Garden trashed but not on condition report

Not looking to get into an argument, but does this confirm my earlier point that the tenant can change the garden/let grass die and it gets rectified at the end of the tenancy? Only saying this as you indicate that you take costs for new grass out of the bond which my understanding is that the bond can only be accessed at the end of a tenancy?
Or is there something that I have missed? For example how would you treat it if the grass was dead midway through a tenancy and they didn't rectify this? Unlikely to be cause for eviction. (granted if they haven't looked after the grass there may be bigger challenges with them as a tenant)

 

If you get a lawn bettle infestation, usually brought in by the lawn mower guy you can water it 7 days a week and its still going to die , unless you find out what the problem is.
It only really becomes noticeable after the lawn is cut and you have all these big areas of dead grass.
By the time its noticeable they have moved on to another patch and are munching away at the roots.

 

Did you visit the house last week, and what are the latest updates?

 

@Hosko.
Taken as intended
My tenants have black thumbs. At the beginning the grass is ok, then they let it get too long, PM breaches them for the lawn not being mowed, so they get it mowed but it generally scalps it back and it suffers from then on. It's not an instant situation and after a few times the grass just can't recover but knowing their inability to keep it alive it is noted and then sorted out at the end. In this area my tenants don't stay much longer than 18mths.
The situation of immediately taking out live healthy plants I feel is a bit different. It's not death from neglect but a premeditated act. A property manager can charge a tenant money at any stage for damage that they have done that needs to be fixed - it can be a risk to leave it to the end to bond when there are other items that might need to be used for bond.

 

Yes! I'm dying to find out too. What nutbags!?

 

The tenants are a husband and wife with a very young baby and a toddler. They don't speak much English. They claim to have woken up the morning after moving in covered with insect bites. There was a compost bin in the front yard. Naturally when they took the top off, they saw some eggshells and the like, and they didn't understand it, and assumed that their insect bites were from flies in the compost. They then proceeded to dig up every single plant from my front yard and courtyard, and hacked everything in the back yard to stumps, and dumped all the green waste on common property. As well as turfed the compost bin.

The husband was really aggro. He was ranting and raving about how "filthy" everything was. I kept saying that he wasn't allowed to make changes to the property without permission. His response was, "I no make changes, I clean! I no need ask to clean!"

My agents literally said to me, "He hasn't made any changes to the property, he's just given the garden a bit of a trim" and, "Do you really want to evict them over something so trivial?" They were more concerned with the fact that the tenant had spent $1,000 out of his own pocket like it was my fault.

Completely railroaded. I was speechless.

Under the coercion I agreed to let them stay for now. I am currently just trying to function and work and look after children without having a complete nervous breakdown - honestly am 2/3 of the way there as it is.

 

I'm so sorry for you.

I still call BS. The PM is off her tree. Garden, fence, trees, shrubs, compost bin - it's all part of the property, FHS. What do they call the letter box and the clothes line?

Imagine going to her house and removing everything in her yard and telling her it's nothing.

This makes me sick! Turn up at her office and ask if you can destroy their front premises, see if they like it then. Suggest you want to lift the pavers, paint over the footpath, remove any signs........ (Better not, but @datto and his colleagues might be up for it). I helped a friend evict her tenants last year, wish I lived in your city. I'm quite good at "gentle persuasion".

 

Thanks Angel. I demanded to know why the garden wasn't on the condition report. The agents looked blankly at each other, shrugged and said, "We just don't put it in. It's not part of the property. We're only concerned about the inside."

So I have no evidence apart from a few random photos on my phone.
Screwed.

 

Not necessarily. Some photos are better than nothing. Do you have photos from when you bought it (advertising).

What about google earth street view?

You could also ask Council for their aerial photos of your property...

 

Joynz. I have photos from when I bought it but that was 2.5 years ago and it was just a patch of grass and some weeds. This all points to the million dollar question. Do I have a case to evict? A few friends have suggested to take it out of their bond when they vacate, but that could be years from now. If I want to take action, I need to do it now; otherwise I have to suck it up and let it go.

(But I'm too angry.)

 

On the positive side, if the trees are only 2 years old, it means it’s really fixable.

I got the impression they were mature, which is harder to fix...

 

OK, I've done some further research on this, and, particularly if you'd had the condition noted on the report or can establish malicious damage, you may have some prospects of success. If the property manager will testify that the plants were there and were all deliberately removed by the tenant, that should be helpful, particularly given the short duration of the tenancy thus far. (And my condolences - these tenants sound like they're going to be a nightmare.)

To digress for a moment, my earlier answer was the legal answer, if the matter's being decided by a court. Tribunals - which deal with tenancy disputes - aren't courts, and aren't bound by the precedent of courts. They usually follow precedent for the sake of making consistent decisions, but they're not obligated to. It looks like in NSW that at least some Tribunal members have awarded compensation for damage to plant material.

The unfortunate thing is that, because Tribunals aren't bound by precedent - even their own - another Tribunal member may decide that they want to adopt the common law position that plants are land. (Many tribunal members aren't lawyers and may not even be aware of this.)

Anyway, here is a handy reference list of cases where damages have been awarded to landlords relating to plants in NSW: http://www.tenantsrights.org.au/Resources/2. Bond/ParticularBondClaims/Gardens and Lawns.pdf

 

I don't get why you haven't just made a decision yet. Do you want to seek to terminate or not? Do you want to seek damages or not?

Either just start the termination process or instruct your PM do it. Or make a decision to move on. I personally am a landlord that doesn't care that much about garden things, so I would get it if you went that way as well. But you don't sound like that.

I don't know why there has been so much talk and no action. The whole condition report is such a red herring - its just one form of evidence. Its not like you're going to struggle to prove it happened.

Honestly people put way too much emphasis on condition reports and forget there's other forms of evidence that exist sometimes.

 

Hi thatbum,

I'm still trying to decide the best way forward that will cause the least amount of stress for myself and my family.

 

Why would you even waste time stressing about a couple of plants.
Just ask them to replant them at end of lease.
Save the stressing for when they stop paying rent.

 

I'm concerned about the attitude of the Property Manager AND the tenants in this situation- and I think you have every right to be upset. Who doesn't take any photos of the outside of the house in the condition report!?

My thoughts would be to change management ASAP, let the new agents give their thoughts on the situation over the next few months. You can then decide whether to ask the tenants to leave or not (without grounds) at the end of their lease and claim compensation for the garden damages.

You're not likely to have success breaching them out over the garden, for a variety of reasons (some of which I wont list publicly, but you're welcome to call).

 

An update.
A new agent will be looking after my property from today onwards.
They had good reviews online, they're local, they have comprehensive internal policies and procedures, and they are native speakers of my tenant's ethnicity (particular part of Sydney).
They were shocked to see all the blank spaces in the ingoing condition report, and even more so when they saw that my management agreement was UNSIGNED!
Good for me though, as it means it's null and void, and they can take over straight away without me having to give the required notice.

 

Just be aware that might not actually be legally true.

 

Cool. That's the advice she gave me, and she sent me the wording to email to the old PMs stating as such.