Tenants Are Looking For Low Rents

I moved into private rented accommodation a couple of weeks ago and from the outset the heating and hot water (combi boiler) has not worked properly. The plumber has visited numerous times and I've had to take time off work to be in and my boyfriend has often had to remain in for him coming. At most the heating's worked for 24 hours a time but then goes off again. It's looking as though it is now fixed, as of yesterday.

Also, the property has been recently refurbished but the backyard is not complete (it's open and like a building site), approx 3 weeks ago before we moved in we were told it would be completed within a few weeks, I have since been told today that due to delays on another job it will be the new year before it is started. As well as being difficult to access for bins etc it is also unsafe as there is a low level window which anyone could easily gain access to.

I feel that for the last couple of weeks we have been living in a house which is inhabitable as it's had no heating and no hot water. Can we therefore ask for some form of compensation?

Thanks in advance

The landowner next door has decided to install a hideous blue portaloo in the garden, against a low-level wall between our gardens, so it is fully visable. He rents the house out (to a decent tenant) but the back of the garden is still his to use, so has a self built 'studio' for jamming sessions. He has told me they needed to put it in for when they have people over to their 'Studio'.

Basically he is looking at making it a permanent fixture. I am concerned about the smell, the potential biohazards (especially when the summer comes and the thing heats up) and I would like to know if there are any laws that could prevent this portaloo from being there, and who I would need to contact.

thanks!

I moved into a flat (privately renting) which has a socket on the wall to insert the aerial cable. However it does not work. I contacted the estate agent who sent round a TV aerial man to have a look. He tested it, and said the socket only has a low frequency hence why poor picture. He tried looking for an aerial, but couldn't see one on the roof, and was unable to access the loft space of the flats so ot sure if there is an aerial, whether faulty, etc. He can't fit an aerial from my own sole use because obviously it is a flat, and permission is required from managing agents. Managing agents won't allow me to fit an aerial. I asked if there is a communal aerial, and they don't seem to know.

At the moment I'm using an indoor aerial, with a booster. Although I get all the channels, sometimes some become scrambled (in bad weather) and I have to re-scan. Other times (usually every other day) I switch on the TV and there are no channels, thus again have to do a channel scan. Very annoying.

The fact that I can get a picture with an indoor aerial suggest no problems with signal in my area, so are the managing agents responsible for insuring there is a working aerial for the tenants of the block.

I checked and it seems a lot of the other tenants have Virgin Media/Sky - I don't want these those. I'm happy with just my Freeview channels.
The person who came round was a professional tv aerial man. He came in a company van clearly marked with the company details.
The landlord can't do anything - he only owns the property, not the entire block of flats. It is the managing agents responsibility.

This Government really do not like the fact the poor still exist in Britain and they detest even more working class council tenants.

I've never heard of anything so stupid, the past labour governments have encouraged the sale of council homes to tenants who found themselves able to buy and despite a 3 year bond to pay the council for maintenance of the properties thus bought, these properties are now in the private sector.

The councils have given themselves a pat on the back as they relieved themselves of a lot of older properties that had high maintenance costs. However, the purchase price they received for these properties was meant to be used for reinvestment in low cost house building. Very little has been spent on this, as councils instead have sold land on, to both housing associations under the premis to build homes at reasonable rental costs for both private and social housing needs, and also to commercial builders for private house development at reasonable costs to first time buyers.

Hence, local authorities have long lists of those waiting to be housed and even longer exchange waiting lists. In the none to distant future, it looks like these two lists are set to grow even bigger.

What I can't understand is why the Government wants to do this? It should be a matter of choice, whether you opt to buy your home or rent your home. The likelihood is that if you can;t afford private rents, that you might be able to afford a socially set fair rent, from an association or local council, However, the unbelievable news is that, as soon as council tenants circumstances change and improve they could be evicted out of their homes.

I can;t understand this logic at all, If a council tenant has a job he could find himself homeless within 6 months. The majority of council tenants do have jobs, they are not the type of jobs that pay well, as they are normally people earning at the bottom end of the earnings bracket. Part- time at less than 6k a year or full time at less than 12k a year. To be able to afford private rents you need to be earning a secure income of around 19k plus per year and to be honest, I know nobody at all in these circumstances. Or if they were earning 30 k per year a mortgage of 90k might be possible for the rest of your life, but then this is all dependent on your job being secure for life and the likelihood of that in an economic depression is nil. Defaulting on mortgage payments also adds to the social housing problem. .

The simple answer to not allowing repossessions to take place, would be to allow the insurances people will have paid in with their mortgage, to cover mortgage payments and then when they had run out, to allow income protection plans and pension schemes to be used for mortgage payments and then finally for the bank or building society, to come up with a scheme that is akin to: "rent to buy" That gives the householder a certificate covering the percentage of their home they own already from paying the...