How much money was awarded in case 5452596?

Filing Fee: $28.00 awarded to tenant; Refund Rent: $720.00 awarded to tenant

What type of tenancy dispute was case 5452596?

The dispute type was not classified.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 5452596?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/13267532-Tribunal_Order_Redacted.pdf.

How much money was awarded in case 5452596?

Filing Fee: $28.00 awarded to tenant; Refund Rent: $720.00 awarded to tenant

What type of tenancy dispute was case 5452596?

The dispute type was not classified.

Where can I read the official tribunal order for case 5452596?

The official Ministry of Justice published order is available at https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/TTV2/PDF/13267532-Tribunal_Order_Redacted.pdf.

Room 3, 153 Strickland Street, Spreydon, Christchurch Tenancy Tribunal Case 5452596 — Tenancy dispute

Q: What was Tenancy Tribunal case 5452596 about?

The tribunal order states: An application for suppression has been made in this case, and the Tribunal

Tenantcheck Insights

Order

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 5452596 — net $748.00 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Tenant	Reason
Refund rent	$720.00	Refund rent
Filing fee reimbursement	$28.00	Filing fee reimbursement
Net award	$748.00
Total payable by Landlord to Tenant	$748.00

An application for suppression has been made in this case, and the Tribunal orders suppression of the tenant’s name and identifying details.

Krishna Rani Saha must pay [The tenant/s] $748.00 immediately, calculated as shown in table below:

The Bond Centre is to pay the bond of $1,440.00 ([Bond number suppressed]) to [The tenant/s] immediately.

Reasons

Both parties attended the hearing. Both gave evidence I also heard from a witness for the tenant. Background

The tenancy started on or about 29 October 2025. The tenant had been released from prison the day before. The landlord had some dealings with a co- ordinator from the prison and offered a room at the premises for the tenant to rent. She had the tenant sign the tenancy agreement at his friend’s place (the witness) before he viewed the tenancy. The tenant paid a bond and 2 weeks’ rent through the Ministry of Social Development (MSD).

The tenant gave evidence that when he went to the premises on 30 October there was faecal matter on the bed, carpet in the hallway was wet, and the kitchen was disgusting. He said he would have preferred to return to prison.

The tenant said he did not take possession due to the state of the room and the premises. He told the landlord about that. She agreed to end the tenancy but required that he pay rent to the end of the 3-week notice period.

The parties met at a library. The landlord wanted him to sign a bond release form for him to receive $900.00 from the bond. He refused. A verbal altercation followed, and the landlord made a police complaint.

The tenant applied for the refund of his bond and the rent he paid. The landlord cross-applied. She seeks rent arrears from the bond, with the balance of the bond being paid to the tenant. Issues

The Tribunal must determine these issues: •Is the tenant entitled to a refund of his bond and the rent he paid? •Is the landlord entitled to the balance of rent to the end of the 3-week notice period? Relevant law

Section 45 of the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 (RTA) sets out a landlord’s statutory responsibilities. Included among them is the requirement to provide the premises in a reasonable state of cleanliness.

Section 51(2A) allows a tenant to terminate a periodic tenancy by giving at least 21 days’ notice.

Section 85 RTA sets out the way the Tribunal is to exercise its jurisdiction. Discussion

This landlord is a very experienced landlord and is well known to the Tribunal. She has multiple applications each year.

Often, the landlord succeeds in her applications against tenants because the tenant does not attend the hearing to defend the claims made against them.

In this case, the tenant not only defended the application made against him, but he also filed his own application.

The landlord offers accommodation to vulnerable tenants; that appears to be her business model. This tenant had just been released from prison. Tenants in that situation are vulnerable, often desperate, because their release conditions will sometimes depend on them having accommodation arranged.

The Tribunal has repeatedly told this landlord that she needs to have objective evidence when making applications and when defending them. She knows very well what is required by the Tribunal. On my enquiry she had no photos of the state of the premises. She gave evidence that she cleaned the room the tenant rented a couple of days before the tenancy was to start and opened the windows to air it. She states that she left the key to the room on the top of a wardrobe in the hallway, after locking the door.

