Frustrated Tenancy

Brightspark87

Dear all

We are in a very difficult position.

We had a fire last week in our flat and our landlord is being awful about getting it sorted. It was in the bathroom and the fire service will be conducting an investigation but have confirmed it is very unlikely to be our fault, but could be either accident or landlord fault (he does not look after the property well and makes botch jobs of everything). He has cancelled the buildings loss adjuster and refusing to sort anything out. We cannot live in the property as we cannot use the lights nor the bathroom at all.

We have been put up by our insurance but will be homeless from Wednesday. On the advice of our loss adjuster we have sort alternative rental accommodation.

We have found somewhere to live but haven't formalised our offer yet as husband was unable to view (at work). Therefore we are looking to do this on Tuesday morning.

We are worried, mainly about the rental on our current property, and that we had incurred vast expenses in this ordeal. We are struggling to raise enough for the new flat, and worried about getting the money for the expenses back.

Our loss adjuster has also not been in touch since his visit on Thursday but we have made calls and texts.

Any advice welcome please! Thank you

G_M

If the property is now 'uninhabitable' and will be so for the remainder of the tenancy (however long that is) then the contract is 'frustrated'. It ends. You will owe no further rent.

If the contract is not 'frustrated', but the property is temporarily uninhabitable, pending repair, the LL must re-house you until you can move back in. You must continue to pay (the same) rent.

If you sustained losses, and the fault is shown to be the LL's (ie fire report result), then you can claim your losses off the LL.

Otherwise, you must claim losses off your own insurance.

Brightspark87

Hi the landlord is not rehousing us, between both ourselves and our insurance we are being rehoused. The landlord has asked us not to talk to his insurance and if we do, say we are lodgers and not tenants. He has also said that we can end the tenancy (we have in writing).

We are more worried as we have paid rent for 2 weeks that we have not been able to live in the property and that we are being asked to lie to the insurance company.

We did not cause the fire and our loss adjuster has confirm he will be pursuing his insurance company for the compensation.

Brightspark87

G_M wrote: »

If the property is now 'uninhabitable' and will be so for the remainder of the tenancy (however long that is) then the contract is 'frustrated'. It ends. You will owe no further rent.

If the contract is not 'frustrated', but the property is temporarily uninhabitable, pending repair, the LL must re-house you until you can move back in. You must continue to pay (the same) rent.

If you sustained losses, and the fault is shown to be the LL's (ie fire report result), then you can claim your losses off the LL.

Otherwise, you must claim losses off your own insurance.

Thank you for your help! I honestly am 100% sure that we will not be at fault for the fire, it was electrical and a faulty extractor fan that has never worked all the time we lived there (2 years). We made the landlord aware of this and he just bought us a dehumidifier.

Brightspark87

just to confirm our tenancy is until 27th February 2015, however our landlord has agreed to terminate our contract.

Brightspark87

Also does the landlord have access rights without our permission? We are worried about our possessions as he has damaged things before and we have wedding gifts and items that are special and irreplaceable. We have a full tenancy agreement.

G_M

Brightspark87 wrote: »

Hi the landlord is not rehousing us, between both ourselves and our insurance we are being rehoused. The landlord has asked us not to talk to his insurance and if we do, say we are lodgers and not tenants. He has also said that we can end the tenancy (we have in writing).

.

You are in a very strong position.

Clearly your landlord does not have 'landlords insurance', but normal domestic insurance. If the insurers find out the owner has been letting the property to tenants, they will invalidate the insurance and not pay out. A bean.

You could ... ehem!... request all sorts of compensatio in return for your.... ehem!.... silence.

PasturesNew

G_M did a bigger post on this issue here: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=60981007&postcount=9

This might be worth a read too: http://www.landlordsguild.com/house-destroyed-by-fire-or-flood/

Brightspark87

G_M wrote: »

You are in a very strong position.

Clearly your landlord does not have 'landlords insurance', but normal domestic insurance. If the insurers find out the owner has been letting the property to tenants, they will invalidate the insurance and not pay out. A bean.

You could ... ehem!... request all sorts of compensatio in return for your.... ehem!.... silence.

Haha! thank you but sadly, I will not ever lie to an insurance company. Morally I think it is wrong and also, I am in the process of being FCA authorised and do not want to put myself in an position of insurance fraud however minor.

G_M

Brightspark87 wrote: »

Haha! thank you but sadly, I will not ever lie to an insurance company. Morally I think it is wrong and also, I am in the process of being FCA authorised and do not want to put myself in an position of insurance fraud however minor.

Then I trust you will be informing the insurers of your tenancy (and not claiming to be lodgers). The LL will have to accept the consequences of his fraud.....

Brightspark87

G_M wrote: »

Then I trust you will be informing the insurers of your tenancy (and not claiming to be lodgers). The LL will have to accept the consequences of his fraud.....

Thank you of course. I have spoke with the loss adjusters and they are already questioning him, as he has lied to them (about us cancelling the appointment) and he has unnecessarily delayed repairs.

I believe, that he claimed last year when our water pump broke and did not repair in the way they paid for. This was due to him replacing the floor, but putting the old the old one back down. This may be why he is worried about the insurance.

It also confuses matters as he does not speak good English, and often blames us for simple matters (such as the leaking water pump. He refused he repair it for 2 weeks as he said it was our fault, so we had no running water for 2 weeks...)