Burglary at flat - Landlord/Agent liable?

mrginge

SJI85 wrote: »

I then come on this site which is clearly pro landlord and come under attack.

You asked for feedback.
You were given feedback from multiple people that stated you were in the wrong.
You don't like the feedback, so you come out with the above nonsense.

You need to grow up.

Guest101

<---- sorry, I'm pro landlord ?! There'll be a list of people 2 pages long who would disagree with that statement.

I'm not anti landlord either ( though some will disagree with that too ). I just think tenants in general have more to lose when difficulties arise and often have no idea ( some LLs also have no idea)

( sometimes I have no idea...)

SJI85

mrginge wrote: »

You asked for feedback.
You were given feedback from multiple people that stated you were in the wrong.
You don't like the feedback, so you come out with the above nonsense.

You need to grow up.

The pro landlord comment was in response to the repeated comments regarding the locks and lack of attention paid to the back door itself.

Would I be in the wrong for witholding rent? Yes and I was never comfortable with this.

Am I wrong for believing landlords have a moral duty to take reasonable steps to keep a property secure? I believe so.

Do they have a legal tesponsibility? I still think so and evidence from this board (if not this thread) suggests so.

After talking with my council today they informed me that they could have undertaken an assessment of security and ordered the landlord to make improvements if necessary. They were particularly concerned y the internal door used as a back door.

dancingfairy

You really should have had contents insurance yes, I know you couldn't really afford it and hindsight is a wonderful thing. It's a really horrible thing to have happened to you and I can understand you blaming the landlord and wanting compensation but I don't think you will get far. You can of course write and argue your case that he was notified on x,y,z occasions about the lack of security but somehow I doubt he'll pay up I'm afraid I think, realistically you need to accept you weren't insured and need to move on
Df

dancingfairy

Could the landlord have done more? Yes
Should the landlord have done more? Possibly.
Can you prove it? Possible.
Are you likely to get anything back or compensation back? Probably not.
You may or may not be correct and the landlord probably should have done more, but being right sadly doesn't always mean being compensated
Df

AdrianC

Whether the back door was an internal or external door is irrelevant - force wasn't used against it.

Guest101

SJI85 wrote: »

The pro landlord comment was in response to the repeated comments regarding the locks and lack of attention paid to the back door itself.

Would I be in the wrong for witholding rent? Yes and I was never comfortable with this.

Am I wrong for believing landlords have a moral duty to take reasonable steps to keep a property secure? I believe so.

Do they have a legal tesponsibility? I still think so and evidence from this board (if not this thread) suggests so.

After talking with my council today they informed me that they could have undertaken an assessment of security and ordered the landlord to make improvements if necessary. They were particularly concerned y the internal door used as a back door.

Listen to the words: 'could'. Doesn't mean they would. At best you described verbally to the council rep, they gave you a broad answer.

In reality could means it's not likely.

Kynthia

Whether or not the landlord should have done more to secure the property is immaterial in my opinion. The main reason why I feel tge landlord won't be responsible for your loss is because there is a responsible person, the person that robbed you. The reason you incurred a loss is because of the deliberate actions by that person. Legally I don't believe you can transfer the liability from that person to another, your landlord, just because you don't know who the first person is.

If your landlord hadn't weather - proofed your property and you incurred damaged I think you'd have more chance of arguing liability.

TBagpuss

I'm sorry that your were burgled - that's horrible.

However, i have to agree wit hthe majority of posters that you don't have a hope of making a laim against your landlords in this scenario.

You could have done more yourself - for instnace, you have now made enquiries with the council; you could have done that at an aerlier stage.
You could have put a bolt on the door.

You could have pushed harder with your landlords about the issues with security which you say you were aware of.

This is not to criticise you, but simply to point out that a landlord might reasonably say that they had no reason to belive you were still concerned, as you hadn't pursued the isse.

Add to that that you have no evidecen at all that the burglary was due to the nature of the door or to whther or not the locks were changed. It is possiblethat you did make a mistake and leave the door unlocked. It is possible that someone stole a key at some point, either fro you or from the landlord. It's possible that someone was able to force the lock even without leaving obvious signs. It is very possible that the burglrs would have broken in in another way of they could not get in. (years ago, my home was burgled. The first tim, the burglars forced the door. They also stole keys. They returned a couple of wek later. They tried to get in using the stolen keys (we know this because they left the stolen keys in the door). When they could not get in (because we had added bolts to the door as or landlord wouldmn't change the lock) they broke in through a wondow instead.

To make a claim, you'd have to show that, on a balance of probablilities (not beyond reasonable sdount) that the landlord was negligent and that the negligence resulted in your losses.

You'd almost certainly lose on the first but even if you didn't, you'd lose on the second as the liklihood is that the buglary would still hjave happened even if the locak had ben changed.

And even iof you won on both, then the fact that you had no insurance and that you admit it is possible you left the door unlocked would cause you major issues.

It sucks that you have lost your property but unfortunately you don;t have an way to make someone else liable for that, unless of course the burglars are caught and your posessions recovered, which is, sadly,fairly unlikely.

FBaby

You do realise that even secured homes gets burgled? We were burgled through our french window which was locked and considered secured. Yet it took them only a few seconds to wack it open.

The most likely reason you were burgled is that you were watched and the criminals learnt that you spent many nights away. They knew they had plenty of time to act, and that's why they targeted your home. A more secured door would most certainly not have stopped them.