Giving notice on my tenancy with a social housing landlord - can they do this?

[StormyLovesOdd]

Just had the pre assessment check done as we've given notice that we're leaving and buying a home.

The house has been well looked after, all nicely decorated etc.

Our landlords have told us before we leave our tenancy we have to change the nice light fittings in the kitchen to fluorescent strip lights, there are 2 lights so this is going to cost about £60.

We also have to change all the crome light switches/plugs to white plastic ones - this will cost about £50.

Take up and dispose of the perfectly nice carpet and strip the perfectly fine and neutral wallpaper off the walls.

They are also going to charge us for missing skirtingboards behind our fitted wardrobes. These skirtingboards were not there when we moved in (20 years ago) as there has always been fitted wardrobes there.

Can they do this? I think all of this work and the recharge will end up quite expensive and we frankly can't afford it.

Having a similar issue here and its infuriating.

Requested new front door as ours was broken and damaged, also air was travelling through gaps ..they refused and said it was useable so wouldnt replace.

We saved hard and paid for a solid wood door, new frame; and professional installation at a cost of £1400. When they installed it became clear the actual door frame wasnt screwed into the walls it was " screwed" into the air cavity and only secured top and bottom.

They are now mentioning us having to pay upwards of £200 to replace with their bog standard ones when we move.

We also have to rip out the new bathroom we installed and the porch that was built. Vegetable planters. Shed. Decent flooring.

I get their reasoning but it's so wasteful and frustrating.

There was fitted wardrobes but they were falling apart our new(ish) Pax wardrobes look like fitted wardrobes as they fill the whole space but they're not really fitted.

I will advertise the shed on Facebook as free on collection, hopefully someone will want it and will dismantle it. Don't know where we will keep our bikes and lawnmower though in the gap between the shed going and us moving to the new house.

It's a lovely idea to take the carpets up and give them to the new tenant but we don't have anywhere to store them. It's only a small terrace house

Decisively - your HA sounds even worse than ours, I feel your pain.

They are "letting" us leave the lovely decking we brought which covers the mess of cracked concrete which there before so I suppose it could be worse.

@luckystarmaking

You're crazy for giving up the tenancy. You should have rented out the other home. Residual income and an investment for your future.

OP isn't crazy. She has morals. We have an acute housing crisis with ever increasing levels of homelessness. Families living in temporary accommodation rooms for years (at huge costs to the taxpayer), rising numbers of rough sleepers.

OP can afford to buy her own home and is doing the right thing by freeing up her social housing for someone who can't afford to even rent. Thank you OP. I really hope things work out for you in your new home.

@Decisivelyindecisive

It's literally all in the tenancy agreements that social landlords make tenants sign. You spent all that money knowing that this would need to be done at the end of your tenancy.

When people change the houses without permission, they don't necessarily install things properly even if they personally think it's an upgrade. HA rip it out to make sure everything has the same functional starting point and someone doesn't get a house full of potential bodge jobs. Imagine if they let out a house with a fancy kitchen that your brothers cousins mate installed for you and one of the cupboards fell on top of the next tenant. Or they left the carpets and didn't notice a massive bodge job on the flooring.

I think people forget sometimes that not everyone does things properly and the HA will find ALLSORTS of weird and wonderful "upgrades" in their properties. Much easier to have a policy about removing them all rather than spending time arguing about which ones should be allowed to stay.

It's literally all in the tenancy agreements that social landlords make tenants sign.

I'd say you're being optimistic about how competent housing associations are. Quite likely they demand things that aren't in the tenancy agreement, especially for long term tenants.

I'd say you're being optimistic about how competent housing associations are. Quite likely they demand things that aren't in the tenancy agreement, especially for long term tenants.

This would surprise me considering the ones I've dealt with have always been very quick to protect their properties and anything that could damage the value of them 😂 and the tenancy agreements reflected that.

I know and agree. It's just frustrating. This is a move we werent expecting to make any time soon ( moving due to dc disabilities) so it's just a little frustrating