When my partner and I were looking for a new home to rent, my parents said one of their spare houses was empty and for us to move in there. We said no at first and they brought it up again, so we said only if we pay them rent.
We moved in and they insisted they didn't want any money/rent from us at all. They said just keep it clean and tidy. Which wasn't a problem at all, but we would have preferred to have paid rent to them as well.
The property was one that a old man had passed away it, so they had my mother brother do some work on as it was in quite a state when they had bought it. By the way he is not a builder, so the work was not at all brilliant but we were just very grateful.
When we moved in the woodwork on the side of the stairs was spongy and rippled and the top step you couldn't step on as it wasn't safe. We thought it was rot, but my father hammered a few nails in it to support the top step and said it was fine.
We thought if we're not paying rent then we'll finished of jobs in the house. We painted the house, levelled the floors, carpeted, installed a stairwell/spindles as there was nothing there.
The garage had collapsed so we rebuild the garage and paid for the planning permission. The fence was damaged, missing, so we had new fencing, New guttering, the garden had collapsed down to the lower lever, so we had the wall supporting that rebuilt and a new patio laid. New decking area built too.
The drains had collapsed, so we also had that sorted.
Whilst we paid for and done this work to their property, we struggled to stop the condensation from the single pane windows. This mean wiping them down every morning, but we could never stop it. Some of the windowsills were rotten when we moved in. We also notice that the side wood on the stairs was splitting, warping more and mushrooms had started to grow and spread, the kitchen wall was also becoming damper and damper, plaster was falling off.
We decided we had spent enough on the property, and the dampness was becoming too much of an issue. We didn't want to spent on windows either as money had run out. My husband had gone up the attic to fetch the Halloween decorations and noticed everything was absolutely soaking up there, the felt on the roof was rotten, some tiles slipped.
We bought our new home and told my parents we think they need a new roof on their house and that this was probably contributing to the damp in the walls.
However, my parents have insisted that my partners fish tank caused all the dampness and problems with the house. I told them I don't think a fish task could have caused all those problems. Especially as the stairs was rotten when we moved in. And I explained about the roof again and said that my parter would help them do it. But there was no offer of money towards the batton, felt or roof tiles. My mother just said good, perhaps he can ask her brother (my uncle) to give him a hand. She said she thinks he would want £160 a day, clearly she was expecting us to pay his wages and for a new roof. So to avoid conflict my husband and I paid for them to have a new roof on the house.
They seem very ungrateful and are still blaming the fish tank for all the problems.
Even when we had moved out, we still had to pay the council tax, gas and electricity when the work was being done. My mother expected me to pay these bills until they either sold it or had rented it out.
I feel they are expecting too much and I've stopped paying the council tax, gas and electricity a few months ago. I told my mother I had given final readings and her details to the council, and energy supplier. She hadn't bothered to contact them or set up any direct debits, so now she's had final demands and keeps ringing me to say I better sort the bills out, I must have given wrong readings. Ive checked my photos of the readings and my final bills were correct.
I feel they expected too much and wish we hadn't accepted their offer.