Rental property with faulty front door garage

varghesejim

Hi, our rental property has a garage with a door in the front.But it only has a opening to the rear(to garden). We are not provided with the keys to the main front garage door(I think the door up and over electric mechanism has some issue which is not evident at first look). At the time of viewing we didn't check the garage and we are not told about this issue. We didn't imagine a situation a good sized garage couldn't be opened from the front!

Looked into the property advertisement again. It said "garage with rear door opening to rear garden". The ad sweetly cover the issue of non operable front door with a politically correct statement.

What are our rights in this issue? Can we ask to repair the front door so that we can access it from the front?

Guest101

You can ask, ofcourse, but not sure whether you could demand.

varghesejim

Guest101 wrote: »

You can ask, ofcourse, but not sure whether you could demand.

For such an obvious and misleading fault, don't the EA need to tell this is advance? Is there any law protecting tenants from such problems?

Guest101

varghesejim wrote: »

For such an obvious and misleading fault, don't the EA need to tell this is advance? Is there any law protecting tenants from such problems?

It's unlikely the agents ever used the garage, so how would they know?


Yes there is consumer protection, but it's limited. First point of call is to ask in any case. If they refuse then we can look at the law

varghesejim

Guest101 wrote: »

It's unlikely the agents ever used the garage, so how would they know?


Yes there is consumer protection, but it's limited. First point of call is to ask in any case. If they refuse then we can look at the law

I think they knew it. The statement "garage with rear door opening to rear garden" suggests to me that they knew it all along.

As you said, let me talk to EA and let us see what they say

saajan_12

What exactly to you need protecting from? The ad clearly stated you would only have access from the rear, so at the viewing you could have enquired about the front opening. Nothing has changed since the viewing so you are getting what you bargained for.

varghesejim

saajan_12 wrote: »

What exactly to you need protecting from? The ad clearly stated you would only have access from the rear, so at the viewing you could have enquired about the front opening. Nothing has changed since the viewing so you are getting what you bargained for.

Where did you get "only" from?

xylophone

garage with rear door opening to rear garden".

I don't see how this statement negates a tenant's quite reasonable expectation that the garage would be usable as a garage or implies that the front door does not open.

My house has a garage with front door (fully openable to allow car and
personal access) and a back door which is big enough to allow personal access only.

The OP should contact the managing agent and ask for the mechanism to be repaired.

IAmWales

varghesejim wrote: »

I think they knew it. The statement "garage with rear door opening to rear garden" suggests to me that they knew it all along.

As you said, let me talk to EA and let us see what they say

They knew that the garage only opened from the rear, and had you bothered to read the particulars, you would have too. The garage was not misrepresented.

Have you looked into the cost of fixing the door? Tbe landlord may be more open to resolving your issue if you pay for it.

SeduLOUs

saajan_12 wrote: »

What exactly to you need protecting from? The ad clearly stated you would only have access from the rear, so at the viewing you could have enquired about the front opening. Nothing has changed since the viewing so you are getting what you bargained for.

I don't think the ad said that the rear door was the ONLY access - if it did mean that it certainly wasn't stated 'clearly'. Besides, even if they did mean that, the large front door of the garage was presumably visible at the viewing.

For a garage it would normally be safe to assume that there is a large accessible front door that you can drive a car into. For me, specifically mentioning that the garage has a large front door would be akin to mentioning that the bathroom has a toilet. Therefore, I personally would have read the ad to mean that there is an additional door from the garden as well as the main door.

varghesejim

IAmWales wrote: »

had you bothered to read the particulars, you would have too. The garage was not misrepresented.

A statement of a feature does not negate anything else.