Advice required: Deposit not returned to me (tennant)

Megalomaniac

Hi all,

I need some advice as to what happens next. I'll set out the information, and then the situation. It's a little long but please bare with this.

I moved into a property last September, with another guy who was living there before. I gave him a £300 deposit and paid him the remaining rent of the month until the day when he pays his rent to the landlord. It was then agreed that I would pay the landlord half the rent on the same day as him to not complicate matters. He also gave me a 'contract' signed by him stipulating among other things I need to give him one months notice. Importantly, I did not sign this contract (half a page of A4).

He then returned the £300 deposit to me, and told me to pay it to the landlord which I duely did as I felt this was best. I then went away for a couple of months, came back and met the landlord for the first time. After a 10 min conversation, I left her house having not organised a contract and lived there happily for a year.

I confirmed to my housemate I would move out in September and gave my month's notice then, but because of a long letting process for the flat, I didn't move out until November, only giving him a day's notice that it was to happen (was at the end of the rental month).

Now, I have written to my Landlord for return of the deposit, but have been told because I didn't give a month's notice to my housemate (and supposedly my contract is with him) I have subsequently lost my deposit. This has been used to pay half the rent for the month after I moved out.

So what steps should I take? I also realise the deposit should have been help by a third party as of April this year. So, am I right in saying that if I went to court and the deposit was not protected through a third party (which it wasn't) I could lawfully ask for a refund of my deposit? It states on the following website:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/TenancyDeposit/DG_066373

that "If your landlord or agent has not protected your deposit, they will be ordered to repay three times the amount of the deposit to you".

Do you think I should do this? Also, who is my landlord in this case? The actual landlord for the property who held the deposit or my housemate? Are there other steps I should take prior to this? Am I to blame here?

Really need help in this, as £300 is a lot of money!

Thanks

olly300

Who did you pay rent to? The landlord or the housemate?

The person who you paid rent to is your landlord and legally tenancy agreements can be verbal as well as written so not signing a contract doesn't mean a thing.

Your deposit wouldn't not have needed to be protected because your tenancy agreement started before April 2007.

Megalomaniac

Right, ok, thanks for giving me the protected deposit information.

I paid the rent to my landlord, not my housemate. Therefore, if I pay the landlord the rent and deposit, I assume that person is the person I deal with. My housemate at regualr periods stated what happens between myself and the landlord is nothing to do with him. However, my landlord, when she wrote back to me stating she would not pay me my deposit, said my contract was with my housemate, not with her.

I was never asked or told to give one months notice to my landlord at any point. So who is my contract with (if any) my landlord who I paid, or my housemate who I lived with and subsequently returned my deposit to pay the landlord?

Thanks for your help olly! Any more would be appreciated.

I am definitely thinking of going to my CAB regarding this. I think I am in the right, because as far as I can see, I don't have a financial contract with anyone. Am I right in saying this? Just need this all clarified!

Megalomaniac

Also, just as an aside. If on the contract with my housemate it states a deposit was received, surely, when that deposit was returned to me, the contract is ended?

clutton_2

you need specialist advice on this - go to shelter - they are good at this type of complication

bw

silvercar

Whoever is technically your landlord, you only gave a day's notice. By default the notice should be at least one month to end on a rent day.

With no written contract, your actions ie paying rent would demm you to have accepted the tenancy and therefore you are liable for the last months rent.

Megalomaniac

For future reference, I spoke to Shelter and they said because I had given my notice, but had stayed on through that, any agreement in place had ended at that point and I could move out whenever I wanted after that. I shall be chasing this up through my housemate and be reclaiming my deposit back, through court proceedings if need be. Thanks for everyone's help.

real1314

Hmmm, I think you may have either been given bad advice, perhaps not explained it properly, or perhaps heard what you want to.

otherwise, I could give notice at day 1 (or the end of an initial 6 months), stay on as long as I want (3, 4 or 5 years), then just up sticks without notice.

I'd suggest that once you stayed on past your notice, the notice expired as you did not complete the act.

So, you gave 1 day.

wherediditallgo

I once lived in a houseshare where one of the residents collected all the rents & sent off a personal cheque to cover the total amount. If people paid by cheque, they were made out to him not the owner of the property. The rent-collecting resident told me he was the licencee – he was the go-between with the landlord, dealt with any problems with the property, & when people were moving out they gave their notice to him. I didn’t pay a deposit to live there, just a month’s rent in advance, so there was no deposit to be argued over when I moved out. (I can’t speak for the others though, as they were there before me. )

To all intents & purposes, the person I paid my rent to was my landlord, though he was also my housemate. Your case is different, because (a) when you moved in, you gave your housemate a deposit, which he returned to you when the first full month’s rent was due & told you to pay it to the landlord, which you did, (b) you agreed to pay rent to the landlord, not to the housemate, & did so for a year without it being a problem, & (c) your housemate “at regualr periods stated what happens between myself and the landlord is nothing to do with him” & you continued to live there for a year without that being an issue.

