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Neighbours property damaged my car.


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I have a car parked on my mothers drive and she called me last month to tell me her neighbours garage door had fell and hit my car. There is no garage at the house, it was just a free standing garage door as the owner of the house fits garage doors for his job.

 

When I arrived, the garage door was lay in front of my car and the damaged looked like it has hit my door and then slid down to the front of the car.

 

The door had caused dents and gone through the paintwork on my bonnet, wing, front bumper, door, mirror and headlight. Not a simple dent removal and smart repair job by any means.

 

The neighbours house is rented out to tenants. I knocked their door and asked them if they knew what had happened and they informed me that the wind had blew the garage door on to my car on two occasions and the wind from the night before had obviously caused it to happen again. On the previous occasions they have lifted the door off my car and put it back up against their house.

 

They tell me the garage door was there when they moved in and it belonged to the owner of the house. They explain the door keeps falling and hitting their van and car so they informed the owner of the house and he told them it wasn’t his door any more so they should just get rid of it.

 

I have contacted the owner who wanted nothing to do with this. I explained I would need to go down the route of small claims. I cannot put another claim on my insurance, I had a car was stolen last year, I lost my NCB so another claim on top of that would make it impossible to insure my current car. He says his home insurance will not cover it as it is an act of god but I have two witnesses and one independent witness that have agreed to give statements to explain the tenants admitted the door has hit their cars before mine therefore proving negligence.

 

I eventually agreed to meet him at the house to show him the damage and what had happened. He requested 5 days to get advice and find out where he stood. This was three weeks ago and he is no longer replying to my phone calls and messages.

 

I am really just looking for some advise before I start small claims proceedings as I have never done this before.

My mum doesn’t have legal advice coverage on her home insurance.

Will the two witnesses statements from my parents and one independent witness statements from another home owner in the same street alone help prove negligence?

The owner is renting out this property against his terms. He has bought the house on the same scheme as my mother (half rent half mortgage) which does not allow him to have tenants. I have tried to settle this without courts, mainly for this reason but I am getting nowhere.

I believe I should be proceeding with small claims against the tenants as it was in fact them who were negligent to the garage door hitting their car multiple times before hitting mine. Is this correct?

I only have the tenants first names so cannot start proceedings against them at the moment.

 

For third party claims, I would need to prove negligence. The tenants know it has hit both their car and van which should prove negligence but they will deny ever saying this and why I would like to know if my witness statements are worth anything.

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On the basis of what you say there should be no difficulty in establishing negligence. Why do you think the tenants are not interested in claiming for the damage to their vehicle?

 

Does the landlord own the property? You can check that out by going to the land registry and making an ownership check.

 

What is the value of the damage which has been caused to your vehicle? You will need to get a couple of independent quotes for the repair value and that will be the value of your claim.

 

If you want to bring a small claim then we will help you – but you need to understand the steps before you issue the papers. It's not difficult.

 

If you know that the guy owns the property then assuming that you get a judgement in your favour, the easiest thing to do will be to enforce the judgement by putting a charge on the property. If you happen to know the landlords residential address then even better – but you may need to get this from the tenants and of course from what you say they may be unwilling

 

Have you taken lots of photographs?

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A tad complicated. The garage door is not a private residential risk, as it is goods of a business. Private Home Insurance would exclude any liability. So no cover under any private Home Insurance of either landlord of the tenants. However, once abandoned, does the garage door stop being goods of a business ?

 

Did this garage door fitter have business Insurance ? Sounds like they did not and the garage door has been left at the address.

 

Now the legal side which Bankfodder may know more about.

 

Is the tenant or the owner of the garage door responsible for such a liability ?

 

I would say that the tenants are responsible because it seems like they were the last ones to have any control over safe storage of the garage door. They admitted that the garage door had been a problem, yet they did not place it somewhere else, so that wind would not blow it over damaging property.

 

Suggest you find out the full names of both tenants as I think they are probably the parties to issue any claim against. But see what Bankfodder says.

 

Is remoteness a factor in deciding liable party here ?

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Was all the damage caused by the most recent instance of the garage door falling on the car? If so, your cause of action is against the tenants in my view.

 

I would say that for the same reason, if you pursue the owner you may be unsuccessful in a negligence claim (he left the garage door there initially, but the 'chain of causation' was broken when the tenants moved it).

 

By moving the garage door the first time they established a duty of care to you (and anyone else) to ensure that it was stored so as to not cause damage or injury, and were negligent in not doing so.

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On the basis of what you say there should be no difficulty in establishing negligence. Why do you think the tenants are not interested in claiming for the damage to their vehicle?

 

Does the landlord own the property? You can check that out by going to the land registry and making an ownership check.

 

What is the value of the damage which has been caused to your vehicle? You will need to get a couple of independent quotes for the repair value and that will be the value of your claim.

 

If you want to bring a small claim then we will help you – but you need to understand the steps before you issue the papers. It's not difficult.

 

If you know that the guy owns the property then assuming that you get a judgement in your favour, the easiest thing to do will be to enforce the judgement by putting a charge on the property. If you happen to know the landlords residential address then even better – but you may need to get this from the tenants and of course from what you say they may be unwilling

 

Have you taken lots of photographs?

