Insurance and cannabis factory.

Proby

My friend has a 5 bedroomed house which has been rented out for the last year. The police raided the property, rented as a residential accommodation and found that the tenants had used the whole house to grow cannabis on a commercial scale. The tenants are on remand, the property is badly damaged by way of holes made in walls, and electrical damage. The property is unrentable due to the damage and rent is being lost all of which is likely to total £12000 plus. The tenancts are unlike to have any means or inclination to pay.

The insurance company have refused payment on the grounds that the damage was not 'malicious'. They have advised my friend that there is no point in going to the Ombudsman either and similar cases have been unsuccesful.

Does any one have any advice or experience of this?

DavidHM

Was the damage made by the police (presumably lawfully) or by the tenants (unlawfully)?

Proby

Thanks for question, the damage was caused by the tenants unlawfully in the process of the cannabis production by making holes in the walls and tampering the electrical system and general damage to wall and floors due to the impact of large scale plant growing in a house.

berkshiregaz

The first question to ask is "is there a specific exclusion in your landlords police for damage done by tenants?"

If not then thats good!

The next thing the insurers will prob look at is what references and the quality of the references you took! If your friend accepted a typed non-headed letter from a restaurant as a reference then I can see them arguing "due diligence"

Did your friend disconnect the electric account and require the new tenants to register themselves?

If account is kept in landlords name then I can see the elec company saying the burden of any losses is with them! Some of these factories can use £500- £1000 pm of electricity!!!!!!:mad:

If landlords name was taken off then I would think elec company should chase the vietnamese or chinese people for what they did! if they can find them!

The most important thing is for your friend to get a qualified electrician to check the whole system as these guys have no fear, they completely wreck the electricity systems and when Police remove the apparatus you never know what wires are connected where!!

As Police presumably found cannabis growing in the house, there is no recourse against them for damage caused during entry etc!

If there is no exclusion in your policy for criminal damage by tenants then get the police to crime that seperately, then go through the onbudsman regardless of what your insurer says!

Most of the time, your tenant wont have wrecked the elec system it will prob be one of their "electricians" that has actually done the damage!

This is happening more and more today and landlords nead to be aware, a bill of £12k is low for a 5 bed house after these guys have been in!!!:mad:

Proby

Thank you for that information.

Fortunately the electricity was in the tenants name. will pass on message re criminal damage in the policy as i believe the police are going to charge criminal damage. Other problem is that if the type of damage can be sorted the other problem is that it appears that the tenants were here illegally and therefore the company is likely to claim that they were not lawfully in the property.