The House From HELL… with a garden hot tub breeding LEGIONNAIRES disease

Whilst conducting our survey into the best and worst experiences of student housing, we received many comments praising or slating landlords and the quality of accommodation they provided. However, one particular house stood out as the worst (and potentially most dangerous) house The Tab heard about.

Not only did the tenants have to face the highs and lows of having what they described as a ‘nightmare’ of a landlord, they were also exposed to the potentially fatal legionnaires disease. Unfortunately due to legal reason The Tab cannot name the landlord, so we’ll call him “Clive”.

Five months into the tenancy, the council came to visit the property and highlighted that an old hot tub in the back garden was a ‘breeding ground’ for legionnaires disease. This is a severe form of pneumonia and symptoms include, amongst others: fever, vomiting, diarrhoea. In severe cases this can even be fatal – not a nice thought that your landlord is allowing you to be exposed to this.

Whilst this alone may be considered an appalling measure of irresponsibility on the part of Clive, he was a crooked old fiend – the problems do not stop here. Rather, this is merely scratching the surface of possibly one of Southampton’s worst student houses.

Despite having the ‘standard’ student housing problems, such as mould, junk left from Clive’s infamous hot tub parties, leaking showers and a constant failure to rectify the problems, there are several more concerning problems presented from ‘the letting from hell’.

• When moving into the property, one of the bedrooms was left without any furniture, resulting in the tenant having to spend the initial few nights camped out in the living room.
• There were no fire alarms within the property, which could have caused the students to burn alive.
• An upstairs shower leaked so badly it went through the kitchen ceiling.
• The council became involved stating that the house was too small for 7 occupants, it has however recently been reported that the landlord has ‘extended’ the house to be fit for 8. The new ‘extension’ now means one of the tenants has to camp out in the living room. (Others have to walk through to get to the kitchen)

To top it all of, when the tenants moved out at the end of the contract, Clive attempted to charge them for the cost of his late mortgage payments and damage to the garage door, something they could not be held responsible for. Luckily upon taking him to ‘The Dispute Service’ they were rewarded all of their deposits back.

This has led the tenants concerned as to how the council can allow Clive to continue to operate as such an ‘inept’ landlord.

Clive is awarded The Tab’s Landlord from Hell award.