I've lived here 9.5 years, my landlord has been awful for most of our time here, inspections every 3 months, refused to allow us to paint, and she refused to paint. So as you can imagine the general condition of the property is pretty bad. Earlier this year I went against her wishes and painted my sons room, it was mouldy, peeling paint, flaking paint etc. I used expensive damp proof paint, and did a lovely decorative job, with lovely wallpaper and she lost her mind and yelled at us about it, hence the no fault eviction.
Anyway, I have a place to go now, but I know she will try to keep most of the deposit and I'll fight her through the scheme regardless, but how much should I do before I leave? Obviously I'll clean, but do I repaint the wall? Remove the wallpaper I put up (the entire house is ancient woodchip by the way), she has spent years complaining that the garden wasn't up to her standard, do I get a Gardener in (i dont think i can do it all)? Fill in holes in the wall? She put the rent up every year, including during covid, she inherited it, and has done zero improvements, so its not like this place is cheap. Do I just tell her to go fight me, how much do I really worry about this? We are talking lino worn to the floor, flaking paint, yellowing gloss, peeling woodchip, she got an electrician in earlier this year who chased out all the walls, filled it with putty, she refused to allow us to fix the paint, so every wall has a putty white stripes down the middle. It's awful. And I can't decide if I should spend money where I don't need to or just clean, tidy the garden a bit and go?