Witholding rent due to noise issues

EagerLearner

I helped my brother get some tenants in to his flat last October and sadly (despite being 20 year old girls, butter wouldn't melt in their mouth, first home away from home etc), they and their boyfriends/party mates became THE noisy tenants in a building where the ground floor was also noisy. So they were implicated in all the noise, and responsible for half ot it as well. Neighbours on lower ground floor and either side kicked up an almighty fuss and it worked - we (as landlords) got the police, local authority and neighbours all talking. The tenants father was the guarantor, so eventually we made sure *he* was the one getting late calls at night and also letters from the council and calls from police. The Managing Agents, police, neighbours and council were angry and onto them. After months of hell (and late payments, no payment in January at all) we finally got them out last week. The father knows better than to expect all the deposit back, as rent is due plus all the carpets are atrocious in just a few months - he dreads what would have happened with a 1 or 2 year tenance. We registered with Tenancy Deposit Scheme in the beginning so all will be sorted soon enough.

In essence, get as many people involved as you can whilst being polite and putting things in writing to ensure you have solid evidence. Dawn Advice are a great legal free service re deposits - search Google as can't remember their number.

Ugh, why do I get the feeling I should never be involved on either side of property rental...

Trollfever

And you think you have problems:

Mum trashes £325,000 home
By [EMAIL="news@theargus.co.uk"]Andy Chiles[/EMAIL]
A nightmare tenant and her eight children turned a woman's £325,000 home into a wreck - while failing to pay rent for THREE years.
Evicted Leslie Cole left an incredible mound of rubbish and destruction in her wake, complete with two abandoned cars in the front garden.

The comments have been removed but the full story is here:

http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/generalnews/display.var.1985710.0.mum_trashes_325_000_home.php

Debt_Free_Chick

JoeChip wrote: »

"However, I have agreed with Mrs **** that if the issues prove not to be resolved within the agreed timescale then we will release you early from your agreement."

Thank you for your letter blah, blah, blah.

In the unfortunate event that matters are not resolved, would you please confirm the terms and conditions under which the tenancy could be ended, by us. In particular, please confirm the notice we would need to give. Please also confirm that there will be no charges, fees or penalties.

Yours sincerely


Joe Chip

JoeChip

thanks again to people replying. it looks as if we will have to get a letter to LA/LL on moving early, and will use Debt Free Chicks text as a basis for it. Last night upstairs neighbours boiler was going on and off making noise and there was lots of banging around by tenants. My wife asked them to turn the boiler off which they did about 15 minutes later. Boiler has been looked at before by LLs handymen/repairers when it was noisy before and they commented that the upstairs tenants should not be messing around with the settings. They sorted it out. My wife will be speaking to LA/LL about this again today.
LA also spoke to wife yesterday regarding moving early and say they cannot get in touch with LL as they are on holiday! A bit convenient.

Looks like a talk to CAb and EH is in order

fenbubbles

Hi Joechip

My son is in a similar situation. Noisy neighbours are so bad that he is getting little sleep. He has tried to reason with them but no luck there, the noise got worse. Has been to the landlord several times and the neighbours have had letters of warning. The letting agents now say they are trying to get them out but the situation has now turned into a vendetta. These scumbags are now doing things like leaving lighted cigarettes on the carpet outside his front door and this left a burnt hole in the carpet. He's has done everything he can to deal with the situation legally and is now having to wait for the eviction process to run it's course which he has been told can take two months. Surely there must be something else that can be done? Basically his life (and the landlords building) is being put in danger. A visit to the Police has been no help at all - they're really not interested.

I wish you the best of luck with your situation. I know from my son's experience how stressful it is.

caringa

Being landlords ourselves (kind and considerate of course!) one of our tenants had a similar problem which he bought to us. We wrote to the offending flat owner and said we would be taking legal action if the noise continued and that seems to have done the trick. Might have been just lucky but from our point of view, we obviously would have not been too pleased if our tenant had withheld rent. So best advise is - dont withheld rent as this will put you on the wrong footing with your landlord. Try to get your landlord to put some pressure on for you. Good luck!