Issues with landlord/letting agents - Gibraltar

[Landrover90]

I don't know if you people can help much, as we are actually in Gibraltar but most of the laws down here a copy and paste from the UK.

 

Long story short we moved into our current apartment in February and to be honest had nothing but problems some of which I have listed below,

 

1 the shower leaked all over the bathroom floor every time it was used and the tray had a sharp crack in it, this took 6 months for them to fix. and now the drains smell so bad in the shower that we have to keep a glass over the drain hole to keep the smell down.

 

2 The bathroom tap developed a leak this took 2 months to fix so we had no bathroom tap for that time.

 

3 The how water tank burst and flooded the apartment downstairs, this was fixed the same day!

 

4 The fridge is broken it gets no lower than 9 degrees they had someone change the thermostat which made no difference and then sent someone else who said it was fine, we pointed out on many occasions that at 9 degrees was to warm, it was only when we said we would create negative press for them that we finally got a meeting with someone higher up who said he would arrange for a temporary fridge and someone would look properly at it the next week without fail, we got the temp fridge but the old one has still not been looked at.

 

5 The actual owner of the flat wants the electricity bills and water bills in his name as he uses this place as his residence despite living between Spain and the UK to avoid tax in those 2 countries.

 

6 We have never seen an inventory of what is supposed to be here.

 

The licence for the apartment has been signed by someone we don't know we are not able to tell who signed it.

 

We asked the agents if we could be released from the lease early they said that they would check with the landlord but did not foresee a problem with it so we started to look for another property, we found another property and then checked with the agents again who confirmed that it is ok and there was not a problem so we agreed to take the other apartment.

 

We told our current agents who then said to come in and they would explain the procedure, which then transcribed that they had not spoken to the landlord and we would have to pay a 250 pound admin fee and we would be liable for the rent if the property was not rented until the end of the licence despite telling us that it was not a problem when we double checked.

 

Where can we go from here? by there attitude and tone to us I would not be surprised if they still have not even contacted the landlord and I wonder if I should contact the landlord myself.

[raydetinu]

As your contract is with the LL, it is only he who can release you and on his terms!

It would appear you have acted prematurely and relied on an agent who are not the ones responsible.

If you have all these agreements with them in writing you may have recourse to the courts for their misleading statements.