End of tenacy...

[Charlottelouiseox]

I’m about to give notice in my property, just reading through my tenacy agreement it states that we have to leave the house in the state we found it. Which was clean unmarked walls, which we will be filling in holes where we’ve had shelves/tv/pictures etc. However our house is in quite a bad way, the house is full of leaks, my kitchen ceiling has caved in 3 times, living room, main bedroom is caving in. Landlord has said he would want the house in the way we moved in which is fine, we have wallpapered and painted etc.
My question is do we need to redecorate and paint all magnolia? We have been here 6 years, my main concern is redecorating and putting it all back to magnolia for the walls to start caving in again and time and money wasted. Any ideas? I’ve uploaded some pictures of kitchen and main bedroom. What would you do?

It should just be wear and tear...if the landlord didnt rectify damp and floods etc thats not your problem. Is your deposit in protection scheme?

I’m pretty certain it is procured in the scheme I remember receiving letters about it when we first moved in. I’m more than happy to pay for a professional end of tenacy clean as with both working and young children it’s so much easier but I don’t want to have to redecorate when the house is falling apart anyway

If I remember correctly then a flat should be re-decorated roghly every 6 years by the landlord (not if the tenant does not want). I once rented a flat for 8 years and only the kitchen was re-painted during that time. But I just cleaned the flat and did not put it into the state it was 8 years ago.

Asking you to do this does not seem right and I do not think he can justly claim that you need to do this.

We ask our tenants to return the property to its original state if they want to decorate. If they do something that isn’t too out there we sometimes agree they don’t need to return it to the original state - (eg tenant painted our grey kitchen walls cream, it didn’t really change the rental appeal so we didn’t ask them to put it back. If they’d gone with hot pink we probably would have).

Did you get permission to decorate and wallpaper, etc? If so, then unless you were told it had to be returned to magnolia when you leave, it should be fine to leave it as it is. As for the damp marks - the LL should have sorted those out, not you, unless the leaks were down to you forgetting to turn off taps, etc. Doesn't sound as though they were. Are you dealing with the LL directly? If so, do you have an inventory from when you moved in? Make sure you are present when the check out process is carried out.

Yes got permission from landlord to decorate, nothing was said about returning it to the current state when we moved in. No leaks weren’t down to us, landlord is aware it’s still happening tiles are missing of the roof so must be coming through attic, but the handymen that checked the attic said it really needs to be retiled and re plastered but nothing has come of it yet.
In the bathroom, it’s behind the sink and the bath have at least a 7inch gap from wall to sink and bath usually it’s filled or covered and it’s just left open, also boiler was leaking so that explained the leak in hall way. It’s damaged our wallpaper we’ve redecorated and our stuff within our home. Not to fussed about that though now, I just want to try and do everything possible for our deposit back.

If it’s in the agreement and you didn’t negotiate otherwise when you sought permission to decorate it sounds like you should put it back.

You could always get in touch and ask?

In that case, do you have a trail in writing of what was agreed? Check the tenancy agreement as that may state you need to return the décor to the original finishes and colours.

If you have a good relationship with the landlord, it might be worth arranging to meet him and agree what will be done. Obviously if he is trying to get you to make improvements and put right things which aren't your responsibility, push back on them. Follow up the meeting with a written summary of what was agreed and email it or get proof of posting.