Depending on the property, the amount of bond money may be small. But bond money is important because of what it represents. For tenants, bond money represents safety and security. Families can reapply bond moneys to secure a new rental property. In this case, a family was evacuated due to flooding and were told that they would not get their bond back unless the property was in the state it was let. The following speaks for itself.
This is our family, and this is our story.
On the 28th of January 2013 we noticed flooding had started in the backyard of our house and tried to block off all entries for the water to get into the house, on the 29th of January we woke up to water in the house we were evacuated and told by a council member due to the pressure of so much water from the floods had caused a pipe to burst over night from a house behind us, we lived behind 2 houses in a gully.
We copped all the water as it ran down our yard into the house causing 90% of my kids clothes, toys and other belongings to get water damaged and mould. We packed up what we had left and informed our real estate the situation, she insisted we stay while the house was being cleaned. I informed her that the whole house is wet and muddy we cannot stay here she had no understanding to what we had just gone through and let us know it's okay to stay. I packed up my family and said to my partner we are not staying here it's unliveable, I am not letting my kids stay in the house, he agreed and got straight onto my Dad. He was more than happy to help us move our stuff out and get what wasn't ruined into storage.
The following day I called and reminded her that we had been evacuated and wanted to know what happens from here in regards to our bond, she replied "you need to clean the property back to how it was when you first moved in" gobsmacked and in disbelief I agreed and hung up the phone, I thought about what to do and talked to friends on what to do and got referred to call the RTA, I immediately called and explained my situation the lady who I spoke to was in disgust as to what is happening and gave me a few numbers to call to get more help.
I had to wait until the 7th of March to do a phone conference through the RTA with the real estate, a day before the conference my solicitor sent her and the tribunal a copy of a affidavit. The real estate decided not to participate and now have until the 18th of March to respond if they do it goes to court and our solicitor is going to sue, if they do not respond we automatically get the bond back.
The reason for the no bond return is ridiculous, $600 for cleaning which both my partner and I spent hours upon hours cleaning what we could in the house and in the yard keeping in mind the condition of the yard/house, $512 to change a lock, the keys got lost in the flooding, $180 for pest control mind you the carpets were pulled up and new ones put in the whole house and we didn't have any animal/s at the house $160 to trim a tree out the front. Humidifiers were ran through-out the whole house to dry the carpets they ran at over 40 degrees for a week with the house closed up and the real estate still expected us to stay in the house with our 2 kids.
The real estate now also want 2 extra weeks rent because we failed to give 2 weeks’ notice of leaving, when in reality how were we supposed to give 2 weeks’ notice when we didn't know about the floods. Our lease was due to end on the 3rd of February. Now having to worry about solicitor fees upon storage fees and replacing everything my children lost in the floods which was well over thousands of dollars of toys, clothes and other belongings.
The stress is starting to get to us and we are on the verge of giving up it has been an ongoing battle since the 29th of January, it's not fair on us or my kids we have done absolutely nothing wrong...What they are doing to us is disgusting, the house is now back up for rent and I would hate for the next family to go through what we are going through right now. We’re asking for help to get our story out so please share this, all it takes is the right person to see it.
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