Landlord not paying for hotel costs during house flood

[Deleted User]

Dear all,

I would appreciate advise on this matter urgently!!

In february this year our flat [rented out to us by landlord] had a burst pipe and there was an extensive flood throughout the flat. There was no hot water or heating during this time and many of our contents were damaged due to water across the entire bottom floor of the flat.

During this period the flat was not inhabitable due to the above issues. We had to stay in hotels for the duration of a week. The landlord agreed to pay these hotel costs to us. Now four months down the line we have still received nothing. The landlord continually says she is waiting for insurers to pay her. We have said continually that we should not have to wait for insurers and she should pay us out of her own pocket and then await the insurance herself. She ignores the question and continues to just say she will wait for insurance.

It is now approaching five months, we ended our tenancy in March and do not know what else we can do to get our money back! It is hundreds of pounds!

Can we take this to small claims court? She is not refusing to pay, she is just stalling us and refusing to pay out of her own pocket whilst providing no evidence to show that she is actually waiting for insurance to pay.

Any advice would be much appreciated

thesaint

She is right in that she should wait for her insurers to apy out, if indeed that is what she is doing.

Do you have any proof that she would pay for your hotel?

[Deleted User]

I'd send a letter before action. In your position, I'd be wondering at the delay (if it exists) in receiving money from insurers.

Pixie5740

Unless your landlord was negligent I don't think she has to reimburse you for your hotel costs. Therefore, if your landlord has decided to go above and beyond by offering to reimburse you then you might just have to wait until her insurers have paid out.

G_M

Not sure what happened after the hotel - you returned to the property and the tenancy continued? Fo how long? Did you deduct the hotel cost from the rent?

That was the obvious solution.

Only 2 options now

* wait for the insurance payout, though that should only take days or weeks - not months

* Letter Before action, enclosing copy of your proof that she agreed to re-imburse you plus copies of the hotel bils

clockworks_2

Insurance pay outs are more likely to months rather than days or weeks.

[Deleted User]

The landlord agreed to pay it as the flat was literally flooded and unable to walk in it, we asked the landlord if we could either not pay rent which she refused to do. She said that we have to pay rent so we did to avoid any dispute.

Now we are out of pocket from both paying the rent and paying the hotel costs on top!

She has not provided any evidence that she has submitted the costs to insurance. This happened in February and it is now June. She is also avoiding our emails.

Losing hope!

Rain_Shadow

Sallyleila wrote: »

The landlord agreed to pay it as the flat was literally flooded and unable to walk in it, we asked the landlord if we could either not pay rent which she refused to do. She said that we have to pay rent so we did to avoid any dispute.

Now we are out of pocket from both paying the rent and paying the hotel costs on top!

She has not provided any evidence that she has submitted the costs to insurance. This happened in February and it is now June. She is also avoiding our emails.

Losing hope!

What evidence do you have that she agreed to pay the hotel bill?

booksurr

was the flood due to LL negligence (LL is in breach of his "repairing obligation")?

http://www.landlordsguild.com/house-destroyed-by-fire-or-flood/

how strong do you think your claim against the LL is?

did you have tenants contents insurance?

discat11

RS's point above is very pertinent. Do you have written evidence She agreed to recompense you for the hotel?

[Deleted User]

I do have evidence in the form of several text messages where the landlord has stated that they will submit the hotel costs to insurance and then we will be recompensed. I also have text evidence where I stated we are not happy to pay full price of rent and we would like the hotel costs deducted from the cost of rent, however the landlord refused to do this and said we would be in breach of our contract.

The flood was caused by a burst pipe. It took the landlord five hours to stop the pipe leak, at which point water had spread throughout the flat. It then took them over a week to fix the hot water and heating. The flat was also not inhabitable due to water on the floor.

i am not sure I could argue that the burst pipe was the landlords fault/responsibility however the time it took for them to get someone to come to the flat to clean it and get hot water and heating running again was excessive. They also did not professionally clean the flat after the flood and we cleared it up ourselves.