Damp issues... Tennants rights

[Asteria]

Sorry - this is a bit of a long one:

I have lived in my current home for 4 years. It is a 100(ish) year old mid-terraced farm cottage with horrendous damp. This was not obvious when I moved in and as the matters have arisen I have informed my landlord...

In the last two years I have had to repeatedly scrub the walls in the back of my kitchen to get rid of the black mould - I have now just resorted to putting a curtain across that part of the kitchen and not using the area at all. The agents were informed and I remind them every month when I go in to pay rent - but they are yet to actually do anything about it. I also have to wash dishes as I use them as there is damp in the cupboards so even when clean they have been exposed to lord knows what...

The front and back doors are both rotting - the back is now taped up with thick "black and nasty" (courtesy of an army friend!) to stop the draughts. The front door has a howling gale around the edges, despite my putting the foam insulating tape around it - and when it is wet and windy (which in Yorkshire is a lot of the time) the carpet inside the door (currently about 1msq) becomes saturated with water being blown under.

I also have an inexplicable damp patch in the middle of the floor in my sitting room - it only appears when it is really wet outside so I can only imagine that there is a split pipe under the floor that backs up...

Repairs were done to my bedroom ceiling last year after some tiles fell off the roof, but it took 4 months for them to even come out and look at it - by which time I was catching water in 5 buckets. This repair work is now leaking again and they refused to deal with any of the other problems when they were in doing that...

I really love the area I live in and the house is very sweet (despite being damp and draughty) - I cannot afford anywhere else within the area and am loathe to move. The Agent (who is notoriously shit) has informed me that my rent is going up at Easter - despite fact that I am only £50 a moth less than the house next door which has another bedroom, bathroom, downstairs loo, utility room, garage and twice the size of garden to mine. I pointed this out to him and he said that it "had to go up because it hadn't been raised in 4 years" - which is very true, but surely it is depending on market value, rather than that they fancy getting a bit more cash out of it...

I will consider paying the extra £50 a month - but only if they do the repairs (and perhaps fit a new kitchen/bathroom - which are circa 1980 and very delapidated). The problem is that I have been telling the agents about it for literally years and they do nothing about it. When I was being snippy about the rent rise I did point out that if it was being hiked to get me out the landlord would probably have to spend £8k to £10k just making it habitable for any other tennant. I was just given a gallic shrug...

What are my rights and how on earth do I do to get the house sorted out? I am loathe to go through the courts as this is a very small community and although the landlord (who owns this village and the next) is known for being a tight git - it wouldn't stand me in good stead for getting another rented property locally. I would basically have to be prepared to completely leave the area if it backfired.

[lalalonglegs]

Forcing the LL to do anything would probably be expensive and, as you say, counter productive. As he has lots of property, he has probably employed these agents on the basis that they are as obstructive as possible.

If the rent is going up and the place next door which is bigger and, hopefully, in better repair than your current home is only #50 pcm more expensive, I'd say you can afford to move. Hand in your notice and start asking around now - you have until Easter, something is bound to come up. Let them try and relet the house in its current state (remember to leave plenty of buckets out for viewings).

[Asteria]

I have been looking about for another house in the area for the best part of a year to no avail - it is a very rural area and people don't seem to move on that often. I can't afford to move in the foreseeable future either - so leaving isn't an option unless I suddenly have a huge surge in business (self-employed but hit rather hard by current financial bollocks!).

[scaryteacher]

I haven't raised the rent on my house for 4 years as I'm happy with what I get and the tenants seem happy too.

I would talk to the Local Authority about the damp as I think they have the authority to serve a notice on your l/l to improve the property. Also, examine you contract carefully, what does it say the l/l should do? If he's not doing it, can you get a legal letter written to boot him up the arse? Surely he'd rather have a happy tenant paying rent regularly than an unhappy one who leaves and he has a gap in his lettings?

Is the l/l aware of how shit the agent is being? Try a recorded delivery letter to the l/l direct.

[GrendelsMum]

An issue very similar to this came up on MoneyBox on Radio 4 quite recently. Here's the transcript - you want page 7, with the lady with the damp problem.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/programmes/money_box/transcripts/19jan11rentingandletting.pdf

You can go to the Environmental Health Officer who will serve an Improvement Notice on your landlord - however, this might be something that you're reluctant to do. As with the lady in the transcript, you might feel that going to the EHO will make your landlord chuck you out, and you won't be able to get any other houses nearby.

The ultimate conclusion in the phone in is that it's bad for your health and you need to move.

[Asteria]

thank you both - I will have another crack at getting my landlord/agent to sort out the problems and if they still don't fet their fingers out I will hand in my notice