You had a verbal agreement with your housemate to give a month’s notice. You gave a month’s notice in September, but stayed until November, thus wiping out the notice period altogether, as that month no longer existed. The month’s notice isn’t just to let them know you’ll be moving out in a month, it’s also to give them time to find someone else to take over the tenancy if they so wish. By you not moving out at the end of the notice period, you put your housemate/landlord in a position where they couldn’t get someone else in as planned. I appreciate that the delay wasn’t your fault, but once you had finalised your moving date, you should have either given a month’s notice again or paid a month’s rent in lieu. You'd have then been entitled to your deposit back (taking into account any deductions for damage etc).

I can well believe that your housemate is trusted by the landlord to decide on who shares the property with him, rather than end up with someone he doesn't think he can get on with. In return, he has to ensure they know they have to give a month’s notice & tell the landlord when appropriate notice has or hasn’t been given, hence the contract he presented you with. However, he quite rightly didn’t wish to have an actual landlord-tenant relationship with anyone else living there, & told you as much, clearly with the landlord's knowledge. I wouldn't be surprised if the rental is for the whole property rather than per room or tenant, & the landlord would be looking for all of the rent from your housemate if he hadn’t got your deposit to use instead. So when you only gave a day’s notice, he told the landlord, who then decided to take your deposit in lieu of rent.

I don’t think you’ve got a leg to stand on, to be honest. Whichever one ends up as your landlord (I don’t think it’s your housemate), you didn’t give the month’s notice required and forfeited your deposit as a result.

Megalomaniac

Thanks for your replies. This is what the guy from Shelter informed me with:

From the situation you describe it sounds as though you’re an excluded occupier and your landlord is your housemate. It’s not necessary to have a written contract to create a tenancy or licence, so the fact you’ve not signed the contract written by your housemate doesn’t make any difference in your case.

In order for you to have created a tenancy with the landlord, your original agreement with your housemate would need to have been ended. This can take place by either you or your housemate giving the other notice, or by surrender. Surrender can only take place if there if an unequivocal agreement on both sides that the tenancy/licence will end. This didn’t happen, so your original agreement stands even though you arranged to pay rent to the landlord and to give your deposit to her.

The amount of notice that an excluded occupier has to give needs to be equal to your rental period. (For example, one month if you pay your rent monthly). In order to be valid it must also end the day your rent is due.

Once the notice ends you no longer have a right to live in the home, so in your case, if your housemate agreed you could stay longer this was a separate arrangement and you’d not have needed to give notice again (as long as your original notice was correct).

You can read more about the rights of excluded occupiers here:

http://england.shelter.org.uk/advice/advice-2938.cfm

moneysavinmonkey

Megalomaniac wrote: »

Thanks for your replies. This is what the guy from Shelter informed me with:

From the situation you describe it sounds as though you’re an excluded occupier and your landlord is your housemate.

when you first lived in the property & paid rent to your housemate this would seem to be the case

It’s not necessary to have a written contract to create a tenancy or licence, so the fact you’ve not signed the contract written by your housemate doesn’t make any difference in your case.

similarly then, a contract was not needed to create a valid AST tenancy agreement with the landlord

In order for you to have created a tenancy with the landlord, your original agreement with your housemate would need to have been ended. This can take place by either you or your housemate giving the other notice, or by surrender. Surrender can only take place if there if an unequivocal agreement on both sides that the tenancy/licence will end.

when you housemate returned your deposit & you agreed to pay your rent to the landlord this was agreement by both you and your housemate to end the original tenancy agreement

you were then free to start paying rent to the landlord and a new agreement was created - the landlord surely by definition is who you are paying hte money to.

This didn’t happen, so your original agreement stands even though you arranged to pay rent to the landlord and to give your deposit to her.

why are shelter saying that you did not end the previous agreement? i don't understand this statement

The amount of notice that an excluded occupier has to give needs to be equal to your rental period. (For example, one month if you pay your rent monthly). In order to be valid it must also end the day your rent is due.

Once the notice ends you no longer have a right to live in the home, so in your case, if your housemate agreed you could stay longer this was a separate arrangement and you’d not have needed to give notice again (as long as your original notice was correct).
[COLOR="rgb(255, 0, 255)"] did your housemate agree you could stay longer - was it up to him - or did you need to ask the landlord [/COLOR]


You can read more about the rights of excluded occupiers here:

http://england.shelter.org.uk/advice/advice-2938.cfm

hmm. you have not convinced me you are an excluded occupier. I think you were at first, but when you agreed to pay the landlord directly and went to see them to confirm the tenancy then you would be an AST tenant

The information that shelter has given you, the details you have given us + the conclusion you have reached do not quite match up.

In all honesty you really only gave the landlord one day notice in order to get another person into the house so it is entirely reasonable to forfeit your deposit. Sorry if this isn't what you wanted to hear. I don't think you'd get very far with a county court claim & could end up costing you even more as you say your deposit only covers half a months rent....

ps. i'm usually a landlord bashing MSEer so it pains me to give this advice!