Housing Disrepair Compensation Guide

 A Housing Disrepair Claim is a claim made against your Council or Housing Association for their failure to keep your property up to legal standards of repair.

If you are suffering from Housing Disrepair, you may be entitled to compensation if your home is unfit to live in because of the poor maintenance/conditions of the property. Also, if they have failed to carry out repairs within a reasonable time frame since you issued the report (we suggest 3 months/ 12 weeks) you can claim compensation. The amount of compensation will vary, but be settled covering the extent of damage/inconvenience caused.

Your landlord has a legal duty to maintain the structure and exterior of the property they rent out. If problems arise after an inspection or are reported by a tenant, the landlord must fix the issue (i.e. carrying out repairs) within a justifiable time frame. The amount of time varies depending on the issue that has been found/reported, for example, some repairs are classed as emergency and should be completed as soon as possible.

What can you claim compensation for?

• Financial loss
• Inconvenience
• Damage to belongings
• Damage to health
• Rent recovery

What falls under 'Damage to health'?

If your mental and/or physical health has been affected by the conditions of your home, the amount depends on how long you was affected for and in what ways.

We advise to keep all sick notes, hospital/GP letters, prescriptions and/or reports of your health, to demonstrate evidence of how your health has been affected.

This can also relate to 'loss of earnings' if you have had to take time off from work from poor mental/physical health caused by the disrepair.

In some cases, you may be eligible to claim for the pain and suffering the disrepair has caused you.

For example, personal injury such as skin irritation and/or breathing issues caused by damp/mould.

What falls under 'Inconvenience'?

Inconvenience can be claimed in circumstances such as;

• Not having full use of your home
  
• Disruption to your daily life
• Time out of the property due to inspections/builders

The amount of compensation you can claim for in terms of inconvenience will depend on your circumstances and the extent of disruption. Essentially, if the disrepair has affected your daily life in some form, you will be able to claim for the inconvenience caused.

What falls under 'Damage to belongings'?

To include damage to belongings in your compensation claim, you can include items/property that are destroyed, damaged or lost because of the repair works/poor conditions in your home. The amount is determined by the extent of the disrepair. We advise to try and keep all receipts of your items, and in some form have photographic or physical evidence to put forward in spite of any disputes. For example, you have experiences a water leak from the roof which has ingresses into your bedroom and damaged decorations on your wall. The poor conditions can affect your belongs such as clothes, carpets, furniture, personal items etc.

What falls under 'Rent recovery'?

Essentially, if you have not been able to live in your home because of the repair, you may be entitled to claim an abatement of rent. This is where you can claim back some of the rent that you have been paid. However, if you have fallen behind on rent or withheld rent in protest of repairs, the landlord can counterclaim against this which may exceed or limit your claim.

We calculate the compensation owed to you by establishing your first complaint made regarding the disrepair, and then estimating when we expect works to be completed at your property. This period is known as the “liability period”. We then assess how much rent has been paid at your Council or Housing Association property during this timeframe. A percentage of this is deducted based on how many living spaces in your property are affected by the disrepair.

As a brief example, if you have been complaining for 1 year (minus 4-8 weeks) regarding damp affecting 50% of your property, and you pay £400.00 in rent per month, the formula would look like this:

11 months x £400.00 rent per month – 50% inconvenience = £2,200.00 (amount repayable).

What falls under 'Financial loss'?

You can claim for financial loss if you have had to spend money because of the issues in your home, for example higher electric bills for using a plug in heater if your boiler was broken for a period of time. We advise to keep all receipts and have a track of your bills, to demonstrate evidence that you have paid/financial losses due to the disrepair or poor conditions of your home.

To commence a Housing Disrepair Claim, please contact the Housing Disrepair Experts .

📞 0800 610 2223
📱 07765839628
✉️ info@mlasolicitors.co.uk
🔗 www.mlasolicitors.co.uk