To not put the house back to what it was?

[QuantumDog2]

I've rented the house I live in currently for nearly 9 years. When I moved in it was a new build and we were the first to live here, so obviously a buy to let. The walls were all trade paint magnolia and the carpets were cheap, exactly the way new builds are presented as standard.
Over the years I've decorated it and made some improvements like extending the patio and I spend £1400 on new flooring for the lounge because the carpet was worn out by that stage and looked grotty.
Now I'm leaving as I've bought somewhere with my partner, but contractually apparently I have to return the property the way I found it. I'm 6 months pregnant now and don't fancy donning my overalls and climbing ladders to paint. What would you do? I feel like after 9 years here and the time and money I've spent on the place (although my choice totally) I shouldn't really be penalised, but I expect I will lose my deposit?

I'm team quantum.
The LL can't have their cake and eat it.

Good luck with the move and the baby OP

Alrighty then. I've stated throughout that I'm not bothered about the money. I don't know who pissed in your Cheerios this morning but it wasn't me.

If you're not bothered about the money then stop getting so het up about it and just move on? I'm simply saying that at the end of the day it comes down to a contractual issue (and you're likely in breach of that contract) and a negotiation (which you've likely already lost due to your angry retorts to landlord and agent). Everything else is hot air, conjecture and high blood pressure.
I've been through a dispute with the TDS recently and they were only interested in the facts - not someone's puffed up high opinions of their own home decorating skills!

Suggest you move on emotionally and start planning your new home - good luck!

@mathanxiety

You should have bought a big rug and rug pad to go over the carpet, and you need to return the painted hall and kids' bedrooms to cream.

Do you have friends or family who could do a painting party for you?

It wasn't even painted for the first year that the OP lived there.

I don't think that the OP is being unreasonable, the landlord hasn't decorated or maintained the house in the nine years she has lived there.

@mathanxiety

You should have bought a big rug and rug pad to go over the carpet, and you need to return the painted hall and kids' bedrooms to cream.

Do you have friends or family who could do a painting party for you?

You're suggesting that she should have put down rugs because the LL's carpet wasn't fit for purpose? Are you sure?

That’s simple.
List every change that you have done and ask the landlord if he accepts the way it is or what does he want put back.
The flooring might be acceptable but maybe not the paint.
Pay someone to do it if this is the case.
Improvements in your perspective can be such a pain for your landlord. I am one and my tenant had the audacity to change my whole kitchen cupboards to something I absolutely hated and not even new stuff.
So, think twice. You signed a contract. Follow it or chance losing your deposit.
Good luck.

I was thinking ywbu op but after all the updates fuck em

theyre advertising it based on what it looks like now i bet they havent told the potential renters it will all be magnolia and basic when they move in

@QuantumDog2

Find out exactly what you landlord requires. In writing. And then get it done to a good standard if you [for obvious reasons] cannot do it. I say that as - if you leave it to landlord/agent - you will have absolutely no control over costs. They can use any contractor at any cost and - if an agent is used - they may add their mark-up.

I was a landlord and would never allow a tenant to do anything lasting to decorations. tastes are so varied!

Of course the cleverer thing to do would have been to engage with the property viewers and ask them to specifically request that the decor be retained if they like it - then it would have been a win-win for everyone . . . but now of course you're refusing viewings . . .

I think you should be prepared to return it to magnolia, as you agreed when asking permission to paint, or accept the cost of the landlord doing it being deducted from your deposit.

The fact they haven’t redecorated in 9 years is largely irrelevant- I imagine they would argue that as OP had requested to paint it to her colour scheme, there would have been no point in redecorating themselves. I mean, could you imagine OP bring overjoyed if they’d decided to do a refresh for her but in their chosen colour scheme?! I imagine she’d have been furious if they had tried to do so, destroying her redecoration in the process. And there would have been lots of disapproval from MN about landlords being unfair (and disrupting OP’s right to quiet enjoyment) by undoing her redecorating.

I wonder if the fact she was given permission to repaint on condition she return to neutral colours may carry weight? After all, she did the redecorating in the full knowledge that it should be back to neutral at the end of the tenancy.

OP I can’t help but think you are just antagonising your LL now and making the situation worse.

Surely you need your LL to be onside and state your case logically and reasonably. But all this refusing viewings isn’t helping your situation.

Personally yes I would reach out to her again but even in this thread there are a lot of mixed and muddled messages where you even admit you can’t be bothered to rectify.

I really do see your position but I don’t think you are approaching this in the right way.

I think you’ve been given leeway with changes so perhaps better to get LL on side rather than create hurdles to be overcome.

@Kipperandarthur

OP I can’t help but think you are just antagonising your LL now and making the situation worse.

Surely you need your LL to be onside and state your case logically and reasonably. But all this refusing viewings isn’t helping your situation.

Personally yes I would reach out to her again but even in this thread there are a lot of mixed and muddled messages where you even admit you can’t be bothered to rectify.

I really do see your position but I don’t think you are approaching this in the right way.

I think you’ve been given leeway with changes so perhaps better to get LL on side rather than create hurdles to be overcome.

This!!

The LL is really cheeky, letting you improve the place and then try and claim they paid for half the flooring!

The attitudes on this thread that you should put up with shitty living situations because it’s not your own home are so depressing.

Stick to your guns OP.

@Kipperandarthur

OP I can’t help but think you are just antagonising your LL now and making the situation worse.

