Panicking over awful state of new rented house we're moving into

[Sleepyhamster]

What the hell do we do!?

Got the keys yesterday for the rented house we are moving into on Monday. First of all, it is filthy. The landlord have now hired professional cleaners which is happening today, and DP is going to rug doctor the carpets. The bigger issue is the general state of the house. We viewed it two years ago, and It had just been renovated and was lovely. However, it seems yo have degraded an astonishing amount - cracked plaster and peeling paint everywhere, and it STINKS of damp. I feel devestated. We are leaving our current house due to damp that only became apparent after moving in.

We will have to move in as everything is booked, and we've given notice on our current house (that I now feel a panicky attachment to) we are going to speak to the landlord about what needs doing in terms of repairs.

I feel like the house has been misrepresented to be honest, and feel angry at the time and expense of moving when I imagine we'll be looking to move again soon.

I don't know if there's anything we can do on terms of being compensated for this. The landlord is surely in breach of their side of the tenancy agreement?

Also if you have not signed off the inventory, only do so with amendments on it signifying the exact amount of wear and tear, any problems and so forth. That's where you will lose money when you move out if you don't document any issues, right down to a stain on the carpet etc.

Let them do the remedial cleaning, visit again with the agent/landlord and only sign the inventory when it actually reflects the state of the house in all aspects.

Damp- see if you can actually get to the bottom of this, a bit of mould in the corners of a bathroom or slightly peeling paint in a bathroom after two years indicates the tenants didn't care to open the windows, not a full scale house wide damp problem....

@BrilliantBulb

The damp smell can hopefully be sorted with bleach to kill the old stuff and then keeping windows on the latch and the heating on over winter. If the OP is moving from her place because of damp then I don’t think it’s going to be as simple as having a hopeful attitude and some bleach.

Depends. If it’s just a smell of damp due to bad ventilation for example then that’s not actually a big deal and can be dealt with pretty easily. Musty smell doesn’t mean much in and of itself. OP didn’t say there’s visible damp, did she.

But I agree with pp that breaking the lease would probably be better as OP has already had one horrible experience with damp and it makes no sense to potentially move from one awful home to another.

Good luck with sorting it out, @Sleepyhamster. If you can afford to lose the deposits then I’d do that.