 

1) I did ask them about claiming for their damage and they told me tthey aren’t bothered, looking at them, they have not been cared for at all and damaged all over

2) I will do a check and report back later about ownership of the property

3) Repairs will cost around £800

4) I know where abouts the owners now lives so won’t be hard to get find his address but this is something I’ll also try to find out ASAP

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A tad complicated. The garage door is not a private residential risk, as it is goods of a business. Private Home Insurance would exclude any liability. So no cover under any private Home Insurance of either landlord of the tenants. However, once abandoned, does the garage door stop being goods of a business ?

 

Did this garage door fitter have business Insurance ? Sounds like they did not and the garage door has been left at the address.

 

Now the legal side which Bankfodder may know more about.

 

Is the tenant or the owner of the garage door responsible for such a liability ?

 

I would say that the tenants are responsible because it seems like they were the last ones to have any control over safe storage of the garage door. They admitted that the garage door had been a problem, yet they did not place it somewhere else, so that wind would not blow it over damaging property.

 

Suggest you find out the full names of both tenants as I think they are probably the parties to issue any claim against. But see what Bankfodder says.

 

Is remoteness a factor in deciding liable party here ?

 

I’m not sure about business insurance and not something I’ll be able to find out due to him not talking to me any more. I do now have both of the tenants names now though.

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Was all the damage caused by the most recent instance of the garage door falling on the car? If so, your cause of action is against the tenants in my view.

 

I would say that for the same reason, if you pursue the owner you may be unsuccessful in a negligence claim (he left the garage door there initially, but the 'chain of causation' was broken when the tenants moved it).

 

By moving the garage door the first time they established a duty of care to you (and anyone else) to ensure that it was stored so as to not cause damage or injury, and were negligent in not doing so.

 

Yes all of the damage was caused by the garage door but it’s supposedily fell and hit my car two or three times. My mum was in the process of moving house and didn’t spend a lot of time their so that was their reason for not reporting it.

 

The tenants were very open and told me everything until the owner got involved.

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Yes all of the damage was caused by the garage door but it’s supposedily fell and hit my car two or three times. My mum was in the process of moving house and didn’t spend a lot of time their so that was their reason for not reporting it.

 

The tenants were very open and told me everything until the owner got involved.

 

It is your decision now. Do you go down the small claim court route against the tenants issuing a letter before claim to them. Or do you decide to just claim on your Insurance and see if your Insurers decide to try to recover cost of claim from the tenants. Your Insurers are unlikely to sue the tenants and it would be a fault claim on your record.

 

You have no guarantee a Judge would rule in your favour if the tenants defended your claim. No doubt seeing a claim form, they will decide they did not tell you what you thought they told you and they will say they had nothing to do with the garage door.

We could do with some help from you.

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It is your decision now. Do you go down the small claim court route against the tenants issuing a letter before claim to them. Or do you decide to just claim on your Insurance and see if your Insurers decide to try to recover cost of claim from the tenants. Your Insurers are unlikely to sue the tenants and it would be a fault claim on your record.

 

You have no guarantee a Judge would rule in your favour if the tenants defended your claim. No doubt seeing a claim form, they will decide they did not tell you what you thought they told you and they will say they had nothing to do with the garage door.

 

I can’t claim on my insurance, I literally wouldn’t be able to insure my car next year.

 

I guess that’s where my witness statements should come in to play, are you saying they won’t help me then? There would be two from my parents and one from an independent witness who owns a house on the same street.

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I can’t claim on my insurance, I literally wouldn’t be able to insure my car next year.

 

I guess that’s where my witness statements should come in to play, are you saying they won’t help me then? There would be two from my parents and one from an independent witness who owns a house on the same street.

 

Your parents are not independent witnesses, so that just leaves you with the one witness who is independent. Suggest you get their statement in writing before you think about issuing any letter before claim. They might refuse to issue a witness statement and then you might have difficulty in winning any claim if it is defended.

 

You can only try and see what happens.

We could do with some help from you.

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Depending on what that independent witness says, I think OP could send letters of claim to both landlord and tenant.

 

And even via MCOL, OP could then issue claims against both landlord and tenant under one set of proceedings if getting nowhere in correspondence. Might be better in the context of proceedings, to let them fight it out between themselves as to who's responsible.

 

One thing I would suggest is you move quick with getting that witness statement and deciding how you want to go about this - those tenants may not be there in a couple of months time...

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Does the landlord own the property?

 

Have you taken lots of photographs?

 

I have checked and the owner does not own the property. It is lease hold and will be the same scheme as my mum and others on the street.

 

I missed your original questions about the photos but yes, I have plenty which show the garage door laying next to my car and the damage.

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Depending on what that independent witness says, I think OP could send letters of claim to both landlord and tenant.

 

And even via MCOL, OP could then issue claims against both landlord and tenant under one set of proceedings if getting nowhere in correspondence. Might be better in the context of proceedings, to let them fight it out between themselves as to who's responsible.

 

One thing I would suggest is you move quick with getting that witness statement and deciding how you want to go about this - those tenants may not be there in a couple of months time...

 

Spoke with the independent witness earlier, he is happy to write up a statement confirming the tenant has said everything I put in my originally post here.

 

Could anyone advise next steps or anything I must ensure I do? I just want to make sure I don’t miss anything first time around.

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