A Landlord approached us after his Tenant complained that slats in a double bed were damaged two weeks after he and his partner had moved in. We will leave it to your imagination how the bed broke!
In this case the Landlord had produced his own inventory, which he had verbally agreed with the Tenant. The question that the Landlord came to us with was; who should replace the bed? We discovered that the Tenant had accepted the inventory as just a list of furnishings and did not detail the condition of the items. To further complicate the issue, the tenant had not even signed the inventory.
The answer will depend on the quality of the inventory and the detail in the tenancy agreement. Both were substandard in this case. If there had been a quality statement of condition included in the inventory, signed by the Tenant, there would be no question, the Tenant would have been responsible. The solution now relies on negotiation and in our experience it is likely that the Landlord may have to replace or repair the bed.
The schedule of condition and professionally prepared inventory sets out the baseline condition of the property at the beginning of the tenancy. If you use a professional agent like Belvoir you can be assured that your paperwork will be correctly worded and you will be able to sleep easy!
For more details on the services that my team and I provide, pop in for a chat or check out our website at www.belvoir.co.uk/daventry. Simon Haywood. Belvoir Daventry – Business Owner.
