Is this my responsibility as a tenant, or the LL?

[TribbleWithoutATardis]

Just a quick one, we have some blinds in our house that we rent. One of the blinds in the living room has broken and in the back room, we have told the LL. But they have failed to fix it in the months since we spoke with them about it. They have since turned round and stated that they believe it's our responsibility to fix the blinds.

Is this right? We signed an inventory which these were on, so I figured it was something that was under their remit.

As an aside, we haven't broken the blinds ourselves. The threading came out of the top bit and has unraveled. This happened within a few weeks of us moving in.

We have various blinds in our rented house, all pretty old, all on the inventory too. The Roman blinds in the lounge were slightly broken and very worn and watermarked so we binned them and bought our own. Will be taking with us if we move as they were expensive.

You need to check your lease.

In the tenancy agreements that i use for furnished houses, the items on the inventory are defined as 'Contents' and the tenant has to take responsibility for them, unless they are damaged by an insured risk (eg fire, flood, theft).

Having said that, with low-cost items that have a short-ish lifespan, I would probably take a view and expect a 50:50 contribution towards the cost of buying replacements when you leave (eg this would be taken from your deposit).

Broken wooden venetian blinds in our rental are paid for by the landlord. As I see it, we are paying to rent them, and they broke, not through our being rough with them, so it is up to them to fix them.

if they provided them, they fix them.

appearance on the inventory just means they are there, and in a certain condition. You will notice that the walls and doors are there too!

the idea of the inventory is to record everything in the property, and its condition. At the end of the tenancy the tenant returns everything in the same condition, LESS WEAR AND TEAR.

I don't think a clause telling tenants to fix landlord-provided blinds is enforceable, unless inappropriately used (swung on) or damaged through similar daftness.

jumperoo you've binned your landlord's property. I hope you cleared it with them first. The place was provided with blinds and needs to be returned with them, so you should have kept the old ones.

As specialsubject says (I need to stop agreeing with you at some point otherwise it will appear stalkerish !)

Landlord provided them so he should replace/repair them. We lease our properties unfurnished apart from curtains/blinds and white goods, we maintain anything in the property unless of course they are damaged in the course of the tenancy.

Jumperoo Silly to throw them away as you will need to return the property with blinds, if you don't have the old ones you will need to cover the cost or replacements when you leave

The old ones were broken, therefore unfit for purpose. Told the landlord this and that we were replacing with our own. He used to live there himself so clearly knows how old they are and said nothing so clearly he didn't want to pay £200 for new Roman blinds. Up to him!

If he was fussed he should have replaced them or put up curtains instead, right? A broken blind is worthless to him and us. If we move out and he wants a roman blind in the room for the next tenant then he can buy some more or he is welcome to buy ours from us.

Jumperoo, he probably realises he has a tenant in situ who doesn't have a clue and if he has an inventory from the start of your tenancy that states there were roman blinds in place, with NO detail/evidence of their condition, and they're not there when you leave then unfortunately you'll get stung for the full cost to replace and that will come out of your (protected?) deposit?

We took pics when we moved in which were sent to him. Gave him option of replacing. No offer made from him so they were replaced at our cost. Should have invoiced him really. Have rented for 18 years, certainly I do have a clue.

And inventory states "water and black mould marks to all three blinds, larger blind filthy, bracket and pull cords broken on each blind".

He should have replaced before we even moved in and chose not to. We have replaced at our own expense. It'snot like he wasn't aware they were broken. Not sure how much he can charge us from the tenancy deposit for a broken mouldy blind [Hmm]

Jumperoo ours are black with mold as well, the bedroom is rife with it at the moment. They said they'd painted with mold proof paint . I really don't like this house, but we're a bit stuck here. Oh well.

Phew, good to hear jumperoo!