We moved into a property with a garden, when we viewed the house we were told work was being completed on the house and garden. When we collected the keys we were told the garden was not yet finished but would be within the next few weeks. (The garden is tiered and they had removed the sleepers holding the top turfed area back, to replace with newer ones, or a wall of sorts)
Without this in place the garden was not safe to use. We chased, lettings agents chased...multiple times, told it was going to be done but in the meantime do not use the garden as it isn't safe (also have 2 young children, part of the reason we moved was for some outdoor space for them)
Over a year later and we have moved as the landlord wants to sell. Garden work was never completed therefore garden has been left alone (we did some minor strimming around the edges before the top tier) They now want to deduct £450 from our deposit to have the garden cleared (mowed, removal of weeds on the lawn etc) Am I right to argue this? We've paid the full rent for the property (which includes the advertised garden surely?) reported the issue again and again. We even offered to complete the work ourselves and reduce the rent slightly over several months to cover the costs (this was right before we were told to vacate so understandably we didn't go further with this)
I also think that's a ridiculous amount for mowing and weeding a garden 😂 and suspect the landlord actually wants to cover the cost of more work being done to get the house sold as is still on the market!