facetious
-I'm fascinated by your in-depth knowledge of the rules,regulations of tenancy agreements and especially how much you know about the workings of PRTB, even to the extent of having knowledge of PRTB rulings.
May I ask you something..
When you say that a LL/agent took 15 cases against 15 seperate tenants and won all the cases, can you clarify the word "won"?
My definition of winning when taking a case against tenants is that the tenant hands over the money for all damages, loss of rental and all legal costs (if any).
Most PRTB decisions are available to view on the PRTB website. Most include tenants' and landlords' names which I believe should be obligatory but either may request the removal of their names from the published decisions
I have studied many Adjudication and Tribunal decisions (just out of mere interest!!) and found that most claims can be broken down into (usually) two or more reasons. For example, a tenant makes a claim against a landlord for the retention of the entire deposit.
Extract from PRTB Ref: DR786/2007
The Respondent Landlord shall pay the sum of €350 to the Applicant Tenants within 28 days of the date of issue of this order, being part of the retained deposit of €1,487 having deducted €497 for cleaning costs and €640 for repairs and replacements in excess of normal wear and tear .....
In these findings, the landlord was awarded an amount for cleaning costs, an amount for damage in excess of normal wear and tear and the remainder of the deposit to be returned to the tenant as unjustifiably retained portion of deposit.
Thus, I analyse this as three reasons - two awarded to the landlord and one reason to the tenant. But, as the tenant brought the claim, I deem him as having won his claim, though this was only in part and did not receive the full deposit.
I class a person as having "won" a claim depending on who made the claim and how much was awarded to the claimant - just a personal view. In the above case, I could also have made the landlord as having been the winner as he was awarded more than the tenant. Possibly my analysis needs to to be modified?
However, in the case of the landlord who has won his 15 claims,
1 Rent arrears
2. Eviction granted (Notice of Termination is valid), rent arrears, unpaid utilities
3. Rent arrears, unpaid utilities
4. Arrears of rent (8,000 euros and may retain entire deposit.
5 Arrears of rent and unpaid utilities
6 Eviction granted (Notice of Termination is valid), rent arrears
7 Arrears of rent, damages for no paying rent on time (very rare decision), Entire deposit justifiably retained.
8 Arrears of rent
9 File on PRTB website not found
10 Oral Notice of termination by tenant invalid; tenant shall pay: rent arrears, damages in lieu of valid Notice of termination, entire deposit justifiably retained; - 123 euros awarded to landlord having deducted 150 euros awarded to tenant for landlord breach of obligations.
11 Arrears of rent
12 Claim by tenant against landlord - landlord awarded arrears of rent and may retain entire deposit.
13 Arrears of rent
14 Arrears of rent
15 Arrears of rent, entire deposit justifiably retained
16 Arrears of rent, entire deposit justifiably retained
My belief,admittedly based on anecdotes,including posts on AAM, rather than case history, is that when a LL takes a case before PRTB:-
- it can take months before the case is heard and a decision is reached. in the meantime the LL is constrained against taking action against the tenants (except in serious anti-social cases). during those months the LL can be losing rent.
- If a decision in favour of the LL is made the PRTB rarely enforce their decision. The LL has to pursue the matter in the courts. more time - and now costs.
Agreed - but it used to take just as long, if not longer going through the courts, before the PRTB came into existence.
- If the tenant claims he/she has no money (assuming the tenant hasn't emigrated to Canada or gone back to Poland) then what happens? I believe that the type of tenant who falls behind in rent and/or causes lots of damage is not going to be the type of person who remains in the area with lots of ready cash to immediately pay any claim.
This is where proper vetting of a tenant is important. If a tenant loses his job will he have any funds to continue renting the property? If a couple break up what will happen? Is the tenant a foreigner who might just up and return to his native land, leaving debts and damage? Is the tenant Irish, but may also try to just disappear.
IMO, it is always advisable to try to get the address of someone well known to the tenant; and the return of the deposit at the end of a tenancy is best sent to the tenant who should provide their next address - may seem unreasonable but in my estimation, landlords probably make claims for in excess of one million euros every year - a lot of money to lose and therefore probably also affecting the takings of the revenue commissioners.
Unfortunately, IMO, landlords do not do sufficient checks and combine certain facts which could be established / surmised, they tend to take more-or-less the first tenant who comes along. Again, Irish landlords seem to be stuck on 1 months rent as a deposit while in the UK, it is not uncommon to have 1.5 or even 2 months rent if the tenant seems somewhat dubious, but otherwise acceptable.
Finally, as regards PRTB decisions, the landlord seems to seldom be awarded damages while the tenant is often awarded damages - in the decisions I looked at, in 240 claims tenants were awarded damages while only 54 landlords received damages for tenants' breach of obligations. One very interesting exception, and this, on top of rent arrears is:
Tenant shall pay the sum of €20,000, being damages due to the breach of their obligations under the Act in not paying the rent and their failure to vacate the dwelling having been served with a valid notice of termination.