RTB timeframe

Roski707

Hi, just wondering if anyone has been through the process of lodging a dispute and awaiting adjudication process with the RTB in the past few months.
I've received an eviction notice from my landlord which is invalid (I've checked it thoroughly, he's made many errors).
I will be moving anyway this summer - and he knows this. So I'm not in a position to sign up to a 12m lease in a new property.
I'm just wondering how long the process is taking at the moment. I'm pretty sure his notice will be deemed invalid and he will have to serve it again. I just want to be confident that I can get myself a few more months and not be in a position where I might have to consider overholding.
And no, having an honest discussion with him will not work. He's not that type of guy.

sk8board

Roski707 wrote: »

Hi, just wondering if anyone has been through the process of lodging a dispute and awaiting adjudication process with the RTB in the past few months.
I've received an eviction notice from my landlord which is invalid (I've checked it thoroughly, he's made many errors).
I will be moving anyway this summer - and he knows this. So I'm not in a position to sign up to a 12m lease in a new property.
I'm just wondering how long the process is taking at the moment. I'm pretty sure his notice will be deemed invalid and he will have to serve it again. I just want to be confident that I can get myself a few more months and not be in a position where I might have to consider overholding.
And no, having an honest discussion with him will not work. He's not that type of guy.

As a full time landlord, I can assure you The landlord needs to follow all the steps set out on the RTB site very precisely - or he ends up back at the start.
I suggest confirming with the RTB or civil info office that the eviction notice is indeed invalid, and also see if the next one arrives on time.
If not then they’ll need to restart the process.

Also, I believe the Gov have covid eviction protections still in place - I’d also confirm what date that is valid until.

Fol20

How long have you lived in the property and what are the issues with his notice?

If he hasn’t served proper notice, have you raised this with Rtb or have you already told the ll.

I understand your predicament however you also don’t sound too honest either as even if the notice is correct you are contemplating over holding.

Roski707

He served the notice a couple of weeks ago but back dated the notice to pre-Level 5. I suspect in a misinformed attempt to circumvent Level 5 restrictions on evictions. I've checked with threshold and told LL that its invalid. He now claims that he mailed it to me in early October.

@Fol20 I have no intention of overholding. My intention is to do everything within the boundaries of the law. My LL has been awful, we have had several disputes regarding repairs to the house, raising of rent etc. He tried to give me 1 months notice in April during lockdown - I am a hospital worker with 2 children and have been renting the house for 4 years and have never missed a rent payment. It is all v distressing.
I'm actually leaving my job to move back to my own house that I have in turn rented out. I will never ever be a tenant again.

Fol20

Roski707 wrote: »

He served the notice a couple of weeks ago but back dated the notice to pre-Level 5. I suspect in a misinformed attempt to circumvent Level 5 restrictions on evictions. I've checked with threshold and told LL that its invalid. He now claims that he mailed it to me in early October.

@Fol20 I have no intention of overholding. My intention is to do everything within the boundaries of the law. My LL has been awful, we have had several disputes regarding repairs to the house, raising of rent etc. He tried to give me 1 months notice in April during lockdown - I am a hospital worker with 2 children and have been renting the house for 4 years and have never missed a rent payment. It is all v distressing.
I'm actually leaving my job to move back to my own house that I have in turn rented out. I will never ever be a tenant again.

Does he have proof he mailed it to you. Without proof he can say whatever he likes but it doesn’t matter.

Ah right ok. I assumed wrongly about the overholding. It came across that way when you described it.

You don’t have to leave the house until he serves you with a valid termination letter. Eventually once he does serve you with the valid letter, you have 84 days to leave given you have been there for over 4 years. To be clear. The notice does not start until he provides a valid notice of termination.

