My Tenant Is A Lazy, Worthless, Greasy Kebab

A year or two ago, sick of having to replace carpets every time someone vacated, I became a convert to laminate flooring. I know that doesn't keep an oven clean, but it is SO good to just be able to go in and give a quick mop - once the floor's clean the whole place looks tons better. i don't provide white goods; if they buy their own they will look after them and if they don't.... what do I care..? Have yet to come up with a similar solution for walls, baths etc...

Did you pay him any inspection visits during his stay there? I pay my Tenants a visit every 3 months and if the place looks like a dive I do have a good ol' moan at them and inform them of what it costs to move the pro's in when they vacate. A letter is always good as you have this on file should you ever need to submit any evidence to the Deposit Protection Schemes if they dispute their deposit later.
I must say that most of my Tenants are pretty good. They do generally tidy up and sort the place out once you give then a good ol' talking to but then again I'm sure there are so many shitbags out there who couldn't care less! What this guy has done to your property is appalling! He deserves to be shot in the groin!

OMG just had an identical problem. We even have the same oven! My scum bag was a Teacher!!!! how the hell they can teach primary school kids how to read and write when they cant even wipe their own arse????

I would have been happy with scuffs on light walls in the main bedroom- instead I got snot (well I hope to god it was)
As for skids in the bog- the toilet seat was so stained I had to get the cleaning company to remove it!!! I know a lot of tenants are not going to repect property that have not grafted to buy but for heaven sakes have a little self repect and either get your butt oven the toilet or learn how to clean it before people look at it.

As for shooting them in the groin they are probably bullet proof with all that caked on Sh@*

My colleague often comes back from inspections absolutely horrified at how people live. Class means nothing and the most intellectual are often the worst offenders! I'm not talking about engineer types who are often regimental in the cleanliness but doctors and professors, bankers and IT people seem to live happily in filth. Young sharers are another dirty bunch. Usually one will do all the cleaning because they care how they live, the rest will continue to be slobs and then the clean sharer gets pissed off and gives up.

I had a man in my office the other day claiming to have worked for 3 days to clean his place and why did we have to send cleaners in? Because you and your lazy wife lived like pigs all the time you were there bonehead! That's what I wanted to say anyway :-) BTW, we inspected his place twice in the 6 weeks prior to his vacate date and put in writing what he needed to do!

The worst I ever saw was a a real hair raiser. Had an Overseas landlord in Nigeria and when the tenants gave notice on the flat told us she was letting to family so didn't need us anymore. We parted on good terms and gave it no more thought. A few months later had a phone call from one of her neighbours who thought we were still managing it. The tenants had trashed it. We phoned the landlord as we still had her number. The council hadn't bothered to let her know and she asked us to take it over again. Turned out the council had talked her into letting it to them on a no deposit basis and they't put heroin addicts in there. We went to see the damage.

Vomit everywhere including inside the washing machine along with the contents of bags of sugar, dried fruit pasta and god knows what else. Shit on all the walls and curtains. Piss everywhere. Flooring ripped up and they even bent all the hinges trying to jump out of a window. (4th story flat). All the doors off, furniture broken and her white leather sofas destroyed. (Yes I know, we told her not to leave white leather but she wouldn't listen.) Needles everywhere. The place was fumigated and everything in it destroyed. The landlord was never fully compensated and the insurance didn't cover this situation. She also lost two months rent due to delays n being notified and the time it took to sort out.

That is actually disgusting especially the oven. How people live like that is amazing

You should see the house my agent (who I've sacked) just tried to give me back. I flipped my lid - the tenants have had 2 massive dogs in there (without permission) which have obviously done their business all over the house. Not only am I withholding the deposit I'm suing the agent aswell.

I am dreading the day I finally get my tenant out! He is a DSS tenant and has ignored the section 21 notice which expired last month.. so off to court.

Being disabled (and he loves to play that card!) he can't clean! Last inspection i found a small pile of either sick or shit he had just put a piece of card over!

It was a brand new flat when he moved in 18months ago and will need new carpets (Laminate sounds good!) and a bloddy good scrub and clean.

