Deposit advice

BitterAndTwisted

Never EVER communicate with your landlord by any means other than IN WRITING. Sending texts and emails does not prove they have been received or read.

wilf3uk

Just heard off the estate agents who are currently processing our application for a new rental house which we were due to move into today/tomorrow..... Our previous landlord has been in touch and is now changing his reference to a very negative one. Its put our application on hold, while the estate agents see if the LL of the new house wants to accept our application with the new reference.

Im guessing the letter has arrived on his doorstep today and he's got the hump over it

jjlandlord

A good rule for the future: Sort out the new tenancy agreement with your new landlord before your current tenancy comes to an end.
As you've just noticed things can turn sour quickly when it's time to discuss the return of the deposit...

Blackpool_Saver

wilf3uk wrote: »

Just heard off the estate agents who are currently processing our application for a new rental house which we were due to move into today/tomorrow..... Our previous landlord has been in touch and is now changing his reference to a very negative one. Its put our application on hold, while the estate agents see if the LL of the new house wants to accept our application with the new reference.

Im guessing the letter has arrived on his doorstep today and he's got the hump over it

Uuuuuuuuugh hideous, I hate this system it is so biased towards the landlords.............

chappers

Blackpool_Saver wrote: »

Uuuuuuuuugh hideous, I hate this system it is so biased towards the landlords.............

I beg to differ, most of the law around letting is set out to protect the tenant.

wilf3uk

Almost a month gone and still no deposit paid back to me :mad:

We went down the route suggested and sent a letter saying that we wanted the deposit paid within 5 days......heard nothing back from them so then went down the route of getting a solicitor to send a stern sounding letter stating the same.....still not heard back from the LL tho.

They did text a week or so ago to ask if we had a copy of our tenancy agreement which we could fax to them(they have no documents at all relating to our tenancy)
That text was ignored. I don't really want to be sending them documents which they will need in court, so have so far only given them copies of a document which shows how much deposit was paid.


What is the next step to take? Should we be looking at taking them to court?
The property we were renting was in Wales, but we have since moved up to yorkshire. Would we be able to request the LL to come to a court up here, or would we be required to go back to Wales?
Finally, does anyone have any sort of idea how much the court/solicitor fees would be for this sort of thing? Im willing to take a hit on this as I don't want them keeping my money, but obviously have a limit on how much I am prepared to lose in chasing this up.

Thanks again

lizzywig

I can't advise on your last questions but what I can say is that I also had moving out nightmares. Be persistant. If you fight hard enough and go through the proper channels and think hard about backing your case up then you should be ok.

When we moved out our LL paid our depodit back in full through our DPS and then started harrassing us for money saying that we had been negligable, thankfully I had 1001 things to back up our case (that's the PA in me). More history to it than that but I won't bore you.

What I can say is I did loads of research at the time and this might interest you, scroll to the end Deposit Protection Scheme, basically says that it's LL's responsibility to put it into a scheme, so it doesn't matter if he says that he didn't know the agency went out of business.

Deposit disputes has some info which might help you but I sense that you know most of this. When we had problems with out LL we went to Shelter who saw us very quickly and gave very pratical advice, much better than CAB who didn't know what to say.

BTW if there is no tennancy how does your LL prove that you made any damage and it wasn't just like that when you moved in? He is trying to rise you probably because he knows he is in the wrong about the deposit and so he is trying to make some money from you before he loses lots.

Some LL's are great but others are no so great, equally the same with tennants. My advice, get everything in writing.

wilf3uk

Bit of an update.

Have received a letter from the LL denying liability for the deposit. They claim that when the EA went bust, the deposit scheme which the deposit was held in in wrote to us and told us we had 3 weeks to claim for the deposit to be returned. We recieved no such letter from a deposit scheme. The LL claims that this letter was sent some time in 2009.

Im at the stage now where I am going to take him to court, would really appreciate some answers to the following and a rough guess as to whether I was be successful in court.

