Exiting my agreement early

Jonbo55

Hi all,

i am looking or a little bit of advice as to where i stand with my currently situation and some guidance on how to move forward.

to make a long story short, I am in a 12 month tenancy agreement, which is due to end 15th June 2017. We have have multiple problems with the property, many of which were outlined to us when we first moved in, but we were reassured that "the maintenance guys" had been contacted and would be out to fix them the following week.

to list a few things that were wrong
- Downstairs loo didn't work - 15th June 2016
- Cracks in the walls in the toilet 15th June 2016
- All 3 bins (household, recycling and garden waste) were not there when we moved in - 15th June 2016

further down the line, a few more things went wrong
- Kitchen sink leaked and ruined the cupboard and its contents - August 2016
- Dishwasher stopped working December 2016
- Kitchen door handles all started to fall off - December 2016
- En suit shower stopped draining - December 2016

all of these problems were reported as soon as we came across them, of which we have evidence.

Firstly we were told to "ask the neighbors if they had seen the bins and that all 3 were there on the initiatory - we checked, they weren't. neighbors hadn't seen them - after 4 weeks, we got bins.

Secondly our dishwasher broke, which thankfully was fixed 4 weeks after reported.

Lastly On 10th March 2017 (9 months after moving in) a maintenance man finally turned up and fixed the loo, sink and en suit but said he had to order parts for the kitchen handles and didn't even mention the cracks in the walls and when questioned didn't even know what we were on about.

Since 10th March we have not heard about the progress on our door handles, despite pestering the letting agent. As a result out 10 month old son grabbed one of the handles, it fell off and he fell pretty hard onto his head.

Now, we have contacted the agent and advised, we are no longer happy to be in the property, outline our reasons and originally we were told we would have to pay £300 to break the agreement and give a date we wanted to leave - we were fine with that, we found somewhere to go and agreed a date - i called today to advised of this and the agent was straight on the defensive, being very aggressive and dismissive of my situation. he advised the landlord would not agree a early release and i would have to pay all the rent till the end of the contract ( at this point he hadn't even asked the LL yet) i tired to explain the letting agencies failings and pointed out - the date on our contact is wrong and there is no reference to any "early release" terms anywhere in the document (this has been confirmed by another letting agency) we have advised we want to leave on the 28th of April and are happy to pay till the 15th may. the Agent refused to give our reasons to the LL as our reason for leaving which baffles me as to why they would not do this?

i apologies for the lengthy story, but would appreciate anyone to give me some guidance on what i may be able to do in this situation.

thanks all . :j

Pixie5740

1) Your contract is with the landlord not the letting agency. The letting agency just act on the landlord's behalf.

2) None of the "issues" you've had with the property give you the right to end the tenancy early.

3) Unless there is a break clause in your contract and you invoke it, you are legally obligated to pay rent until the end of your fixed term.

Your landlord has no obligation to end your tenancy early. If you want to end it during your fixed term you have to negotiate an early surrender with your landlord and your landlord can dictate the terms. The landlord is also free to say, "no."

pmlindyloo

I am afraid that failure to deal with repairs should have been escalated by you at the time. Now that they have been fixed this is not a basis to leave a contract. (I would fix the door handle yourself if you have a young one)

So, what are your options?

Have you checked that your tenancy agreement doesn't have a break clause?
Have you actually written to the landlord yourself and asked for an early surrender?
Did you get the early surrender and £300 payment agreed in any written form or was it just a conversation?

Unless any of the above work out to your advantage then I am sorry to say that you are stuck with the rent to the end of the contract. Have you actually signed a new tenancy agreement for your new place? Is it too late to 'pull out'?

Marvel1

I can only advise for future and learn from this, if a property is not up to standard and the landlord/agent says they will be done before or just after - walk away it's not. A decent landlord would have problems fixed before viewings.

Cakeguts

Kitchen door handles and en suite not draining properly are actually down to you to fix not the landlord. If the kitchen door handles and the en suite were working for the first 6 months then they were actually in working order when you moved in.

When the door handles started to work loose it was your job to make them secure. An en suite that has ceased to drain is because something is blocking the drain. This could be a build up of soap. You unblock it.

No one can predict how long a dishwasher will work for before it has a problem. I have no idea how a kitchen sink suddenly starts to leak. Do you mean that you accidentally disturbed the join in the drain part in the cupboard under the sink?

Apart from what was there when you moved in all the rest are things that happen when someone lives in a house. Door handles should have been fixed by you because they were not loose when you moved in. The en suite drain should have been fixed by you because it worked when you moved in. You can't expect a landlord to predict what a tenant is going to do in a house to cause problems to the house. The kitchen handle falling on your child's head is your fault.

Nothing that you have mentioned is anything that will allow you to break your tenancy agreement if there is no break clause.

It doesn't matter how happy you are to pay until 15th May because you contracted to pay until 15th June. The right is not on your side here. You can't dictate your terms to the landlord

I would suggest that you read up on tenant's responsibilities and the correct way to end a tenancy.

If you have agreed to another tenancy the only way forward is to pay the rent for both properties.

saajan_12

I’ll go through each of your complaints but most sound minor tbh.

- Downstairs loo didn't work – fixed 9 months later. You could have complained / chased before this but now its too late.
- Cracks in the walls in the toilet – does this really affect you other than cosmetically? You should have chased this earlier and followed the Shelter process but not enough to break a your tenancy.
- All 3 bins were not there when we moved in – you got bins 4 weeks later, so all good
- Kitchen sink leaked and ruined the cupboard and its contents – Unless you can establish this was the LL’s fault (unfit for purpose / broken from the start) this is likely to be due to being impacted by the tenant or damanged by excess water, which is your responsibility. Anyway, fixed 9 months later so now its too late
- Dishwasher stopped working – fixed 4 weeks later so all good
- Kitchen door handles all started to fall off – these were fine for 6 months so appear good quality / fitting at the start. Any loosening due to adults / babies pulling too much on them are the tenant’s fault and responsibility to fix. In fact I think this would be deducted from your deposit if you don’t remedy at your cost.
- En suit shower stopped draining – 6months later and just the shower not all drains so likely inside the property -> this sounds like a drain blocked by soap/hair/debris, which is a tenant issue. Anyway, fixed 9 months later so now its too late.

All your issues are minor, and either now resolved or a tenant issue so there is no reason to break your tenancy. You could have followed the Shelter process earlier, but the place was perfectly habitable and your wanting to move out now, just after it was all fixed sounds like you found a better place and are looking for an excuse.

Given you have no valid reason to break your agreement, the LL is under no obligation to agree an early release, and can require any conditions / fees they like. You are requesting to amend or cancel a written contract, so any verbal offers by the agent are meaningless, and the agreement needs to be changed in writing. Your only options are to pay until 15June and move out by that date, or agree an early release and follow whatever the LL suggests.