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Hi all! I recently moved out from a property. He visited the property 3 times in the 1.3 months my partner and I lived there, and never found any issues. We moved out on the 28th of Feb, returned the keys on the 8th of March as agreed on. I chased the refund return on the 14th and he replied saying he found a couple of issues including: the fridge wasn't clean enought, oven had burnt marks, lvc flooring had a stain, and a rusty stain on the carpet in the bedroom. And since the property was brand new when we moved in, he was quoting a cleaner and alerted us that if the floor wasn't sorted out, it would need replacement. I'm ok with the fridge and oven comments. The stain on the lvc floor is small (covering less than one full tile), caused by water dripping off from clothes and shoes during winter. The rusty stain is from the foot of my bedside table, also small. He replied today 1st of April that a cleaner has been there and apparently didn't sort out completely. They will check in person on Friday and predicted the following costs: Hallway LVT Cost (£985) + fitting (£472) divided by 3 (since the LVT is fitted to 3 rooms) = £485. £484 divided by 10 year life span multiplied by 9 years life remaining (before we would have expected to replace it) = £437
Master Bedroom carpet (£413) + fitting (£60) = £473 £473 divided by 7 years life time x 6 years remaining life span = £405
Can they charge me for a full replacement of carpet and floor?
Thank you if you can share your knowledge!
Landlords cannot charge tenants for normal wear and tear, which is considered an expected consequence of living in a property. For example, small stains from water drips or rust marks from furniture might fall under this category, especially if the damages are minor and proportional to regular use
Landlords cannot charge tenants the full replacement cost of items unless the damage is so significant that repair is not feasible. Instead, they can charge a proportionate amount based on the item's age and expected lifespan (as they're attempting to do with the carpet and flooring). This approach is called "betterment" and ensures landlords don't profit from replacing old items with new ones at the tenant's expense.
Normal wear and tear is proportionate to the amount of time the tenant lived in the property. If you have tenants in for 10 years the LL probably can't reclaim anything for flooring/walls because everything will be past its expected usability. Unless OP made a typo I wouldn't expect there to be any significant wear and tear on brand new surfaces after the tenant lived in the property for less than two months. Especially if the landlord has photos to show the flat was in brand new condition.
I'm assuming you meant to type 1.3 years not months
The answer is the LL is trying it on. And attempting betterment. Dispute through the DPS that is what it's there for.
Indeed 1 year and 3 months
They are definitely trying it on. However the fact is you caused at least some damage to a new property..damage is not the same as wear and tear. I'd have thought £ couple of hundred to replace tiles.
You can definitely challenge this! Landlords can't charge tenants for betterment, meaning they can't ask you to pay for full replacements unless the damage is beyond fair wear and tear and irreparable.
From what you described, the issues sound minor and typical of wear and tear, especially given how short your tenancy was. A small stain on fooring and a bit of rust under a bedside table doesn’t justify full replacement costs. And even if there was some damage, they must account for depreciation, which it looks like they're trying to do, but the numbers still seem off.
If your deposit wasn’t protected in a government-approved scheme within 30 days of payment and you didn’t receive the prescribed information, you could be entitled to compensation of 1–3x the deposit amount. That might give you some leverage if they’re being unreasonable, courts don’t look kindly on unprotected deposits.
If they try to deduct anything from your deposit, raise a dispute through the deposit scheme, they usually side with tenants when landlords try to overcharge like this!
Many landlords or agencies try to abuse tenants when they leave, however the main is to remember your rights. If you haven't damaged this property then you've 99% chance to get your deposit back!
Be firm but professional!