AIBU to expect the tenants to turn the heating up?

[LadyMaine]

I've owned my 3 bed Victorian house for 7 years. There was a little bit of damp in the downstairs bay window but nothing serious.

I moved for work at end of August this year and rented it out. Within a few weeks the tenants (3 adults & dog) started complaining of damp and mould. When I went to inspect the house was very cold.
They said they are worried about high heating bills. I do understand this but have told them they really need to turn the heating up.

The boiler is in full working order as are the extractor fans in the kitchen and bathroom.
I installed new double glazed windows throughout when I bought the house. It also has a damp course installed.

Now they are complaining that there is black mould and that one of the tenants' asthma is getting worse.
What can I do to get them to turn the heating up?

There's a disproportionate number of landlords and strange balance of opinion compared with how these threads usually go on Mumsnet. I might flag this thread up.

I really would look at getting them a basic dehumidifier. Argos would work. I dry clothes indoors with mine in winter, rarely have heating on, have run it occasionally in the vicinity of any damp spots while renting. It sorts everything out. Much cheaper than heating

@angharadsgoat I suspect its due to some landlords panicking after what happened to the little boy so are upping the anti tenant rhetoric because they are worried it might cause new laws to be brought in.

^This
”There was a little bit of damp in the downstairs bay window but nothing serious.”

Why didn’t you fix this? This is penetrating damp. Bay windows are notorious for this. It’s not caused by the tenants not heating or not ventilating. And it’s like you don’t even realise that damp cam get worse very quickly if ignored (which you have done for 8 years!). Mould also grows super fast and often with windows it spreads within the window frames, behind the plaster board, into the insulation….

Stop blaming the tenants for the mould your failure to fix penetrating damp has caused.

That makes sense!

They didn’t say all renters are poor and it’s a fact that overcrowding is more common in rented accommodation.

Overcrowding is more common for renters than owner-occupiers: 1.2% of owner-occupiers are overcrowded compared to 8.7% of social-renting households and 6.7% of private-renting households.

Why are you trying to make @MilkyYay pretty accurate post into an argument?… come on!

IMO landlords always try to blame tenants for mould (you haven't put the heating on enough, haven't opened window enough, etc) whereas usually as a tenant you can do everything possible to prevent mould and if the house has mould it will always come back.

Fix the mould. It's a health issue and they shouldn't have to live with it. Even if you lived with it for years, a tenant shouldn't have to

I can't believe they were expected to turn the heating up in the few weeks (still warm) following August, and in that short interim the mould, etc, appeared and worsened.

Obviously the OP needs to take action as if the deterioration was so bad at the tail-end of summer it's going to be an awful lot worse over November /December /January.

My survey (when I bought it) said a small amount of damp in bay windows was normal in older houses.

That was over 8yrs ago. Damp doesn’t getter better or stay the same, it gets worse. The survey wasn’t permission to ignore the damp. You have done nothing to fix the cause of the damp for over 8yrs. Where there is damp, there is mould. And actually, it’s a good thing the tenants are keeping the house cold because mould grows faster when it’s warm.

@LadyMaine we are also currently dealing with this with tenants. About to spend best part of £1k on a top to bottom survey including thermal imaging to be absolutely sure it's nothing to do with the building and everything to do with lifestyle. At the moment it all points to huge amounts of condensation not being able to escape. As someone above pointed out, an owner occupier has a massive incentive to keep on top of window condensation, open kitchen window and use extractor whilst cooking, use extractors in bathrooms because they will be footing the bill for the long term consequences of damp and mould. There's a delicate balance in any home of heating and ventilation. More people and animals, more ventilation required. The best time to ventilate is also when heating is on. We have supplied a dehumidifier (low energy Meaco) but the tenants won't run continuously due to cost despite the fact that it will almost certainly be better for everyone's health never mind better for the house. I'm almost hoping there is an actual issue because if it is simply down to not doing all the things I would be doing an an owner occupier to prevent/manage condensation I am going to be absolutely fuming and how much money we've wasted.

As someone above pointed out, an owner occupier has a massive incentive to keep on top of window condensation, open kitchen window and use extractor whilst cooking, use extractors in bathrooms because they will be footing the bill for the long term consequences of damp and mould.

I would argue that a tenant-occupier with asthma (as the OP has) who can literally die due to mould has the bigger incentive to do as much as they can to sort the mould. A home that was let to them with pre-existing damp per the OP means they did not cause the damp and therefore cannot reasonably be expected to sort the damp.

@LadyMaine you won't get much sympathy on here because MN is virulently anti landlord.

In your position, I would evict the tenants or you'll end up having your house trashed, as happened to me.

I rented a house to a useless housing benefit tenant. She had been a friend desperate for a property and I helped her out when her husband left. When I first knew her 15 years ago she was working full time. But she told me she wanted to 'go on the sick' and get a disability badge so she wouldn't have to work ever again. She did this by eating tons of chocolate, junk food and takeaways so she became massively obese.