Anyone got any advise, I had a tenant in a property with a two year contract, they decided to leave early with 6 month to run, I made a gesture of goodwill and said that if they paid 3 months I would let them off three months, they agreed and then asked by email to the estate agent if i would accept the bond as final rent, I agreed.

They are now disputing this payment with the backing of the estate agent who paid it me, as I now have new tenants in the property and they think as I was fortunate to get tenants within a month, they have paid for a property I now receive rent from another occupant.

Am I mad or are the tenants stupid and likewise the estate agents for supporting them, the solicitor for the estate agents, clee tompkinson and francis seems to support their case and believes that I will loose if it goes to courts.

Any advise, I do believe the whole thing has been mismanaged by the agents as I am being mislead by the agent, the last occupant I had was an estate agent and left the place in a terrible mess, so the dodgy handling may lay here.

Any advise or names of good solicitors would be helpful as I intend to fight this on pure principal.

many thanks

Mark

Hi Mark, My interpretation is that when a landlord agress to let a tenant leave before the contract expires the tenat pays rent until the lanldord lets the property again. Sometimes the landlord and tenants agree a sum of compensation to cover costs of finding another tenant. These costs should be reasonable and not intented to make you a profit.

You may lose this if they take it further if you took more than say one months rent from them and then started a new tenancy within a month of them vacating. Do you have anything in writing, emails etc, laying out the terms you agreed with tenants and agents? It seems wrong that the agents agreed and were party to something that they now say is unfair.

I'll be interested to hear the outcome and to see what others have to say.

I had a Tenant who recently wanted to leave one of my properties 6 months before the end of their agreement. I agreed to release them from their contract on the proviso that I could find someone to replace them. I asked for their cooperation in the matter where viewings and tidiness were concerned and they very happily complied.
As result I found a replacement and they moved out and made sure the flat was spotless for the new Tenants.
In a scenario like this I don't think it would have been fair to charge them extra. You would've had to do the same paperwork regardless even if they'd served their full tenancy anyway. It can be a slight inconvenience but I think this is the nature of this business.

Many thanks for your response, I'll keep you informed.

the main facts are they signed a goodwill statement where they offered to pay two months of the remaining 6 with no mention of rent on it, one solicitor thinks they have no case but another thinks they are will win and get back 300 of the 650 as I paid £350 to the estate agent to relet, I however had damage and missing items from the property they they have failed to notify the tennants of which will total around £3000 so he thinks this will deter them.

I'll let you know what happens.

Mark

I'm not surprised the carpets were full of shit. They're white. I'll never understand why landlords put white and beige carpets in rentals and then bitch and moan if they're dirty. You are right this shit head was certainly a dirty bastard but you should have told him to clean up his shit before moving out. Somewhere we rented they had put beige carpet in the fucking kitchen of all things, what a nob.

Anyway, you have my sympathy, a doctor should at least rinse out the shower for Gods sake. Treated it like a hotel by the looks of it.

I moved into a property where there were gobs of grease all over the ENTIRE kitchen. It was horrendous. I spent literally WEEKS cleaning, and I used a paint stripper to scrape they layers off the walls, cabinets, under cabinets, window frames, ceiling, light fitting doors...

I have never seen anything like it, but it seems common in rental properties (had the same before in a previous place). Apparently the landlords wife used to clean for the old tenants, but understandably became fed-up with clearing up after a bunch of lazy men. Since then, the place clearly was never cleaned - and numerous fry-ups were cooked resulting in this mess.

One of the things that does make a huge difference in my own rental property is having a decent extractor hood over the hob. (along with a stainless steel or glass splashback rather than tile).

Another thing... when I first tried to deal with the grease layer that was several cm thick. - I tried all the commercial cleaners. NOTHING worked. Not bleach, cilit bang, washing up liquid, oven cleaner, cream cleaner blah blah blah. My moment of triumph came when I discovered that simple Bicarbonate of Soda mixed up with a little water in a paste, then applied to surfaces and left for a few minutes - outperformed everything else by huge margins! I thought it was just a hippy/eco/old lady option that was only suitable for light cleaning. Boy was I wrong!

