Exiting tenancy early. Is this unreasonable?

camptownraces

mrginge wrote: »

Sometimes people who run businesses outsource functions to third parties who they trust to manage things for them. That doesn't mean they are stupid, on the contrary in fact.

Yes - but there has to be some basis for that trust. Professional qualifications? unbiased recommendations?

With a valuable asset such as a residential property, this landlord owes it to himself to be educated in the law relating to lettings, before taking on, as his agent, a third party such as this.

ashtray_heart

The rules about leaving a tenancy early are not clearly displayed on the website. They are hidden in a pdf that you can download and that we had never seen before. It was through explicitly looking for some evidence of their policy that we came across it.

My LL is a lovely man. We don't usually deal with him directly as we are LA managed. However, before buying a house and paying a deposit, I spoke to him to ask his position as it was unclear from the contract what the rules were. There is nothing in my contract about leaving early. He said as far as he is concerned we can just give notice and leave and to let LA know once we knew house was going through.

I spoke to LA to check with them my contract and they told me about the exit fee and paying rent. I am happy to pay compensation for leaving early as I would not want to leave LL out of pocket however paying to end the contract and then keep paying rent seems quite steep. I therefore asked about the subletting clause in my contract (I can sublet with LL permission) but apparently even though it doesn't say it in the contract I have to keep living in the property to do this.

The issue LL has with LA is that they didn’t notify him of damp or any other problems with the property. He told them he wanted to be notified immediately of any problems but we were told not to contact him. If he had been told months ago when we reported the problem he wouldn't be facing redecorating two rooms due to water damage from a leaking pipe.

I just want to know what my position is so when I formally give my notice I can work out whether I really have to part with such huge amounts of money or if legally I can come to an arrangement with my LL.

mrginge

camptownraces wrote: »

Yes - but there has to be some basis for that trust. Professional qualifications? unbiased recommendations?

As far as i'm aware there are no professional qualifications on which such a judgement can be based. However, it is a bit presumptious given that you know neither the LL or LA to assume that there was no basis at all.

In fact, given that this LA *appears* to be up front in regard to the terms of any early surrender, one could argue that they have acted in a thoroughly professional manner. Significantly better than an LA that simply makes up charges as on the fly.

With a valuable asset such as a residential property, this landlord owes it to himself to be educated in the law relating to lettings, before taking on, as his agent, a third party such as this.

I don't understand this point. It seems to suggest that any business that contracts out and believes in good faith that their contractor/agent is carrying out the required service, should also retain the same knowledge that they have contracted out.
I understand perfectly the need for things such as penalty clauses which any sensible business would use to protect themselves and how such clauses are pretty much non-existant in most LL/LA contracts, so if we're going to bash this LL for that then we might as well bash them all.

Granted i'm playing devil's advocate here but all i'm trying to say is that this LL is getting a kicking for apparently listening to his LA's wishes rather than the tenants and the LA is getting a kicking for being up front on some charges because the tenant believes them to be too high and didn't do their homework.

Oh and before you-know-who turns up and starts bleating about compensation and changing locks, this is an adult discussion where we look at both sides of an issue and debate appropriately.

mrginge

ashtray_heart wrote: »

The rules about leaving a tenancy early are not clearly displayed on the website. They are hidden in a pdf that you can download and that we had never seen before. It was through explicitly looking for some evidence of their policy that we came across it.

My LL is a lovely man. We don't usually deal with him directly as we are LA managed. However, before buying a house and paying a deposit, I spoke to him to ask his position as it was unclear from the contract what the rules were. There is nothing in my contract about leaving early. He said as far as he is concerned we can just give notice and leave and to let LA know once we knew house was going through.

I spoke to LA to check with them my contract and they told me about the exit fee and paying rent. I am happy to pay compensation for leaving early as I would not want to leave LL out of pocket however paying to end the contract and then keep paying rent seems quite steep. I therefore asked about the subletting clause in my contract (I can sublet with LL permission) but apparently even though it doesn't say it in the contract I have to keep living in the property to do this.

The issue LL has with LA is that they didn’t notify him of damp or any other problems with the property. He told them he wanted to be notified immediately of any problems but we were told not to contact him. If he had been told months ago when we reported the problem he wouldn't be facing redecorating two rooms due to water damage from a leaking pipe.

I just want to know what my position is so when I formally give my notice I can work out whether I really have to part with such huge amounts of money or if legally I can come to an arrangement with my LL.

I understand your position and i sympathise. However, the rules of early submission may have been hard to find, but find them you did and that suggests that they are not simply being made up on the fly.
Secondly your LL may be a lovely man, but you must see that you are putting him in a difficult position and potentially in conflict with the LA that he himself has a contract with. As such i would be cautious in how you proceed.

It is also nice and easy for the LL to simply play you by blaming the LA for everything, you should consider that he may just be fobbing you off. Ultimately he has to dictate to his LA and if he's not prepared to then you are stuck, regardless of what he says.

As has been stated before, if you can come to an agreement with your landlord for early surrender then that will override anything the LA wants, assuming you yourself are not in contract with the LA (which is highly unlikely).

I hope you can reach an agreement which is fair to all parties.

Pixie5740

mrginge wrote: »

Sometimes people who run businesses outsource functions to third parties who they trust to manage things for them. That doesn't mean they are stupid, on the contrary in fact.

Yes I know but the OP has indicated that this particular LL isn't happy with the way the LA has dealt with, or rather hasn't dealt with things in the past so why continue to listen to them now without doing his own homework. Since he's leaving it all to the LA I do hope the LA has re-issued the PI at the signing of each new fixed term.

Anyway, back to the OP's problem. mrgringe is right that the best outcome would be to reach a solution that's fair to everyone. That said, if you really don't want to pay the £1,500 + VAT and the LL/LA won't back down, there might be possible ammunition you could use to get the LL/LA round to your way of thinking.

mrginge

If there's one thing guaranteed to get my back up it's referring to me as 'mrgringe'

Pixie5740

mrginge wrote: »

If there's one thing guaranteed to get my back up it's referring to me as 'mrgringe'

Apologies mrginge.

ashtray_heart

I'm happy to pay the 1500 plus VAT it is paying that plus keep paying rent until they find new tenants that I am against. Especially since the place needs work doing to it to repair damage caused by leak and LL wants to wait until we move out to do it so I would essentially be paying whilst the property is repaired and not actively looking for new tenants.

I will speak to LL and see if I can agree something with him. If not then I will have to see what I can do to reduce costs.

mrginge

ashtray_heart wrote: »

I'm happy to pay the 1500 plus VAT it is paying that plus keep paying rent until they find new tenants that I am against. Especially since the place needs work doing to it to repair damage caused by leak and LL wants to wait until we move out to do it so I would essentially be paying whilst the property is repaired and not actively looking for new tenants.

I will speak to LL and see if I can agree something with him. If not then I will have to see what I can do to reduce costs.

While you pay rent you have occupancy whether you physically live there or not. Unless you were crazy enough to agree, the LL can whistle if he thinks he can do repairs while you pay rent.

ViolaLass

mrginge wrote: »

I understand your position and i sympathise. However, the rules of early submission may have been hard to find, but find them you did and that suggests that they are not simply being made up on the fly.

But it's not (apparently) written in the contract that the OP signed. Neither is the 'you can't sublet without staying in the property' condition.

How, therefore, can the OP be held to them?