What was the outcome of Tenancy Tribunal case 4626729?

The tribunal order states: No suppression orders apply around publication of this decision.

How much money was awarded in case 4626729?

Compensation: $990.00 awarded to tenant; Rent Arrears: $4,930.00 awarded to landlord; Water Rates: $1,853.19 awarded to landlord

What type of tenancy dispute was case 4626729?

The primary dispute was Rent arrears.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 4626729?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/9377094-Tenancy_Tribunal_Order.pdf.

What was the outcome of Tenancy Tribunal case 4626729?

The tribunal order states: No suppression orders apply around publication of this decision.

How much money was awarded in case 4626729?

Compensation: $990.00 awarded to tenant; Rent Arrears: $4,930.00 awarded to landlord; Water Rates: $1,853.19 awarded to landlord

What type of tenancy dispute was case 4626729?

The primary dispute was Rent arrears.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 4626729?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/9377094-Tenancy_Tribunal_Order.pdf.

151 Gossamer Drive, Pakuranga Heights, Auckland 2010 Tenancy Tribunal Case 4626729 — Rent arrears

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 4626729 — net $1,793.19 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Landlord	Tenant	Reason
Rent arrears	$4,930.00		Rent arrears
Water rates	$1,853.19		Water rates
Compensation		$990.00	Compensation
Total award	$6,783.19	$990.00
Net award	$1,793.19
Total payable by Tenant to Landlord	$1,793.19

Order

No suppression orders apply around publication of this decision.
Tungane Stacey Hillary Rota and Ten Uri must pay Gulati Enterprises Limited $1,793.19 immediately, calculated as shown in table below.

Reasons

The Tribunal must consider applications filed by both the landlord and tenant, and the relevant law that applies is found in the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 (“RTA”).
The tenancy commenced on 10 November 2021, and ended following a 28 day termination notice from the tenant. Possession of the premises was returned to the landlord on 26 June 2023, but as will be discussed further below, there was a pile of tenant rubbish left on the premises.
Both parties have now filed applications with the Tribunal. The landlord’s application relates to rent arrears and water rates, the tenant’s application is for compensation for lack of maintenance.
Both parties appeared at the hearing today in Manukau, on 5 September 2023.

LANDLORDS CLAIMS

The landlord seeks orders in relation to rent arrears and water rates. Rent arrears
The landlord has applied for an order that the tenant pay rent arrears. The landlord has provided the Tribunal with a rent ledger. I have no reason to consider that record to be incorrect. The landlord has claimed rent arrears of $4,930.00.
The parties are in agreement that the tenancy ended following a 28 day notice from the tenant, and that possession was to return to the landlord on 16 June 2023. The tenant says that she returned possession of the premises on 10 June 2023.
The landlord has claimed a further 10 days of arrears because the tenant had left rubbish on the premises, and they could not otherwise rent out the premises. The landlord seeks rent arrears to 2 July 2023.
The landlord supplied photographs which showed extensive rubbish piled outside the tenancy. The tenant agrees this was her rubbish. As I noted at the hearing, no reasonable landlord would have re-rented the premises with that amount of rubbish present.
The tenant states that the rubbish skip was booked for 5 July 2023, and the rubbish was removed around then.
The landlord confirmed they are only seeking rent to 2 July 2023, not 5 July 2023.
As I explained to the tenant at the hearing, at the end of the tenancy, she is required to remove all rubbish (section 40 of the RTA). She failed to do so. Because of that failure, the landlord has incurred a loss, being a loss of an ability to re-rent the premises. The tenant is liable for rent until the date the rubbish has been removed, so the premises could have been rented. Water rates
The landlord has claimed water rates to the sum of $1,853.19 for volumetric water used at the premises. The tenant does not dispute this claim, so it is ordered in full.

