Mandy Bedingfield. PHOTO/FILE
More damage discovered
KAREN COLTMAN
[email protected]
The Tenancy Tribunal granted landlord Mandy Bedingfield access to her Carterton rental property this week, and ordered her tenant to pay $4950.44 in rental arrears and to forfeit his $1000 bond for renting her Norfolk Rd property.
Tribunal adjudicator Kaye Stirling made the order in the Lower Hutt Tenancy Tribunal on Wednesday afternoon.
Stirling terminated Shaun Quantock’s tenancy and granted Bedingfield possession of the property “immediately”.
“Tenant Shaun William Quantock must pay Amanda Ann Bedingfield $4970.44,” she said.
Stirling calculated the rental arrears to be $5950, but the amount Quantock was ordered to pay was less the $1000 bond.
Quantock did not appear at Wednesday’s tribunal hearing and Stirling declared the tenancy abandoned.
He can apply for a rehearing if he believes that a substantial wrong or miscarriage of justice has happened. Quantock can also appeal the order within 10 working days of the hearing date.
Bedingfield found her house vacated on February 2, but the 90-day notice period she had issued because of rental arrears was not over until April 4.
She was informed by Tenancy Services she was not legally allowed access on to the property.
In January, she had applied to the Masterton Tenancy Tribunal for termination of the tenancy but was given a hearing date of March 20; meanwhile, the rent owing mounted up.
Three weeks ago, she applied to the Lower Hutt tribunal instead.
The amount ordered included rent in lieu of three weeks’ notice, which a tenant was required to give by law if they were moving out.
The settlement does not include rent owed between the date Bedingfield found the place to be abandoned and the hearing date of March 4.
Bedingfield went to her property on Thursday and found a door was smashed and needed replacing, and more windows had been smashed than she thought initially.
She decided, because the bond had been allocated by the tribunal for rent arrears, to apply again to the tribunal for damages.
“I wasn’t going to, but having many weeks of no access on to my property to get repairs done and finding more damage, this is another $1500 I need to spend because of the tenant’s behaviour,” Bedingfield said.
She said she would not rent the place out again and took a real estate agent through the property on Thursday for a market appraisal.
“Many friends have come forward to support with the clean-up job and stories of their own,” she said.
“Yes, I have had negative comments, but I also did this to put forward a landlady’s story of the slowness of the government system and how these delays cost landlords money.”
The Tenancy Tribunal website said hearings would be held within 20 days of the application.
But the Masterton hearing of March 20 was more than three months after Bedingfield’s application.
Justice should have way lo,
Ng done wat a crap of th justice system in this country where victims suffers and wrong does get away from it
I totally agree this tenant needs to be accountable I can understand why this lady would not rent out again. This process is way to slow and as a landlord you should have every right to access your property as you are the owner.
Definitely go for damages as $1500 is alot of money to be out of pocket.
I myself are a landlord and are lucky at present have a good tenant but have also experienced bad tenancy. If this tenant left I also would rethink about letting out again
Yahoo finally somebody got a result against these rental squatting parasites. One for the hardworking honest people.
Yes I recently liquidated my rental for similar reasons-
Govt are punishing landlords for the huge loss we have endured for decades so it’s time to sell up rental property so the tenants can live on the streets where they belong-
Great outcome for this landlord. But I agree, that in her case, the legislation acted as a barrier rather than a help. The Masterson tribunal not sticking to it’s hearing time frames is also not helpful. With a property shortage, the last thing we need is landlords to be put off renting out properties. Bit who can blame her in this case. Also good on the Lower Hutt adjudicator for using some common sense and realising the tenancy was over. Goodness! Even a blind man could see that!