Ask tenant to replace cooker she's ruined?

[MacarenaMacarena]

4 years ago tenant moved into my flat. I provided a new cooker for her. It's now not working. On closer inspection, she has used it a lot (fair!) but never cleaned it (disappointing), damage from her treatment of it is what has damaged it.
She needs another one.
But I don't really think this is reasonable wear and tear - more neglect and abuse.
Reasonable inspections and checks have been carried out regularly, compulsive gas safety checks have been done.
If she moved out tomorrow I could deduct at least part of the replacement cost from her deposit, but as she's staying, what would be a fair way forward?

Also, she’s been paying your mortgage for 4 years. I think you can stretch to getting her a £200 oven.

You the landlord. Either send an engineer to try and fix it or buy her a new oven. It's your job. Plenty of appliances stop working after a few years.

I don't see how not cleaning it could cause it to break. We very periodically get professional oven deep cleans and last time I asked the guy who came to do it if there was any benefit in having it done more frequently. He said (very honestly!) that there wasn't.

This. Stop trying to shirk your responsibilities.

Throw away a 4 year old oven rather than repair it? This is why the planet is fucked.

Completely agree, I’ve had mine mended about 3 times in the past 15 years. I thought I was normal.

Actually I felt that I had to get rid of a kitchen appliance because, it cost a fortune and I had to wait weeks for the part to arrive. It was marginally more expensive to replace it.

Was it a good quality appliance?

Or a cheap model? They generally do not last long & all the cleaning in the world doesnt impact that much

Also you get tax relief against the rental income for replacements of white goods etc, because its really normal to have to replace them.

How on earth has she broken it by using it? For fuck's sake.

Not cleaning an oven does not stop it from working.

So she's used it twice a day for four years. That's normal. I'd expect any oven to last at least 5 years, and normally 10.

What's wrong with it? What makes you think she has damaged it? How?

Where has the OP gone?

For goodness sake don't be so penny pinching just buy the new oven it's a business cost.

I would expect a cooker/stove to last for longer than 4 years, even with 3 times a day use. But then I had tenants who wrecked one in a year & set fire to the kitchen floor. And this was a family of medics - a registrar & a consultant & their children, so not deadbeats in a run down rental property.

The sad fact is that some tenants are just extremely careless and thoughtless. They assume that they can wreck a place & not have to pay for the damage.

Do you have evidence that the lack of cleaning caused the breakdown? I'm not great at cleaning ours and it's still going strong 15 years later.

I'm also a landlord and always ask contractors to state the cause when things break, so wear & tear or negligence. I also ask them to put it in writing. We once had a washing machine break down. One of the tenant's bracelets was found in the drum so she hadn't checked the pockets when loading the machine so we sent her the bill for the repair. She paid no question.

Unless you have clear evidence the breakdown was the fault of the tenant then I'm afraid you'll have to such it up unfortunately.

Probably to report her poor tenant for cooker 'neglect and abuse'

Given there has been regular inspections there’s no suggestion the tenant has just assumed she can wreck the place.

The op is just assuming the fact it’s not as clean as she’d like is what has broken it (and it can’t be that filthy or the inspections would have clocked it)

Well this is a great example of why everyone worries about their landlord isn’t it! My goodness you got what I’m assuming is a decent but very basic oven. Expect your tenant to barely use it and then expect her to pay to replace when it breaks.

The trouble is its often quicker ans cheaper to replace- a new hob including fitting can cost under £200 and be installed within a few days.

My experience of getting someone out is that there's a minimum call-out charge, plus parts so its not much cheaper than a new one. If they don't have parts to hand its then a further delay for the tennant who can't use their essential white goods while they wait for the bits to arrive.... and more often than sucessfully having things fixed, I've been told its not repairable and I need to buy a new one- so have just wasted time and money for nothing by trying to repair.

I'm more inclined to get my own stuff repaired, but for paying tenants I'm not comfortable leaving them for days without working appliances.

It's not right, and environmentally it's terrible but with appliances being available really cheap these days, it makes repairs less of an economically sound decision (plus there's the hassle factor). Unless low end appliances become way more expensive this is always going to be an issue.

I think probably suck it up. I think 4 years of grease could certainly block / damage a gas hob. You’d have to pay for a deep clean on a change of tenant and she has stayed. I’d replace but say that annual check that it’s clean going forward.

It might just need the element replacing.

Just replace the oven ffs. The tenant has been paying you rent for years so I am sure you have been making a surplus on it. Saying this as a landlord myself. I find it very annoying at the lengths and excuses some landlords use to justify squeezing more cash out of their tenants.

This is the attitude of the landlords I had the misfortune of renting from for years. They’d install cheap quality white goods and then when they would, inevitably, fail they’d do their best to blame the tenants for it. This is despite us having used it completely normally.

Can’t you get tax relief on white goods? Buy a new one.

Suck it up. You didn’t check it was being kept in a good condition. It’s been 4 years! Appliances like that don’t last long these days and I don’t really understand how dirt would prevent it from working. If it is left in a mess at the end of her tenancy then deduct a professional clean from her deposit.

If by her treatment of it, you mean not cleaning it, then yes you need to replace it. Cookers don't break because they're dirty