Surely you need your LL to be onside and state your case logically and reasonably. But all this refusing viewings isn’t helping your situation.

Personally yes I would reach out to her again but even in this thread there are a lot of mixed and muddled messages where you even admit you can’t be bothered to rectify.

I really do see your position but I don’t think you are approaching this in the right way.

I think you’ve been given leeway with changes so perhaps better to get LL on side rather than create hurdles to be overcome.

Meh.

Your LL is wanting everything for nothing, and making up that they paid for half the flooring? Bollocks to that.

Offer to leave the flooring and the patio, you get your full deposit back without repainting, and you get consulted on agent viewings at times convenient to yourself. Otherwise you take your OH's offer to take the flooring to your new house, reinstate a shoddy carpet and naff paintwork, and the agents get to explain to the new tenants why everything is just that bit shitter than they expected.

Spell out the work you've had done. Tell the LL they should get a refund from the agent if they've been paying for maintenance for the last 9 years. But fuck them all - they can play nice, or you can reinstate to the much reduced value they're asking for.

All they have to do is converse with me. Then their viewings can resume.

@GammyLeg

The LL is really cheeky, letting you improve the place and then try and claim they paid for half the flooring!

The attitudes on this thread that you should put up with shitty living situations because it’s not your own home are so depressing.

Stick to your guns OP.

Thank you

Trying to paint over dark paints to achieve magnolia is costly and hard work. I think it’s fair that you lose your deposit to cover the cost incurred by your not doing what you agreed to do. However, if you ask them to repay the deposit considering the work you’ve done then maybe they will. No harm in asking.

Sorry - just read updates( it’s a long one) and see that you’ve tried! Good luck. Ignore above.

You've got a shit landlord, but that's beside the point. Two wrongs don't make a right - she has been shit at getting stuff done in the house, but not honouring your agreement to return the walls to the original colour would be shit of you. The difference is that the landlord is raising the fact that you're being shit and penalising you for it, whereas you decided not to raise their shitness for many of the issues. That was your choice, but you can't now hold it against them. If it was such a big deal you should have stuck to your guns or moved. It was also your choice to invest so heavily in the house - fine you wanted to make it nice and that's understandable, but again, you can't then hold it against the landlord - you should have either stuck to your guns or moved.

Hi @QuantumDog2 hope you manage to resolve it as stress-free as possible. After that, could you please come & decorate my house?

You need to get landlord round and have a discussion and negotiate what is to be done

Anything you agree, put in writing. There has to be compromise from both sides seeing as nine years have gone by

OP: your hallway looks amazing, I love the colour & I think most people would. It may not be magnolia or white, but I would still class that as a pretty neutral colour, meaning it's not bright or dark.
If the bedrooms are decorated to a decent standard, leave them as they are - no point in painting them magnolia for the next tenant to move in and just redecorate again!

I'm a private tenant and I've added a good chunk onto the value of this property for my landlords, but I don't see it as money lost as it's meant I've had a much nicer home that was to my taste & suited our family's needs. I've no intention of leaving and they definitely wouldn't sell up though so I am in a very safe private tenancy.
I have lived here for ten years but I've had the gardens landscaped and works done, fitted new bathroom and new kitchen, skimmed walls and ceilings, redecorated everywhere multiple times, replaced all flooring etc. Everything is to a high standard.

Can't believe that some tenants aren't allowed to decorate at all, I don't think I could cope living in a magnolia box.

I think considering the LL wants her to accommodate viewings whilst paying rent, having lived there for 9 years and not troubled the LL except for permission to improve the property, the LL just might have been a bit more appreciative of the improvements considering they are now being listed.

Instead he's claiming he paid for half of a floor that was laid.

Either the LL or the EA is a CF, possibly both.

I think you should inform them both the place is NOT available for viewings until after you vacate as you will be ripping everything out and white washing the place, with every single trace of you gone.

They can then re list it.

I have lived here for ten years but I've had the gardens landscaped and works done, fitted new bathroom and new kitchen, skimmed walls and ceilings, redecorated everywhere multiple times, replaced all flooring etc. Everything is to a high standard.
In a house you don't actually own?
You can't possibly know the landlord definitely won't sell up.

@GreyhoundG1rl

I have lived here for ten years but I've had the gardens landscaped and works done, fitted new bathroom and new kitchen, skimmed walls and ceilings, redecorated everywhere multiple times, replaced all flooring etc. Everything is to a high standard. In a house you don't actually own? You can't possibly know the landlord definitely won't sell up.

No offence, but are you an amnesiac? I Itold you yesterday that you sounded like a broken record and that I was done explaining to you. Then you pop up again like a new poster.

Can't believe that some tenants aren't allowed to decorate at all, I don't think I could cope living in a magnolia box

But it is tenants like the OP - who was given permission to decorate to their own taste on the explicit agreement that they would paint it back to magnolia before they left and then has reneged on that agreement - that mean that LL are reluctant to give tenants permission to decorate to their own liking.

Because for every tenant like the OP who "only" painted a couple of rooms which will "just" need a few extra coats of magnolia to return to neutral, there are other tenants who would use very dark/bright paint or murals or patterns and/or wallpaper which would require even more work to return to neutral. The OP has reneged her agreement for redecorating, so the next tenant probably now won't be granted permission to decorate to their taste in case they reneg on the agreement too.