Bloody fcuking tenants & agents ... always me !

MrsRugby · by **MrsRugby** » Tue Mar 20, 2022 4:46 pm

This is a long rant

In short, i have my house in ireland rented ( we emgirated end of last year as both made redundanct - a whole other rant ! ) i dealt with an estate agent in my home town who deals with this type of thing. Paid them their fee and they sorted out tenents etc. Now there was always problems with tenents it seems and in a nutshell the estate agents did bugger all ! We were in the middle of moving to another country and all the hassle that that brings, plus i am pregnant so left in the hands of estate agents, sure what was i paying them for!! End of tenacy, the estate agent let the tenents use deposit as last months rent! then he let them stay on for another couple of weeks if they paid weekly. I was told about this but was having problems with pregnancy so wasnt in frame of mind but as they were still paying a rent i was ok with this, finally told agents to get them out and sort out proper tenents etc.

New tenants were then got but got phone call over last weekend ( from my parents ) to say house was in a disgrace, things missing/stolen/broken and house left in a filthy condition. The new tenants were not impressed. I contacted the estate agents, i was fuming with them >:o(

so long story short, bloody agents never checked on house when old tenants were moving out, just let them off, no follow on address nothing. My parents spend the weekend cleaning the place up with the help of the new tenants ( who were just brillant to do that ) and its finally back in order ( but cost me get it right again, money i dont have! ). I meanwhile told agents to f uck off, I was not using them again. They made a song and dance about the deposit as new tenants paid them this, but we got it back and new tenants have agreed to deal with me from now on.

Now this morning my mother rings me to say Airtricity bill came for old tenants, there is an outstanding bill of 350 to be paid, so the f uckers have left this behind. I know its not in my name and so not liable. The new tenants want to use ESB, fair enough work away, I would rather deal with ESB myself. So what happens now ............... ?

Do i have to ring Airtricity and tell them tenants have legged it, will they be able to close account, I cant provide them with old tenants details, dont have any only a name and appartently they moved back to China ( yeah right with my bloody hoover) so where can they send a final bill too? Estate agents had no answers when i asked them for this information. Can new tenants just ring ESB and open account, will this automatically close the airtricity one ? My OH has been trying to ring airtricity on and off all day but keeps been put on hold, he is at work so he can dial 1850 number, I cant where we live.

I am at my wits end, its like one thing after another since we left Ireland. I am 38 weeks pregnancy and have complications and stressed out.

We moved so OH could get work, didnt want to leave my family and friends but what do we do, stay & be on the dole and not be able to pay mortgage. Why do other people have to treat our property like crap, the bloody rent was barely covering the mortgage. I left house in lovely condition, makes me angry and sad.

O:|

Cupcake666 · by **Cupcake666** » Tue Mar 20, 2022 7:08 pm

Oh god you poor thing!

Some people have absolutely no respect for other peoples property!! >:o(

Well seems as you have used an agency when these people were living there you have that as evidence for airtricity! also airtricity must be set up with a bank account so these people must have known what they were planning and deliberately canceled the direct debit! as far as i know you do not have to pay for the bill as it is not in your name and it was not you using it (once again i am not too sure on that) surely if your husband called, or even sent in a letter to airtricity explaining the situation and also that you have proof that the house was letted out that they would be more lenient on you and hopefully just close the account! i wonder if there is anything that can be done regarding the letting agency? usually when you get a lease it has everything in the house wrote down, eg, Kitchen table & 4 chairs etc. and when the tenant is leaving the agent is meant to check all that stuff! (maby it is different with the agencies)
Seriously just try forget about all this stress until you have the baby considering you are already having problems! leave it in your husbands hands for now!

mackenzie · by **mackenzie** » Tue Mar 20, 2022 10:03 pm

I stand to be corrected on this but I know one of them bord gais, airtricity or esb, if the tenant fails to pay up then it is on you as the house owner to pay the bill unfortunately. You are still the owner - I cannot remember which company said that to me - don't panic this would have been 8 years ago it may have changed by now. Best thing to do phone them and explain and see what they say.
Best of luck

LadyGaga2010 · by **LadyGaga2010** » Tue Mar 20, 2022 10:13 pm

Did you get house insurance for your house as a rental property? If so. it might be worth looking into to see if this covers it. I am looking into renting out my house at the moment and got a quote for house insurance and it provides cover for theft by the tenants and for unpaid rent - not sure about bills

by **coffeycakes** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 9:24 am

Sorry to hear that you have had this problem with tenants, you are not alone on this believe me, we had a very similar situation, the bad news is that I found airtricity impossible to deal with and we had to pay tenants bill, on plus side ESB reconnected the new tenants within 24 hours for 70 euro,now I deal online with ESB so that we wont have this situation again,and we have had no issues in last few months.

Mrs W · by **Mrs W** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 9:30 am

If you can give some details on the previous tenants it might be enough for Airtricity but if they dont get them they do put it back on the house unfortunately.

Go with the ESB and see what they say. I had a tenant who left a bill in my name with Bord Gais and I've just never used them since, we were with them but in was in my OH name so it was never a problem.

What area of the country are you in? Someone here might be able to recommend a good letting agent for you

MrsRugby · by **MrsRugby** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 10:09 am

Ladygaga, yes i do have insurance on house, I am looking into this at moment. My father is very handy so was able to do a lot of the work himself so this took a bit of pressure off me. New tenants seems very nice aswell, they asked if they could do up garden for me, instead of grass, which old crowd destroyed and put down stones. I suppy materials they do labour. Am looking into it, dont want to ask my father to do it as he has done enough already. They also fixed light in kitchen and repaired crack in ceiling & other bits, he is an electrician. The wife cleaned house again and its spotless so in good faith i took something off first monts rent for this work they have done.