Curious1002

So many issues here with the advice you received. Here is something solid:

1. You are Part 4 tenant and the LL can only terminate your tenancy giving you a valid reason (e.g. selling, giving your place to his family member / himself, substantial renovation, etc) but even if he does give you one of the valid reasons stated on the RTB website and the document looks technically okay, you can still challenge it with the RTB proving that the reason is in fact invalid. Start collecting evidence (pictures, correspondence, his previous attempts claiming different reasons, etc.)
If he gives you a substantial renovation reason then check if the property is a protected structure. If so, he needs to apply for planning permissions, appoint an independent Health & Safety officer that will certify that you indeed need to move out due to the nature of the works etc. If he wants to sell - did he take any steps towards it or he just wishes to sell "one day"? Or if he wants to move his son in did he provide you with a statutory declaration and is everything signed by a solicitor? But even if everything looks perfect, you can still challenge him.
2. He can say whatever he wants that he emailed/posted the letter to you in October but with no proof (only a postal receipt can prove it) he can do nothing. If he backdated his letter then it's immediately invalid but you say that there are many other errors which even Threshold confirmed, then rest assured that he will have to start from scratch to terminate your tenancy.
3. Since you are there for 4 years then he HAS TO give you 180 days notice so once again you are secured up to the summer 2021, of course if he provides you with a valid notice.
4. If you know the exact date you want to move out, you can give him your own notice - count 180 days and send him a letter, email and a text message informing about your wish to move out on e.g. 18 June 2021.
5. Keep your correspondence and all your attachments organised just in case you need to defend your case and prove his notices invalid. The history of the April illegal eviction attempt works to your favour.
6. If he is a shady landlord then prepare yourself for the deposit battle. But dont argue, just clean the place nicely, take lots of pictures, organise a viewing, return the keys and then give him 1 week after you move out for the deposit return. In your email state if you prefer a bank transfer or a cheque and that you expect 100% of deposit return. If he fails, inform him via email once again about the deposit but this time give him only 3 days to return it and state that you will have to open yet another RTB dispute if he fails to return it. After that time simply open the dispute choosing Adjudication option and wait for the hearing.

I am one of those who would never allow any landlord to take advantage of their tenants. I have seen/read about cases where a landlord never spent a penny on renovations for 20+ years because he was always able to prepare the place for new tenants out of the pockets of the previous ones, no matter that you lived there only a few months - deposit got retained for imaginary repairs, renovations and newer furniture. Not many tenants wanted to deal with courts, stress and LLs and sadly the nasty procedure was never reported until it happened to my friend. We exposed this dude and my friend even received a nice compensation.
You dont sound like a pushover, you know who to call, how to check things, you dont put up with the LL's crap - we need more like you.
Good luck with your case.

Roski707

Many thanks for that info @Curious1002
We don't have a date yet for RTB hearing so I'm guessing it will be well after Xmas. I've no doubt they'll find in my favour, so hopefully it will give me enough time when he has to give the 6 month notice again.
Unfortunately he was never a man to give us anything in writing, his previous requests to leave the property were all verbal. The only evidence I have is my emails to him referring to the conversations.

Curious1002

Roski707 wrote: »

Many thanks for that info @Curious1002
We don't have a date yet for RTB hearing so I'm guessing it will be well after Xmas. I've no doubt they'll find in my favour, so hopefully it will give me enough time when he has to give the 6 month notice again.
Unfortunately he was never a man to give us anything in writing, his previous requests to leave the property were all verbal. The only evidence I have is my emails to him referring to the conversations.

Nothing in writing/texts/voice recording - means no evidence - if it's something that the LL claims he did or said - well, he has nothing to back this up. Remember that he is not the first time landlord and if by now he hasnt learnt to keep a proper paperwork and a copy of correspondence with a tenant then he is already on the bad side with the Adjudicator. If you have a correspondence where you refer to some conversation with the LL then you are the winner. If LL hasnt responded to you "Mary, what are you talking about, we have never met/spoken about it before, etc." then you are safe. It definitely works to your favour indeed.
My LL has attempted to invent a fake evidence to support his appeal and sent me a random texted message: "Hey, sorry you didnt like the flat I showed you yesterday. It looks like I can't help you". I caught it straight away and texted back "Hi, please do not try to invent fake evidence. We did not meet or speak yesterday in any form, shape or way. You have never showed or offered me anything. In fact, we have not spoken in person since 12 November of last year (2019) so I would very appreciate if you could stop inventing fake stuff. It will only harm your appeal. Kind regards."
See, this is how you catch a guy on a lie. Always make sure to respond to something that doesnt sound right. If the entire email looks ok but it has just 1 sentence that is incorrect - respond and clarify the part that is wrong.


