How can I make a private landlord make essential repairs?

[theUrbanDryad]

Our bathroom is in dire condition, to the extent that our hall ceiling has started to leak from the rotten floorboards in the bathroom. We had someone to look at it a few weeks ago who said we basically needed a new suite, including tiling etc, then we had another guy who said we just needed a new shower hose! then we heard nothing for a few weeks and when i chased up the letting agency to see what was happening they sent another guy who said, no, it does need a whole new suite.

basically, the whole room is rotten with damp and smells of mushrooms. i'm not holding my breath for it to be repaired or replaced though, so what rights do we have as private tennants? obviously i'm not going to just withold rent because then they could throw us out but what can we do if they refuse to fix it?

TIA

It says in our lease that our landlord is responsible for repairs to the house.

info here shelteradvice

Have you forwarded any report to the landlord? What does it say in your tenancy agreement?

You have certain rights under the law of landlord and tenant and, if your landlord refuses to make basic repairs, you can contact your local authority which has the power to force the landlord to carry out the repairs. However, you may well have to face the fact that the landlord will then simply serve you with 2 months' notice. Depends on how badly you want to stay where you are. Have you looked for alternative accommodation?

Contact your council.

If the repairs needing are bad enough to be legally unacceptable the council can get involved. If the landlord refuses to carry out repairs even then, the council can carry them out and force the landlord to pay the bills.

Go to your CAB and talk to them about it.

am just waiting to speak to an advisor at Shelter about it.

what i want to know really is if he does do the repairs can he then put the rent up because the house is nicer!!

thanks for the quick replies

Just to check but there's no electric stuff under that part of floorboeards si there? Just, ours leaked onto an electric box in the last house which put us at danger

Don't you hate living there anyway (or am I mixing you up with someone else?). Can you look around and see what your other options are?

He can only increase the rent at the end of your initial tenancy agreement or in accordance with the terms of the agreement. E.g. if he does the repairs half way through the term of the tenancy, he can't then immediately increase the rent. In any case, if these are considered to be necessary repairs, how is that improving the property. It simply means that it should have been in this state to begin with.

bran, yes, well remembered, we do hate living there! this is only a small part of it though. the trouble is, we can't afford anything else really. for the money we pay at the moment for a 3 bed house in a shit area we'd only be able to afford a one bed flat!! apart from anything else, we didn't really want to rent again, the next move we made was supposed to be into our own house!

Oh we're in the same boat, just logged on and found this thread!
Bloody private landlords. Our 'conservatory' has flooded three times in the last 7 weeks since I had my baby... (really flooded I mean, although we're not in a flooded area) because it has had it and the roof leaks like a tap is on.
I've had stuff ruined and been bailing out with a newborn on one shoulder, a 4 year old in the kitchen and a thunderstorm going on.
Been here 3 yrs and it's always leaked.

Stupid landlord never helps. Finally rang him angry and asked him to fix it.
Trouble is he wants to sell the house when we go, it's a wreck and we have had to do a LOT since miving in just to make it habitable.

Anyway he turned up with a sheet of plastic stuff and some wood, lobbed it all on top, making a 'frame' for the plastic he shoved a nail through the glass. Idiot.
So now we have 3ft long bits of glass hanging down unsecured from the ceiling ready to fall on my children's heads. There are bits all over the floor too. It's been like that a week.

I had the council round who basically said, class A hazard, and wrote me a letter to show him saying it needed immediate repair.

He was humming and ha-ing about building something else there and knocking it down so I held off, but today he told me he's just going to leave it till we have had enough nd move out, then sell the house.

I'm furious and upset, panicking a bit as we can't afford the other rents...it is cheap...

Sorry to rant, just to tell you that getting council involved doesn't always have the desired effect. Also our tenancy ran out this month and I daren't ask for another because he might say no.

Hope you have better luck xx

Is it possible for you to withhold your rent until its sorted?

We had water leeking in through a flatroof, next to the light fitting which was a little worrying. After 3 months of promises we just withheld rent until it was fixed. Still took then another 2 months to sort and then they had the cheek to demand the rent within an hour of the workmen leaving. Made them wait 7 days on the pretext I had to move the money back from my savings account.

If you withhold rent you are putting yourelf in a very weak position legally to argue the case and could be evicted. Council are probably a better bet .

In my own case witholding is not an option as our tenancy has run out and he would simply sell, he is a callous b*stard.
But not sure if it might be viable for OP?

I hope you find a way to sort it out, it shouldn't be allowed as it is not fair

iirc If you had an Assured Shorthold tenacny he still has to give 2 months notice(or as per the contract) - the same conditions just continue to apply.