Am I a horrible person to be kind of happy about this?

[hatesomethinchangesomethin]

We got evicted in March.

Our LL was the worst we've ever had. She told us she wanted more money which is fine it's her house.. but she didn't fix a single thing in the time we were there. Apart from when the back door seized up and wouldn't open so she sent a locksmith round and asked if they could possibly leave the lock out because it cost less to fix. So she wanted to leave us without a locking door. The locksmith said no thank god. She also didn't provide any smoke alarms or carbon monoxide alarms when we moved in despite having a working wood burning stove and solid fuel aga so I had to provide those. When we moved out I took the carbon monoxide alarms with us because they cost a fair amount and I bought them! She actually had the audacity to try and charge us for taking them away with us because ' it's unsafe' well no shit Sherlock that's why I bought them!! She also just randomly turned up and let herself in as and when she wanted until we changed the locks and had a go at us for not giving her a key, but after she let the dog out to play in the traffic we couldn't risk it.

Anyway! It's still on Rightmove to let, it's just been decreased from 1200 to 850 which is what we paid. It's not really worth 850 but it's her house. Then when I walk past and see the garden all overgrown and weedy it just makes me laugh, it's a small village and she doesn't live here.

The tenants that were there before us were in the pub the other day talking to someone who mentioned that they had viewed it and they just destroyed the LL, admittedly they had a worse time of it than we did but it was quite funny listening. It's been on the market for 5 months because she put it on there before we moved out. Very luckily we managed to buy a house in the village in that time.

YANBU, she sounds like a greedy, selfish cow.

My sister in law had a similar experience, landlord tried to double the rent so they left, then it was empty for months, she rang them and offered it back to them at the same as original and they took great pleasure in telling her they'd bought a house so no thank you!

You're definitely not a horrible person

No you’re not horrible. I’m a LL. She sounds vile and a shark. Greedy. Hopefully the word will get around and the property will be vacant for a lot longer. Words fail me on her total lack of care for your personal safety.

We're LLs in one country and rent in another. Our previous LL was just horrendous; the last straw was when was tried to charge us for a new water heater (the existing one was leaking through the ceiling) and threatened to put the rent up hugely if we didn't. We have two young kids and lockdown was looming, so we stupidly sucked up the cost, not wanting to move. Then less than six weeks later, on our renewal date, he - you guessed it - put the rent up anyway. We found a far nicer place just around the corner for the same price, and it gives me great satisfaction every morning when I pass the old place to see it's still empty

She sounds awful but yabu to delight in another's misfortune

Small karmic victories!

@Limpshade yes I think it's satisfaction! She's just a dreadful landlord. It did make me laugh when I heard him slagging her off to the people who saw it.

Some more terrifying snippets from
Our time there.

Our solid fuel aga was never serviced in the 2 years we were there despite asking, then when we left she tried to charge us for all the shit it failed on, but I had her emails stating it wasn't necessary and to pay for it ourselves if it meant that much to us. Oh sorry for not wanting to die!

She sounds horrendous! Glad you won't have any more dealings with her. Yanbu

Serves her right.

@betteliefsen

She sounds awful but yabu to delight in another's misfortune

It's not misfortune it's entirely her own doing. Misfortune implies bad luck, this was just a woman being a horrible, greedy, irresponsible cow and now facing the consequences. Ha.

We sold our house in London and signed up to a short term let near my parents contract signed deposit paid. I was pregnant with a toddler. The day before the move the landlord rang to say we couldn’t have the house as he had a potential buyer. I thought he was joking it was so bad. So we had all our belongings in a lorry and nowhere to go.

The LL was a religious pillar of the community type. Sadly for him my parents massively plugged in in their community and they made sure everyone knew how he had behaved.

Even funnier the potential sale came to nothing ha

@MsTSwift ouch! Serves him right!!

YANBU to have these thoughts/feelings.

YABU for gossiping about her in the pub.

How could someone who’d simply viewed a property on the market have “had a worse time of it” than tenants? Were they also past tenants.

@Dozer the previous tenants were bitching about her in the pub.. the previous tenants moved out 2 years ago but lived there for 5 years and so much went wrong, they still live in the village...

@Dozer

YANBU to have these thoughts/feelings.

YABU for gossiping about her in the pub.

She wasn't gossiping in the pub, it was the previous tenant who was and she overheard it.

Not a horrible person, she sounds awful! I bet she can’t understand why it’s not selling either, she sounds like the sort of person who doesn’t acknowledge their own faults and wrongdoings.

Oh this is well placed schadenfreude!!

LL has reaped what she has sown!!

Sure, YANBU if you literally just listened. Often, to “destroy” people verbally in public people doing the talking have some encouragement!

It's not "misfortune," it's "consequences."

Laughing at the LL's misfortune would be laughing if the roof blew off in a hurricane. Laughing because their lazy, grasping and uncaring behaviour now means no one wants to rent their house is an entirely different matter.

We bought a house three years ago and it had previously been rented out for over 30 years. The landlords were similar to yours OP. Absolutely horrible people. The sale was a nightmare and they came back with a van to collect the furniture that was left which honestly was only fit for a skip. The place was in an awful state (which is why we bought it as it's a nice area so it was the cheapest house in a nice spot). There was basically no kitchen. The cabinets were hanging off. They hadn't bothered giving notice to the current tenant who had young children. I felt so sorry for her having had to deal with such a horrible landlord. She had the place spotless in spite of the state of it and she was paying a high rent. They just expected her to just leave on their say so. There were several other issues with them. They were just nasty scummy people

@betteliefsen

She sounds awful but yabu to delight in another's misfortune

It's not 'misfortune', it's an entirely deserved consequence of being an avaricious crook.

Glad you're in a better situation now OP. There should be laws against LLs like her.

It's not gossiping to warn someone of bad experiences they've had with a LL. Or indeed any organisation that's provided a shoddy service. This woman made a conscious choice not to keep a property safe.

She could have been fined up to £5,000 for not providing a smoke alarm/carbon monoxide detector.

Having a had a fair few landlords myself OP, YANBU. It's AWFUL when you have a mean one.

Ours is currently absolutely LOVELY. So we feel lucky.