Forums Forums Wirral Information Law And Your Rights Housing law help

My friend lives in a flat and has endless problems.
The flat is damp, she cant have a number 2 in her own toilet because it blocks-dynarod wont come ott anymore. Her lekky/ gas bills are 3 times higher due to the extra work the boiler has to do due to ancient pipework. Raw sewage spills into the garden cönstantly. She has not been paying full rent as protest. As a result the landlord gave her a 7 day eviction notice. Any advice please? She too afraid to go c.a.b in case landlord finds out she is 'making waves'!

Is the flat private or council? Tell her to go to the CAB anyway, they will NOT share any information with anyone, or contact any authority (ie. the landlord) under any circumstance, unless legally obliged to do so (court injunction/warrant etc) or the customer signs a declaration first.

They will offer the best advice and help, for free, and totally confidential. They have specialists for specific area's of the law and consumer advice, they'd most likely cover issues like this on a regular basis and have a lot of experience and guidance to offer.

It does not sound good at all, and she should not have to put up with it.

Its private property.

if the land lord doesnt do anything to inprove it, she could threaten to not pay the tight ass

Thats the posistion she in now. His response? The (illegal?) Eviction notice

Thats the posistion she in now. His response? The (illegal?) Eviction notice

If the issues are that bad, call in the enviromental health; my sister had to do this over her landlord, she was good mates with him, but he is a property developer and and had lost near a million during 2007 and 2008 and was seriously struggling, so was putting jobs off/neglecting to pay for even basic repairs (he is a builder himself, so would start jobs but never have the time to finish them, leaving scaffolding up for 8 months for example).

In the end, when the enviroment health came in, they found 27 faults and took him to court, and he was ordered to rectify all the faults within a set period of time (28 days for serious faults, 3 months for others). He eventually apologised to me sister, and accepted he had done wrong, and thay are friendly again, but I can quite understand the problems facing anyone who is in a similar position with a private landlord.

Still, my best advice, is to g seethe CAB, this is what my sister had to do, and the situation was resolved in the end.

Its not illegal for him to serve eviction for rent arrears, he just needs to go to court and obtain a judgement. However, she is able to cite her reasons in court, but with my sister, it didnt make any difference, the landlord still won the case.

He never wanted to get her out of the house however, it was more a case of male pride, plus if he had, he would have had to shell out anyway, because the house would not have been fit to live in with the amount of problems, so nobody would have taken it on/the enviromental health may have condemed it anyway, without him doing the repairs she was complaining about/refusing to pay a portion of her rent over.

some usefull links
http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/housing/housinghealth

http://www.wirralfed.org/

If you tell your landlord about repair problems but nothing is done within a reasonable time, you can carry out minor repairs using future rent to cover costs. You should never withhold your rent just to protest against disrepair!!

Whether you have a written agreement or not, the law says there are some repairs landlords ALWAYS have to do.

Your landlord has to repair:

The structure (roof, walls, floors and windows) of your home;
The outside of your home, for example, the gutters, drains and pipes;
Installations for heating water and space heating;
Baths, sinks, toilets and basins.

If the boiler is that bad, she can get British Gas out if it has the slightest whiff of a leak and they will condemn it. If they do that, the landlord HAS to fix it!!

The other option is to try and get a receipt of repair notices served by the Local Authority. The problem is that the laws concerning housing and welfare rights are very complicated. Local authorities have wide powers to make sure all homes in the borough are fit to live in. These powers cover both large and small repairs but Environmental Health Officers (EHOs) can inspect rented properties, and draw up lists of repairs that the landlord has to carry out.

If landlords fail to carry out repairs within a reasonable period then in some cases the Council can carry out the work and recover the costs from the landlord. Occasionally landlords can claim grants to help pay for necessary repairs.

Because of the formal procedures EHOs have to follow, it may take a long time before repair works are carried out, but emergency repairs are dealt with more quickly.

If you ask an EHO to inspect your home, they do not have to tell your landlord or the court how they found out that your accommodation needed repairing.

As well as the Local Authority taking action, you can take your landlord to court to get them to do the works and/or ask for compensation for any damages to yourself, family or property.

This is a big step though, and before you start you should seek legal advice, especially as you may need to be represented at court. If you are getting benefit, or are on a low income and have little savings, you may qualify for Legal Aid to help with the cost of going to court.

Was the eviction notice granted by the Courts??

I'm sorry it's long winded honey, but it's somewhat of a minefield. You know where I am if you need any further advice.

With regards going to the CAB - there are laws to protect her from any harrassment from the landlord so she needn't worry about that!