TENANTS CLAIM

The tenant has claimed compensation for maintenance not being done on the premises during the course of the tenancy. The tenant said that she would be often chasing up the landlord to do maintenance, but the maintenance was not undertaken. The landlord disputes that is the case, and considers that maintenance was reasonably undertaken as required.
Section 45 of the RTA relates to the landlords obligations, and that requires that the landlord provide and maintain the premises in a reasonable state of repair.
At the hearing the tenant has advanced this claim in relation to 5 particular areas where she considers compensation should be ordered, I will consider each claim in turn. Stove
The tenant states that there was a fault with the stove, which meant that when power to the stove was turned on, one element would go on automatically. The tenant estimates that this was raised with the landlord in November 2022.
In response the landlord states that they believed this was repaired in late January 2023. The landlord referred to a text message conversation, a copy of which is on file. On 25 January 2023 the tenant text the landlord: ...is anyone coming to fix the problems like I have asked for over a year now. Oh also can you send an electrician to come and look at the 2 power points in the kitchen it’s not working and it blew up the fuse on my microwave as well.
The landlord responded that they would check for an electrician, and then text the tenant on 26 January asking “Did electrician contact you?”, to which the tenant responded “yep he came and it’s done thank you.”
The tenant agrees that the electrician did arrive, but states he only fixed the lights – not the stove. The tenant states the stove was not working when she vacated the tenancy.
The landlord stated that given the above text message conversation, the landlord believed this work had been completed.
However, there is a further text message on 26 January where the tenant asked about when the maintenance man was to come to the tenancy, and stating: No only the electrician man came this morning he came to check the power point and to check the meter box for the power to see why the power point wasn’t working.
On balance, I conclude that the landlord has not repaired (maintained) the oven has it should have done. Broken tile
The tenant says there was a broken tile near the pool, which caused a safety risk.
The landlord says that they would have thought their maintenance person would have fixed this.
I have no reason not to accept the evidence of the tenant, that this tile has not been repaired. Garage door
The garage door had an electrical opener, but the tenant states this was not working during the duration of the tenancy. The landlord accepts that is the case, and agrees this was not fixed.
There is no dispute that the garage door was not maintained over the course of the tenancy. Shower door
The tenant states that about a month prior to the tenancy end date, the shower door came of the track. The tenant says that ultimately she fixed this when the landlord would not do so.
The landlords position is that this was fixed on 18 May 2023.
On balance, I do not consider the tenant has established this claim. It looks like the tenant was able to reattach the shower door. I cannot see that she has incurred a loss in relation to this matter. Sliding door lock
The evidence is that there was a problem with the lock on an external sliding door. The maintenance person removed the lock, and it was not returned. The door had slide bolts, and the tenant confirmed the door could be locked with the those bolts. The landlords position is that even if the lock was missing, the door could still be locked.
The landlord has not disputed that the lock was removed. The landlord was required to maintain the door lock. If the lock was no longer working, then it needed to be replaced without delay. That did not occur so is a breach on the part of the landlord. It is not a defence to say that the door could be locked using the slide bolts.

Should compensation be ordered?

For the above reasons, I consider the tenant has established her claim for four of the five maintenance items (the oven, tile, garage door and lock).
I consider it more likely than not that the landlord has not been efficient with some maintenance at the premises. I note a number of communications on file from the tenant over the course of the tenancy, chasing up the landlord to come and undertaken maintenance, and making reference to work not being completed since she moved in. That supports the tenants claim in relation to maintenance overall.
I also note a text message from 26 and 28 November where the tenant asks for an “update on getting someone to fix the stuff I asked”. The landlord responded by asking the tenant if she knew a handyman who could quote for the work to be completed, which the tenant responded that she did not. It is not the responsibility of the tenant to arrange maintenance to the premises (even when the landlord is overseas), that is the responsibility of the landlord.
It is reasonable to order compensation for these 4 items of maintenance not been undertaken. What the compensation relates to, is loss of amenity in the premises from the work not being completed. To put that another way, a refund of a portion of the rent paid, for the tenant not getting what she was paying that rent for.
These sorts of claims are next to impossible to determine with precision what the loss of amenity would be. The best I can do is to step back and consider, based on the issues and period over which the issues remained, what would be a fair level of compensation to return the tenant to the position she would have been if the work had been done efficiently. Having undertaken that process I consider it reasonable to provide compensation to the sum of one week of rent, being $990.00. That is ordered.

BOND

Both parties seek an order for the release of the bond. Both parties say that $4,000.00 bond was paid.
I have made this order on the basis that the landlord has received that bond. Normally I would make an order that the Bond Centre release the bond to the landlord, but in this case Tenancy Services cannot locate the bond in their system. Therefore I cannot order the Bond Centre to release that money, and so the landlord will need to follow up with the Bond Centre directly to have the funds released. The landlord should provide a copy of this order when that request is made.

FILING FEE

Both parties have had a degree of success, so I make no order for the payment of the filing fee.

NAME SUPPRESSION

The Tribunal can order name suppression when a party has been wholly or substantially successful in the proceeding. In this case the tenant has applied for name suppression. While the tenant has had a large degree of success with her claim, she has not had any success in defending the landlords claim. Overall she has not been wholly or substantially successful, so name suppression for the tenant is declined.

