Water leak into downstairs flat

KingRoLo

I have a bit of a dilema.

I live a block of 4 flats which is essentially converted house. I live on the 1st floor.

The guy who owns the flat below me rents it out to tenants. He recently called me to tell me some very bad news that water has been leaking from my flat and has done some very bad damage to his wall which his boiler is attached to.

So i get a gas man round to see where the leak is and he identifies the problem after ripping away my kitchen panels to reveal the mains pipe and a part called a 'scale reducer' which is connected to the mains has been leaking and from the state of the downstairs flat it looks like for a VERY long time, trouble is i have no way of knowing this has been happening as its all completely out of my sight.

My kitchen is directly above his kitchen and my boiler is on the wall in the same place as his and this is where the leak has been seeping through to, down my pipes, and onto his wall where his boiler is attached to.

The damage is pretty bad, his wall has expanded and he needs to get a plasterer to knock a section of the wall in, re-board it and then remount the boiler. Its one of those cheap partition walls made from wood and plaster.

But what i dont understand is why didnt he spot this before and that the damage has been allowed to get so bad for such a long period of time, apparently he tells me he knew this because there has always been a re-appearing stain on his kitchen ceiling for a long time. And the state of the wall suggests that he must of been blind to not notice this getting worse many months before.

Anyway, to cut a long story short it looks like the insurance might cover it, however there is a not so nice 375 excess which the mangement company says i have to cough up. However do you think i am being unreasonable to ask the owner downstairs to split the cost of the excess with me 50/50?

I spoke to the management company and she orginally said that i would have to pay it. But i said he is the one claiming for the damage, then she said ok i will split it over the 4 flats, and i said no, that would be unfair to the other tenants who arent involved and that i will have a chat with the owner downstairs to see if we can come to an agreement. I havent asked him yet.

Any opinions?

Regards

Richard.

KingRoLo

Any opinions??

hjb123

Have you had much to do with the owner of the other building?

Who is claiming on whose insurance? If he is claiming then surely he shoudl pay his own excess?

KingRoLo

There are four of us, we all pay maintenance fees which covers the insurance so we all share the cost of it. But seeing as the leakage doesnt effect the other 2 flats on the other side its not fair that they share the brunt of the excess. But yes essentially he is making the claim for the damage which is why i dont think its fair i pay for all the excess. But the leak IS coming from my flat which is the tricky thing.

cattie

I think your suggestion of coming to an agreement with the owner of the other flat an excellent one.

If he doesn't agree then tell him the managing agents are suggesting the other 2 flats will then also have to cough up money towards it & how angry & resentful they are likely to be over the unfairness of forking out for something that didn't affect their flats.

jennifernil

Our daughter is in a block of 13 flats. There was a leak in a soil pipe affecting only 3 of the flats, the insurance covered it but all flats were charged a share of the £250 excess. This is how it is worded in the conditions/policy. The soil pipe was a "common" pipe. If the pipe which leaked in your case supplies all the flats then it also is a "common" pipe so all flat owners should probably pay.

I would agree the guy below should have brought the problem to your attention earlier. I would have thought, under the terms of the policy, that he has a duty to minimise the losses and report any problems as soon as they are noticed. Any stain/watermark on a ceiling/wall bears investigation.

hazeyj

I'm a director of the management company and my managing agents have taught me loads about stuff like this. In this instance i feel that it should be absored by the service charge. It could be allocated against..misc costs maybe? The service charge is there for the building as a whole and this incident is somthing that has affected the building and should be treated as such. Its not like you would have to ask the other owners to stump up a share each, as there should be enough money already in the service (or budgeted for above somewhere). I would speak to the managaging agent again and ask them again.

leroy1980

The same thing happened to me, i had a small leak, and fixed it nearly straight away, the tennant down stairs was ok about it no damage.

Then a week later the landlord rang me saying that i had damaged the whole laminate floor, there is no way a little leak could cause that damage, just trying it on. No way am i paying out for that.

My insurange company said that downstairs will have to claim on there insurance and then they would try to get it back on my insurance company. It would not cost me a penny or affect me no claims.

phill99

hazeyj wrote: »

I'm a director of the management company and my managing agents have taught me loads about stuff like this. In this instance i feel that it should be absored by the service charge. It could be allocated against..misc costs maybe? The service charge is there for the building as a whole and this incident is somthing that has affected the building and should be treated as such. Its not like you would have to ask the other owners to stump up a share each, as there should be enough money already in the service (or budgeted for above somewhere). I would speak to the managaging agent again and ask them again.

I run a maintenance company and do alot of work for landlors and come across this situation quite often.

The problem here is that in purpose built flats there is always a management company and therefore a managing agent.

However, I have come across many situations where converted houses (as in the OPs case) don't have a managing agent and therfore no one to co-ordinate the 'bigger picture'. It is often down to individual owners to co-ordinate with each other on issues of general block maintenance etc.

Additionally, if I was an owner of an unaffected flat, I would be really miffed if my service charge was going to cover another owners excess. The issue is between the claimant and the defendant. The owner of the flat damaged has every right to claim the excess from the guy upstairs in the same way as I would expect you to pay my excess if you ran into the back of my car.

dacouch

phill99 wrote: »

The owner of the flat damaged has every right to claim the excess from the guy upstairs in the same way as I would expect you to pay my excess if you ran into the back of my car.

Just because there is a leak from a flat above does not mean the flat above is legally liable for the excess or the damage

phill99

dacouch wrote: »

Just because there is a leak from a flat above does not mean the flat above is legally liable for the excess or the damage

So who is responsible? It certainly isn't the owners of the other 2 flats.