The landlord did not inspect the room with the tenant. She had him sign the tenancy agreement at his friend’s house on the day he was released from prison and told him where the key was.

The tenant gave graphic evidence about the state of the room. He described it as ‘smelling like a sewer’. He said there was excrement on the bed.

The tenant’s witness also described the state of the room on 30 October, the day after the tenant signed the tenancy agreement. He said the room was ‘pretty unsanitary’ and was cold and damp. He said it smelt like a sewer pipe had broken. He said the top of the bed was stained but he did not know whether it was excrement. He said the kitchen was disgusting. There were flies everywhere and the carpet in the hallway was saturated. He said he would not let a dog sleep there.

The landlord’s response to the evidence was to say, ‘if the house was as they say it was, they had a choice; just give notice and move on’.

There are different ways the Tribunal can address this case. Despite repeated prompting from the Tribunal in the (many) previous cases with this landlord she still does not appear to understand her statutory responsibilities. Any prudent landlord would have conducted an inspection with the tenant and have had him sign the tenancy agreement at the inspection and then handed over the key.

Landlords who deal with vulnerable tenants need to exercise care. The Tribunal will not just sanction a landlord’s actions when it hears evidence, as it did here, about premises (a room-by-room tenancy) that were unsuitable to be rented.

Even though the evidence given by the parties was in conflict, I assessed the tenant’s witness to be credible. His evidence confirmed the evidence the tenant gave.

The Tribunal could find that the premises were not suitable to be rented due to their unhygienic state, the landlord not meeting her statutory responsibilities under section 45 RTA. Or it could find that the tenant was required to give 21 days’ notice to terminate the tenancy having singed the tenancy agreement, but then award him compensation and/or exemplary damages for the landlord’s breaches of the equivalent amount. Or it could invoke section 85 RTA which requires the Tribunal to determine each dispute according to the general principles of the law and the substantial merits and justice of the case without being bound to give effect to strict legal rights or obligations or to legal forms or technicalities.

Whichever option the Tribunal chose, the result would be the same.

This is a case where the landlord cannot benefit from her failure to ensure that the premises were suitable to be rented. To allow her to keep the rent paid in advance and the bond when the tenant did not take possession due to the state of the premises would be unjust to the tenant, vulnerable due to his circumstances.

I have decided that the landlord must refund the rent paid in advance (2 weeks); she has no right to claim the balance of rent in lieu of notice; and she has no claim on the bond.

The landlord chooses to offer tenancies on a room-by-room basis. That presents challenges since the tenant is renting a room but with access to shared facilities. Unless the landlord institutes a proper process by conducting a viewing with the tenant and having them sign a tenancy agreement after seeing the room they are going to rent, it is likely that the Tribunal will take a similar position to the one I have taken in this case.

While the RTA does not impose extra responsibilities on landlords when dealing with vulnerable tenants, the Tribunal can and will take tenant vulnerability into account when it considers landlord applications such as this one.

Finally, landlord raised issues about the tenant’s behaviour. The Tribunal notes that some of the tenant’s comments were inappropriate including comments made in his application. They are not matters the Tribunal need address by way of orders. Result

The landlord’s application is dismissed.

The tenant’s application is successful. The landlord must refund the 2 weeks’ rent paid in advance because the room he rented was not in a suitable condition to be rented. The substantial merits and justice of the case require that his rent be refunded as he never took possession.

The bond will be paid to the tenant. Name suppression

Both parties sought a name suppression order. The tenant is entitled to name suppression as his application and his defence to the landlord’s application are successful. The landlord is not entitled to name suppression as her application and her defence to the tenant’s application are unsuccessful 1 .

Order

Claims and awards in Tenancy Tribunal application 5452596 — net $748.00 NZD. Amounts reconciled from the published order (claims sum and net total). Verify on MoJ.
Claim	Tenant	Reason
Refund rent	$720.00	Refund rent
Filing fee reimbursement	$28.00	Filing fee reimbursement
Net award	$748.00
Total payable by Landlord to Tenant	$748.00