me), but painting is not acceptable.

barnaby-bear

Debt_Free_Chick wrote:

Why? Plenty of homeowners decorate whilst continuing to live in the property I'd like to know what a Court would think

No-one is forced into rental accommodation - either you have no choice and then have to live with the consequences of being a tenant; or you can buy. That's it. Tenants do have certain rights and most decent LLs respect that. But it's not a one-way street - the LL has rights too and I would hope that this Board's advice to tenants takes account of the LL's rights.

Homeowners can CHOOSE when they decorate - that's the difference CHOOSING when and if they stay in property not having it forced upon them.

Peope who can't afford to buy have no choice but to rent people are forced to rent. I am lucky enough to be able to buy many aren't, if you disenfranchise people from society by putting them in a situation where they can not own a home and can not rent with quiet enjoyment you damage society.