To keep their deposit!!

[LivFG]

DH and I have a couple of properties we rent out. We have been renting to a young couple who always seemed like good tenants. We gave them notice a couple of months ago as we are going to start renting on AirBnB instead as DH thinks we will get more money (don't get me started).

Anyway, they moved out on Saturday and everything seemed fine. Today I went to get everything cleaned and I found (what I think to be) weed residue next to the sink. I'm Furious. I feel completely violated and uncomfortable being inside the property. I'm sick with worry that they have been using illegal drugs in my home and what the legal ramifications could be!!

Obviously we have their deposit. I was planning to refund it this week. After my discovery today, I now feel incredibly reluctant to make any sort of refund. The idea of supporting/funding their lifestyle makes me very uncomfortable. And they never would have been given permission to abuse my property in this way.

DH seems to think none of this is a problem and seems to completely miss the point - it isn't about cleaning it up - it's about the abuse of our trust.

AIBU?

I can imagine what the police will think….. “I’m ringing to report a young couple who rented a property from me, I think they were smoking weed” 🤣
Seriously this has to be a joke! On a serious note in our rental contract it states we were responsible for a deep clean including professional carpet clean on leaving the property, otherwise they would deduct the cost from our deposit. Thought that was completely normal 🤷‍♀️ of course if you don’t have a contract with them then that is your bad

OP, Maybe step away from the thread and watch this:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/proginfo/2023/44/the-detectives-taking-down-an-ocg

Then come back and tell us what you think your chances of getting a prosecution are (clue: absolutely none).

And maybe post your airbnb link too so that we can all avoid accidentally booking it.

OP, to add to my previous comments.

How you declared the rental to HMRC for tax purposes?

There is no such thing as a "medical card" for weed in the UK

Not only unreasonable, but illegal.

You are a scumbag slumlord and you wanna take the moral highroad because you found some unidentified herbs in someone's home that you just turfed them out of for your own greedy purposes?

I hope every clothes and shoe shop you visit is always out of your size.

Yeah, there is

Yeah, there is

If you have a mortgage on this house you need a specialist holiday let mortgage, not a BTL mortgage.

Otherwise you will be adding mortgage fraud to your unlawful activities.

You shouldn't be a landlord. 1. You are not following the law on deposits. 2. You are over invested in your property and do not understand that it is someone else's home now not yours and 3. You are unhygienic

By the way I doubt it's weed. Illegal drugs are very expensive, people don't just leave a pile by the sink. More likely it's a burst tea bag. HTH.

Get over yourself, you kicked good tenets out to air b&b because you can make more money. Never mind people have nowhere to live now bc of you want money money.

Are you a real person? Did you grow up under a rock at the top of an ivory tower?

Not one thing you have said suggests you live on this planet
.

Thank you for such a hearty laugh OP, I wish you the best of luck with your future cowboy property endeavors 😹😹😹

This thread is great 😂😂

Reminds me once of the agents we rented a furnished flat from many years ago in Highgate London

On leaving despite leaving it absolutely sparkling we were charged for a further clean due to 'grass found under the bed' (this was a few tiny green strands of a fake Xmas tree) and a black smear on the coal scuttle by the fire.

OP- you will love air bnb - as my friend says after her last lot of UAE guests- some treat it totally as if you are a hotel and you are at this every few days- not once a year .

You are absolute fools letting good tenants go who have paid and kept it in good order - you might not be so lucky next time

OP, unless I have missed something you have no evidence of illegal drugs, just your assumption.

But you have given evidence on world wide web of your unlwful handling of their deposit.

Completely unreasonable of you... but if this has set you off, you're really not going to have a good time doing airbnb 😂

This is so over the top.

You think it might be weed residue and think that you'll have to do a deep clean between residents because it makes it dirtier? Do you have ANY concrete evidence AT ALL? Did you find a bag of weed in the house or anything worse? Because of you didn't you are over reacting plain and simple!

Also, a property should be thoroughly deep cleaned between tenants because of the risk of allergens being in the home and the kind of dirt you can't see - think Jackson Pollock under a black light - especially if you don't change the mattresses on the beds or steam clean the sofas. You should also be undertaking property maintenance to ensure it's safe.

This coupled with the fact that you didn't properly protect the deposit makes me think that you KNOW you are making a mountain out of a molehill. Especially as they were perfect tenants up until this point.

So shut up. Put up. Refund their money and get the house deep cleaned. Because knowing that there is no actual evidence of drug use means that you can be sued for the deposit (as others have said) and if I were them I would take you for every single penny.

You are 100% the arsehole and YES YOU ARE BEING UNREASONABLE (and a greedy, money grabber looking for any excuse by the sounds of it).

Sounds like the poster uses weed themselves if they are so sure of what ‘weed residue’ looks like.
And if it is weed why does that necessitate the house being sterilised?!!

This has got to be the thread of the century. People are absolutely potty

PLEASE MN. Put this in classics - it's gold!

You are joking aren’t you. If your turning it into an Airbnb you are going to get a real shock.

But you still haven’t answered what many have asked about: gas and electric safety certificates, and whether ‘informal renting’ is allowed under the terms of your mortgage?

I very much doubt that the rent was cheap. The OP wants to screw as much money out of that property as they can. Keeping a deposit over nonsense and evicting tenants to make more money doing air bnb makes it highly unlikely they rented at below market value.

You’re already off your head but will cave in completely if you’re up for AirB&B guests, happy times!

Get a grip. Bleaching and sterilising the whole house you didn't even know they were doing weed till you found "Something" god help you running an air b and b you'll need to bleach all the areas where they've been doing cocaine having sex and puking.

What is wrong with you? A deposit is to cover any damages that may have been done on your property but if they left the property in a fine state and there are no damages you have no rights to keep their deposit and I believe if you tried to keep that money that isn't yours they could bring you to court and you would very easily lose the case. What they do or don't with their lives is none of your concern, at most you could pay someone to clean up those residues and take that money off the deposit, but you need to return the rest.