I was told as bill is not in my name so therefore not liable ( i checked this out legally )I have heard airtricity are a nightmare to deal with, I have been trying to ring customer service all day yesterday and could not get through, trying again today or rather OH is doing that. thats why a lot of the companies have that deposit thing now as some people were flipping off without paying bills. If needs be, I will get onto solicitor and he can inform them. I am not paying them !

Coffeycakes, i would be interested in hearing your story, would you mind pming maybe ...... ?

Mrs W, waiting to see how tenants get on with ESB, they are ringing them today, they have good record with them so fingers crossed. There are 3 companies in my home town who deal with this kind of thing, but not using any of them. Just going to deal with things ourselves for moment and with help of my dad !

Nostress · by **Nostress** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 10:31 am

Hi MrsRugby

Sorry to hear you are going through all of this

did your tenants pay you be direct debit/standing order. If so the agency will have a record of their bank details. This in turn you can pass onto a solicitor who should be able (don't quote me) to get the new address details from the bank (if they are still in the country).

To be honest paying a solicitor will probably work out more than to pay the bill yourself so I would look into bringing the agency to the small claims court to refund any expenses you have incurred over the past year.
It is their incompetency that has caused you to pay out the extra money so I would be looking into demanding payment from them for
1. Repairs/Missing items
2. The bill
3. Anything you paid them to be refunded.

The application for the small claims court is only 18euro I think and it can all be done in writing.
I would let the agency know you are looking to go down this route and see if they have the decency to give you a refund.

You have a good bit of time on this and if you call Airtricity and let them know the case is being dealt with legally they should allow your new tenants to set up a new account.

In the meantime the main thing you need to do is relax.
Best of luck with the new arrival and hope everything works out for you

Handymammy · by **Handymammy** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 10:59 am

Very good advice from Nostress- do not let the agency away with it. Did you have contract from agency saying what service they would provide for you?

Nostress · by **Nostress** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 11:17 am

Sorry one other thing I forgot to mention - are you registered as a landlord?

When a new tenant moves in you have to register the tenancy with the PRTB. If the agency did this for you (as they should by law) the registration will have the tenants PPS numbers on it.

You will also now need to updated your registration to register the new tenants. Without this registration you may not have any legal standing.

https://smallclaims.courts.ie/esmallcla ... ge=English

https://www.prtb.ie/

IvytheTerrible · by **IvytheTerrible** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 11:30 am

Just wanted to sympathise with you Mrs Rugby

. A relative of mine has a family home rented out and we spent the whole of BH Monday cleaning up after the tenants moved out. They left rubbish out the back and my car still stinks, they had it in black bags which got wet and broke >:o(

. It will take us ages to get the place straight again, they took down all the nets and blinds with an iron fist and broke the brackets etc.

Like that, we had a letting agent and really, all they did was advertise the property and organise tenants for it. After that, it was constant phone calls to us, ie "there is a leak coming down through the kitchen ceiling, do you want to get it fixed yourselves or will we arrange somebody" etc. Now the agent did inspect the place before they left and gave the deposit back. Apparently, they can only deduct from deposit if there are holes in the wall or kitchen cabinets hanging off. Leaving the place crawling doesn't count O:|

TBH I think your agent needs to be tackled over not inspecting, IMO they should have made sure all the bills were changed over before the tenants left. I think your dad probably will have to help out again when the next tenants move out because between rentals, the order in the house will decrease as you go along.

Best of luck with the rest of your pregnancy :wv

by **new start** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 5:52 pm

gotta disagree with you ivy, I am currently renting a property in dublin and living down the country. old tennants moved out last week and news ones in a few days later. The agency was contracted to inspect the property every 3 months and I would get a report. Now to be honest they were poor on contacting me but when I got in touch they gave me an update.
When the old tennants moved out and even before that the agnecy were on their case about cleaning spots off walls and carpets etc. They refused to give back the full deposit because we had the pay to have a deep clean done for the new tennants because of food smell.

They drive me mad in how much I pay them but they have taken a lot of hassle away. They also ensured that the bills got transfered over before the last tennant left.

Nostress · by **Nostress** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 8:20 pm

New Start - as someone who has both rented my own property and lived in rented accommodation; if I was your tenant I would be bringing your agents to the attention of the PRTB.

If you look at Threshold (National Housing Advice) you will see

When you leave, your landlord must promptly return your deposit. The landlord may only keep some or all of the deposit to cover rent arrears or the costs of repairing any damage above normal wear and tear

Your agent was completely in the wrong to withhold deposit based on

They refused to give back the full deposit because we had the pay to have a deep clean done for the new tennants because of food smell.

This is not above normal wear and tear, it's a fact of living - you cook, you get smells. Open a window, don't hold back tenants deposit.

IvytheTerrible · by **IvytheTerrible** » Wed Mar 21, 2022 9:38 pm

New start, your agents sound great (from a landlord's point of view, tenants might not agree I suppose). That is what we were told and they even went on to say that the PRTB was a waste of time in relation to landlords rights as it's too biased against the tenant. Goes to show that a service can vary, depending on the agent you get.

MrsRugby · by **MrsRugby** » Thu Mar 22, 2022 12:12 pm

Thanks girls for the support, we are looking into the small claims court, thanks Nostress (love your user name by the way!)

Thanks coffeycakes on that info.

Our agents were crap, Newstart yours sound a hella of a lot better.

I am leaving it in the hands of my OH as trying to concentrate on pregnancy and being stress free, I might have to be induced next week so my mind is filled with that thought at the moment :ooh

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