Can I expect the LL to travel to yorkshire to come to court?(He lives in Wales)
With regard to his claims that the TDS told us to claim the deposit back in 2009, does this inpact my chances of claiming the deposit back?
Should he have safeguarded a new deposit out of his own money when he found out the EA went bust? (this is what we were advised that he should do by SA and our solicitors)
He has no inventory and no contract. Does he stand a chance at sccessfully disputing any of the damages which he claims? (£400 in total!!!)
I'll have to pay court fees, will these be refunded if he isn't able to prove any damages through the lack of an inventory?
What about if he is successful in claiming for the bed?(which we don't dispute was broken during the tenancy) Will he still have to cover my costs, or will that rule in his favour?

All in all, what are our chances of getting the deposit back? He isn't going to return any of it without court action, but am pretty nervous about the prospect of having to fork out cash only for the judge to rip into me for wasting his time if I stood no chance of winning.

Thanks for the help, alway appreciated.....and a damn side cheaper than the solicitors letter that I had to fork out for.

edit: They are also withholding our mail until we give them a copy of the tenancy agreement(something I am struggling to find amongst the boxes in the attic) Is it a problem that I don't have a TA ready to hand?
How can I go about getting that mail, without having to drive 220 miles to pick it up in person? Mail has been redirected now, but there was a few days gap where mail(inc bday cards) slipped through.

BitterAndTwisted

wilf3uk wrote: »

Can I expect the LL to travel to Yorkshire to come to court?(He lives in Wales).

Yes unless he want to lose.

With regard to his claims that the TDS told us to claim the deposit back in 2009, does this impact my chances of claiming the deposit back?

Your tenancy hadn't ended so you were not in a position to claim your deposit back even if any such letter was sent.

Should he have safeguarded a new deposit out of his own money when he found out the EA went bust? (this is what we were advised that he should do by SA and our solicitors)

Yes, he should have. Monies paid to the agent were taken on behalf of the landlord. And it's the landlord's responsibility to return it regardless of who it was paid to and where it went after that.

He has no inventory and no contract. Does he stand a chance at successfully disputing any of the damages which he claims? (£400 in total!!!)

In my opinion he does not. He needs documentary evidence of the condition of the property at the start of your tenancy

I'll have to pay court fees, will these be refunded if he isn't able to prove any damages through the lack of an inventory?

Yes, if the court finds in your favour the landlord will have to pay your costs.

What about if he is successful in claiming for the bed?(which we don't dispute was broken during the tenancy) Will he still have to cover my costs, or will that rule in his favour?

When you start your claim in court exclude the agreed cost of the bed.

All in all, what are our chances of getting the deposit back? He isn't going to return any of it without court action, but am pretty nervous about the prospect of having to fork out cash only for the judge to rip into me for wasting his time if I stood no chance of winning.

You have a very good chance of winning. What you need to establish is that you have made every attempt to arrive at a reasonable compromise given the circumstances.


edit: They are also withholding our mail until we give them a copy of the tenancy agreement(something I am struggling to find amongst the boxes in the attic) Is it a problem that I don't have a TA ready to hand?
How can I go about getting that mail, without having to drive 220 miles to pick it up in person? Mail has been redirected now, but there was a few days gap where mail(inc bday cards) slipped through.

Sorry, I cannot offer any advice about them withholding your mail but I would almost certainly make mention of it when you amke your claim. This is very clear evidence of the landlord's unreasonableness (if there's such a word).

wilf3uk

Thanks for the previous post. I didn't get any email notification of a reply, so am only reading it for the first time today.

Update - Progress is slow, but we are looking like we'll be in court within the next 4 months.

The LL has filed a counterclaim for damages to the property(totalling £333) and is sticking to the story about it being my responsibility to have claimed the deposit back from the TDS when our EA went bust.

I will be disputing both of these claims as there was no inventory completed and no TDS ever advised us to get ur bond back and then pay it directly to the LL.

Will update as and when I hear more, as it might be a good example for someone in a similar position who is also facing having to go to court to chase up their bond.