Repairs

[PerkyOchrePeer]

I rent from a housing association. Its a flat in a converted house. The communial area carpen is shabby but not that bad. We have a new tenant who wants it replaced but all they say is it can be deep cleaned. The carpet is 30 years old and fraying at the edges. It doesnt bother me but it seems to bother her. She also wants a new more stturdy communial front door as the one weve got can easy be kicked in. Our own front doors to our flats are very secure fire proof doors so if anyone did kick the main door in they wouldnt be able to get into our flatsso i dont think my neighbour has a leg to stand on.

She also wants the front garded done as its overgrown with weeds. The housing association are not forthcoming so im prepared to pay a gardener to come round in two days time and sort it out. Should i really do this because the longer we wait for the housing association the worse the garden gets and my neighbours in our road have immaculate gardens

Normally if you rent, gardening is your responsibility rather than the people you rent from, although maybe housing association is different? If the carpet is fraying then it could be dangerous and needs replacing, otherwise, if it's just old then don't need to replace it. I also t think she will get far with the front door replacement as it sounds fine.

The front door is flimsy and she wants a sturdy one

Yes but it is a door and it opens and closes fine and you have said that all the flats have good sturdy doors so the external one is really just keeping the weather out and to stop people wandering in, which it is doing.

She set the door doesn't properly fit the frame so she wants a new door it's properly fitted around the frame because she said if you look closely you can see gaps where the door doesn't touch the frame

She said it's drafty in the main communal area because there's a gap between the frame and the main door but we don't sit in the community area it's just a means of getting out into the street

She is chancing her luck. She could buy some foam things to stick on the door frame to stop the drafts or put a door curtain up if it's bothering her that much. I wouldn't replace a door because it has small gaps round it, I would insulate it. And like you say, it's a communal area so don'ts matter if it's a bit drafty.

I’d distance yourself from her she sounds as though she has potential to be a complete pain in the arse

the only thing is I’d get the garden done if the HA do it it will literally be a quick cut and strim

How are you involved in all this? Presumably she is very welcome to contact your HA about it and you can just leave her to it?

See what your tenancy agreement says about the garden. It may say you have a shared responsibility, in which case you'd need to agree how to tackle it.

I am polite but that is al. She only moved in a fortnight ago but ive lived here a few years. Im going to get a gardener to do the front because she is not doing it and the garden front and back is the responsibity of the ground floor flat which is her. She has sole use of the back garden because its not a shared garden, but we all have acess to the front and its a state and reects badly on us and my visitors will see an unkempt garden and its embarrassing. She wont do the garden as she is hoping the housing will do it and the longer we wait the worse it gets. I dont know her financial situation so i wont ask her to contribute to the cost of the gardener but i want it neat sooner rather than later