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 4626729 — net $1,793.19 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Landlord	Tenant	Reason
Rent arrears	$4,930.00		Rent arrears
Water rates	$1,853.19		Water rates
Compensation		$990.00	Compensation
Total award	$6,783.19	$990.00
Net award	$1,793.19
Total payable by Tenant to Landlord	$1,793.19

Order

No suppression orders apply around publication of this decision.
Tungane Stacey Hillary Rota and Ten Uri must pay Gulati Enterprises Limited $1,793.19 immediately, calculated as shown in table below.

Reasons

The Tribunal must consider applications filed by both the landlord and tenant, and the relevant law that applies is found in the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 (“RTA”).
The tenancy commenced on 10 November 2021, and ended following a 28 day termination notice from the tenant. Possession of the premises was returned to the landlord on 26 June 2023, but as will be discussed further below, there was a pile of tenant rubbish left on the premises.
Both parties have now filed applications with the Tribunal. The landlord’s application relates to rent arrears and water rates, the tenant’s application is for compensation for lack of maintenance.
Both parties appeared at the hearing today in Manukau, on 5 September 2023.

LANDLORDS CLAIMS

The landlord seeks orders in relation to rent arrears and water rates. Rent arrears
The landlord has applied for an order that the tenant pay rent arrears. The landlord has provided the Tribunal with a rent ledger. I have no reason to consider that record to be incorrect. The landlord has claimed rent arrears of $4,930.00.
The parties are in agreement that the tenancy ended following a 28 day notice from the tenant, and that possession was to return to the landlord on 16 June 2023. The tenant says that she returned possession of the premises on 10 June 2023.
The landlord has claimed a further 10 days of arrears because the tenant had left rubbish on the premises, and they could not otherwise rent out the premises. The landlord seeks rent arrears to 2 July 2023.
The landlord supplied photographs which showed extensive rubbish piled outside the tenancy. The tenant agrees this was her rubbish. As I noted at the hearing, no reasonable landlord would have re-rented the premises with that amount of rubbish present.
The tenant states that the rubbish skip was booked for 5 July 2023, and the rubbish was removed around then.
The landlord confirmed they are only seeking rent to 2 July 2023, not 5 July 2023.
As I explained to the tenant at the hearing, at the end of the tenancy, she is required to remove all rubbish (section 40 of the RTA). She failed to do so. Because of that failure, the landlord has incurred a loss, being a loss of an ability to re-rent the premises. The tenant is liable for rent until the date the rubbish has been removed, so the premises could have been rented. Water rates
The landlord has claimed water rates to the sum of $1,853.19 for volumetric water used at the premises. The tenant does not dispute this claim, so it is ordered in full.

TENANTS CLAIM

The tenant has claimed compensation for maintenance not being done on the premises during the course of the tenancy. The tenant said that she would be often chasing up the landlord to do maintenance, but the maintenance was not undertaken. The landlord disputes that is the case, and considers that maintenance was reasonably undertaken as required.
Section 45 of the RTA relates to the landlords obligations, and that requires that the landlord provide and maintain the premises in a reasonable state of repair.
At the hearing the tenant has advanced this claim in relation to 5 particular areas where she considers compensation should be ordered, I will consider each claim in turn. Stove
The tenant states that there was a fault with the stove, which meant that when power to the stove was turned on, one element would go on automatically. The tenant estimates that this was raised with the landlord in November 2022.
In response the landlord states that they believed this was repaired in late January 2023. The landlord referred to a text message conversation, a copy of which is on file. On 25 January 2023 the tenant text the landlord: ...is anyone coming to fix the problems like I have asked for over a year now. Oh also can you send an electrician to come and look at the 2 power points in the kitchen it’s not working and it blew up the fuse on my microwave as well.
The landlord responded that they would check for an electrician, and then text the tenant on 26 January asking “Did electrician contact you?”, to which the tenant responded “yep he came and it’s done thank you.”
The tenant agrees that the electrician did arrive, but states he only fixed the lights – not the stove. The tenant states the stove was not working when she vacated the tenancy.
The landlord stated that given the above text message conversation, the landlord believed this work had been completed.
However, there is a further text message on 26 January where the tenant asked about when the maintenance man was to come to the tenancy, and stating: No only the electrician man came this morning he came to check the power point and to check the meter box for the power to see why the power point wasn’t working.
On balance, I conclude that the landlord has not repaired (maintained) the oven has it should have done. Broken tile
The tenant says there was a broken tile near the pool, which caused a safety risk.
The landlord says that they would have thought their maintenance person would have fixed this.
I have no reason not to accept the evidence of the tenant, that this tile has not been repaired. Garage door
The garage door had an electrical opener, but the tenant states this was not working during the duration of the tenancy. The landlord accepts that is the case, and agrees this was not fixed.
There is no dispute that the garage door was not maintained over the course of the tenancy. Shower door
The tenant states that about a month prior to the tenancy end date, the shower door came of the track. The tenant says that ultimately she fixed this when the landlord would not do so.
The landlords position is that this was fixed on 18 May 2023.
On balance, I do not consider the tenant has established this claim. It looks like the tenant was able to reattach the shower door. I cannot see that she has incurred a loss in relation to this matter. Sliding door lock
The evidence is that there was a problem with the lock on an external sliding door. The maintenance person removed the lock, and it was not returned. The door had slide bolts, and the tenant confirmed the door could be locked with the those bolts. The landlords position is that even if the lock was missing, the door could still be locked.
The landlord has not disputed that the lock was removed. The landlord was required to maintain the door lock. If the lock was no longer working, then it needed to be replaced without delay. That did not occur so is a breach on the part of the landlord. It is not a defence to say that the door could be locked using the slide bolts.