Despite paying no rates, having reduced utility bills, having three quarters of her rent paid by the council, receiving hundreds of pounds in disability and other benefits, she still failed to pay me the £25 a week rent she was supposed to top up. It's cost me nearly 1k to evict her and remove all her junk and I've lost over 5k in rent.

The house was immaculate but she was a hoarder and filled the rooms with crap and furniture against all the walls. The house was like a tomb, never ventilated. Never opened the curtains much less the windows. Never used the extractor fans in the kitchen and bathroom. Never wiped up condensation. Dried wet clothes in the lounge. Never did any housework or employed a cleaner. Now there is black mould everywhere and damage to the plaster.
It's going to cost me thousands to renovate the property and I've still got a mortgage to pay. It's heartbreaking.

Mine is a cautionary tale OP. Get out now before your house is ruined. Some people just don't deserve a decent place to live.

The keyword 'lifestylé' keeps coming up from the people who say they're landlords, too. Quite telling if you think about the originating sources where tenant lifestyle is frequently mentioned.

That's expanding on my earlier reply to Jennifer.

I rented a house to a useless housing benefit tenant. She had been a friend desperate for a property and I helped her out when her husband left. When I first knew her 15 years ago she was working full time. But she told me she wanted to 'go on the sick' and get a disability badge so she wouldn't have to work ever again. She did this by eating tons of chocolate, junk food and takeaways so she became massively obese.

This is horrible language to describe someone, and are you quite serious about the junk food, that sounds unbelievable. There's a couple of awful posts on this thread and not what I expect to see on Mumsnet.

@angharadsgoat not horrible language just the truth to describe someone who is a manipulative liar who swindled me out of thousands. Someone who had 30 2 litre bottles of coke and numerous boxes of chocolate, cake etc in the kitchen at any one time.Takeaway and pizza containers in the bins which I saw every time I visited. Filling the house with rubbish.

You know NOTHING until you have been a landlord.

Quite possibly because we've all paid to have issues investigated and been told the same thing by professions about it being a lifestyle issue. The lifestyle bit isn't limited to tenants, it's the basics of breathing, showers/baths, cooking, drying washing inside/vapour from tumble dryer and the resulting moisture in the air. Lots can be done to minimise with running extractors for extended time during and after cooking/showers with window open and door closed, wiping down glass condensation before it drips, heating and ventilating rooms daily. In Germany it's written into rental contracts that houses have to be fully ventilated by opening windows for a set amount of time every day - it might even say twice a day so it's not just in the UK that there's an expectation that houses need airing daily. I am also both a landlord and a tenant so I do tend to see things from both perspectives.

Sorry, but I just don't think that's very pleasant.

You know NOTHING until you have been a landlord.

Not sure I agree with that. Though my parents have rented out what was my grandmother's house out for a few years now, so I do have an interest in this thread.

I'm afraid you've missed the point @theteenage. I was expanding on a previous post in reply to someone else.

You know NOTHING until you have been a landlord

you know nothing about landlords until you have been a local authority housing inspector 😏

If there is something essential to be done for the maintenance of a property, it is best that the cost be rolled into the price of the rent. That does mean the landlord has to take the risk of variability with something like utilities.

this was the case when I rented a house from someone who had a prized garden. The rental came with a hired gardener of the landlords choosing. They were traveling for just one year and wanted to return to their wonderful garden in good shape. The landlord did not make the mistake of trusting a tenant to properly maintain the garden. The rent was a bit higher than other rents in the area to reflect the gardener, but since we didn’t have to do any work ourselves we were happy to pay.

I wondered how long it would be before posts from LL's like this about lack of heating and damp and mould started, it's something that LL's and tenants need to work together on to find a solution to because heating is fast becoming a luxury many can't afford, and it's going to cause problems.

Ultimately you can tell them all you like, but if they can't afford to do it then it's not going to happen.

You could evict and either sell up or write something into the next tenancy (if it would be enforceable?) But good luck finding tenants that are willing to commit to that because I certainly wouldn't be in the current climate. If I can't afford to have the heating on to keep myself warm then I'm not going to be able to do it so the property doesn't get damp and cause problems.

Urgh the amount of landlord apologists and arse lickers on here is foul.

What EPC is the house because if it is below C you will have to improve it anyway by 2025.

How does all this not sealing up houses work with the ASHPs we are all meant to get, we are supposed to insulate and have really good well sealed windows and doors and no draughts, won't this make damp worse.

are you my daughter’s landlord? £600 a month for a mouldy room it was mouldy when she arrived and getting worse- been at uni for half a term and had to throw away several new fabric storage boxes this week due to the mould on them.

it is only november,
not everyone has put their heating on.
you need to look at the House