I've had an almost identical situation. The property was let through an agent. The house was described as 'A1 condition' at the start of the tenancy and handed back to me as 'unfit for human habitation'(by my managing Agent) when I finally got the tenant out. I suspect the tenant was sourced through the council's homechoice scheme...I could have done that it seems without the need of an agent who would supposedly market the place. Easy work for them... An instant tenant off the waiting list and they could 'big themselves up' in letting me know they'd found one the next day!
Now I was on the full management service...so one asks how was it that Lazy, Worthless, Greasy, Iranian Kebab parents with three crayon yielding kids were allowed to get away with it by the agents who were doing the inspections. Be careful of the the small print I say.... When I dug out the original contract with the Agent it states that they will only inform the landlord of any issues...Note inform me!!!.... not that they will deal with it. Of course I did get inspection reports saying that the place was untidy and that mould was appearing in the bathroom and spare room etc...But I'd expect more than just informing me... For fucks sake, who's paying for the management. ...And what really pissed me off, on reflection, was that any little issue that was a Landlord responsibility under the contract, was notified and dealt with by the agents contractor and charged to me form the rent I'd receive. When it was a case that all the walls and woodwork had been comprehensively scribbled over with crayons,felt-tips, biros etc...absolutely nothing happened...I was informed the place needed painting and they billed me!! Contract is worthless...what the landlord was responsible for, I paid. What the tenant was responsible for...I paid again. Never once was the tenant presented with a bill for the consequences of their neglect and lifestyle. It just SUCKS. What message does that send out I told the Agent.

So with tenants like these what recourse do we have? We can't add them to a 'Blacklist' because apparently the data protection act doesn't allow. Court?... well I'm told is just chucking good money after bad. The 'previous landlord' reference is useless if they are council's responsibility and moving into 'temporary accomodion' or being given a nice council house on us. I'd like arsehole tenants like this to have a record that haunts/embarrasses them...somewhere. Any ideas?

I'm a live-in landlord with an incredibly lazy tenant. She literally doesn't lift a finger and I'm expected to rifle through her room to collect up dirty dishes, saucepans and my stuff that she has 'acquired'. Yesterday I found she had taken a lamp from my room despite having two of her own. Her room is so disgusting my cleaner refuses to touch it and I don't blame him! Her socially inept boyfriend stays nearly every night and he's so rude that I can't have friends over because he insults them. He does all his washing etc at my house and just helps himself to my food and drink. My tenancy agreement states that I'm supposed to get 48 hours notice of overnight guests and I have the right to decline the request. Does anyone have any advice? Preferably I would like her to leave.

Not to minimize your trauma, but I would trade that tenant for the ones I have had. I just do not know how to pick them, and I got the help gene and fall for every sob story. Mi Culpa, Mi Culpa. But I had a tenant high up in Apple who was a liar, destroyer, when she moved her lips I knew she was lying, she caused 10,000 damage, then I had a man who ran for senator with the libertarian party in California, total slob and caused me 10,000 damage, and he actually took me to court to get his deposit back, and so he got most of it back as I could not prove I rented it out in the shape it was, although it was the pride and glory of my late mom who built it with her own hands when she was 50. And a film was made about her endeavor. Then there was the animal rescue person who really was just a meth head who said he would kill me and mom, and burn the place down if we complained to anyone, which we did not as we were shaking out of fear, he and his woman squatted then and then stole everything, and even the car battery. Now I have a chronic liar who is sucking on every government tit, I was sympathetic as she claimed she had a head injury and a 7 year old child. Just lies from the ad on craigslist onward. Then a woman who bbq under a dead tree three feet up and caught her about 10 times just dropping her cancerette ashes into redwood needles and dead grass, no smoking allowed, but she lied. I am in california, the worst drought we are facing. Then a odd thing happened, I had the fortune that I encountered 5 different firefighters in a short amount of time and they went nuts when I explained what was going on, so I warned her, but she refused to change, use a ashtray, but she could not manage that request and her friendly pit bull until it was not and she apparently knew he was not but lied, but when I evicted her she went total nuts overdrive. Refused to pay her electric bill, scratched the wood floors, abandoned her cat for a week without food or water ( I took mercy and feed the cat, as I love animals) she highjacked my craigslist post, insulting me, calling me a kook for evicting her. So tired of tenants.