Should compensation be ordered?

For the above reasons, I consider the tenant has established her claim for four of the five maintenance items (the oven, tile, garage door and lock).
I consider it more likely than not that the landlord has not been efficient with some maintenance at the premises. I note a number of communications on file from the tenant over the course of the tenancy, chasing up the landlord to come and undertaken maintenance, and making reference to work not being completed since she moved in. That supports the tenants claim in relation to maintenance overall.
I also note a text message from 26 and 28 November where the tenant asks for an “update on getting someone to fix the stuff I asked”. The landlord responded by asking the tenant if she knew a handyman who could quote for the work to be completed, which the tenant responded that she did not. It is not the responsibility of the tenant to arrange maintenance to the premises (even when the landlord is overseas), that is the responsibility of the landlord.
It is reasonable to order compensation for these 4 items of maintenance not been undertaken. What the compensation relates to, is loss of amenity in the premises from the work not being completed. To put that another way, a refund of a portion of the rent paid, for the tenant not getting what she was paying that rent for.
These sorts of claims are next to impossible to determine with precision what the loss of amenity would be. The best I can do is to step back and consider, based on the issues and period over which the issues remained, what would be a fair level of compensation to return the tenant to the position she would have been if the work had been done efficiently. Having undertaken that process I consider it reasonable to provide compensation to the sum of one week of rent, being $990.00. That is ordered.

BOND

Both parties seek an order for the release of the bond. Both parties say that $4,000.00 bond was paid.
I have made this order on the basis that the landlord has received that bond. Normally I would make an order that the Bond Centre release the bond to the landlord, but in this case Tenancy Services cannot locate the bond in their system. Therefore I cannot order the Bond Centre to release that money, and so the landlord will need to follow up with the Bond Centre directly to have the funds released. The landlord should provide a copy of this order when that request is made.

FILING FEE

Both parties have had a degree of success, so I make no order for the payment of the filing fee.

NAME SUPPRESSION

The Tribunal can order name suppression when a party has been wholly or substantially successful in the proceeding. In this case the tenant has applied for name suppression. While the tenant has had a large degree of success with her claim, she has not had any success in defending the landlords claim. Overall she has not been wholly or substantially successful, so name suppression for the tenant is declined.

Tenancy Tribunal case 4626729 — Rent arrears at 151 Gossamer Drive, Pakuranga Heights, Auckland 2010

At a glance

Tenancy Tribunal case 4626729 — Rent arrears at 151 Gossamer Drive, Pakuranga Heights, Auckland 2010

At a glance

Award balance

Claims & awards

Order

Reasons

LANDLORDS CLAIMS

TENANTS CLAIM

Should compensation be ordered?

BOND

FILING FEE

NAME SUPPRESSION

Topics & place

Residential Tenancies Act sections

Key findings

Property management

Frequently asked questions

Award balance

Claims & awards

Order

Reasons

LANDLORDS CLAIMS

TENANTS CLAIM

Should compensation be ordered?

BOND

FILING FEE

NAME SUPPRESSION

Topics & place

Residential Tenancies Act sections

Key findings

Property management

Frequently asked questions