In terms of the RTB dates - dont hope for a quick hearing. They have been overworked way before the pandemic so you can imagine the volume of cases that have grown since. I have been waiting for mine since March 2020 (I already won my case in Jan but my LL appealed and the appeal was scheduled for March but got postponed due to Covid). The RTB may call you and offer the phone adjudication, just like they offered to me, but I refused and opted for the face-to-face hearing and said that I dont mind to wait. I feel that the phone adjudication would give a huge advantage to my LL because he would be sitting at home surrounded by his solicitors and they will tell him what he should say over the phone, you know the "say yes" or "say no", "say can't remember". Face-to-face hearing will exclude these tricks and it will be much easier for the Adjudicator to spot when he is lying. The body language is the key with my LL. So if you are not in a rush and dont want to speed the hearing then refuse the phone adjudication and tell them that you will wait until the Covid restrictions are lifted to have a traditional face-to-face Adjudication hearing.

Roski707

Curious1002 wrote: »

Nothing in writing/texts/voice recording - means no evidence - if it's something that the LL claims he did or said - well, he has nothing to back this up. Remember that he is not the first time landlord and if by now he hasnt learnt to keep a proper paperwork and a copy of correspondence with a tenant then he is already on the bad side with the Adjudicator. If you have a correspondence where you refer to some conversation with the LL then you are the winner. If LL hasnt responded to you "Mary, what are you talking about, we have never met/spoken about it before, etc." then you are safe. It definitely works to your favour indeed.
My LL has attempted to invent a fake evidence to support his appeal and sent me a random texted message: "Hey, sorry you didnt like the flat I showed you yesterday. It looks like I can't help you". I caught it straight away and texted back "Hi, please do not try to invent fake evidence. We did not meet or speak yesterday in any form, shape or way. You have never showed or offered me anything. In fact, we have not spoken in person since 12 November of last year (2019) so I would very appreciate if you could stop inventing fake stuff. It will only harm your appeal. Kind regards."
See, this is how you catch a guy on a lie. Always make sure to respond to something that doesnt sound right. If the entire email looks ok but it has just 1 sentence that is incorrect - respond and clarify the part that is wrong.


In terms of the RTB dates - dont hope for a quick hearing. They have been overworked way before the pandemic so you can imagine the volume of cases that have grown since. I have been waiting for mine since March 2020 (I already won my case in Jan but my LL appealed and the appeal was scheduled for March but got postponed due to Covid). The RTB may call you and offer the phone adjudication, just like they offered to me, but I refused and opted for the face-to-face hearing and said that I dont mind to wait. I feel that the phone adjudication would give a huge advantage to my LL because he would be sitting at home surrounded by his solicitors and they will tell him what he should say over the phone, you know the "say yes" or "say no", "say can't remember". Face-to-face hearing will exclude these tricks and it will be much easier for the Adjudicator to spot when he is lying. The body language is the key with my LL. So if you are not in a rush and dont want to speed the hearing then refuse the phone adjudication and tell them that you will wait until the Covid restrictions are lifted to have a traditional face-to-face Adjudication hearing.

Thanks for all that info. Sounds like you had to deal with a real peach of a landlord yourself!
I was offered paper based hearing or a virtual hearing - skype/zoom. I opted for a paper based hearing. Maybe that was a mistake but they told me there were no face to faces happening at the moment. I didn't think there was an option to say 'Ill just wait'. They said there would be no difference in time frame if I did paper based or virtual.

Curious1002

Roski707 wrote: »

Thanks for all that info. Sounds like you had to deal with a real peach of a landlord yourself!
I was offered paper based hearing or a virtual hearing - skype/zoom. I opted for a paper based hearing. Maybe that was a mistake but they told me there were no face to faces happening at the moment. I didn't think there was an option to say 'Ill just wait'. They said there would be no difference in time frame if I did paper based or virtual.

That's interesting but I suspect that this is what they offer for the first RTB hearing. With the Tribunal (it happens when either you or your landlord appeals the Adjudicator's determination order) they would give you the option to wait for the face-to-face, which is what I chose.
I think you did the right thing to pick the paper based submission. I am not sure how you can question your landlord when you read some bold lies in his submission though. With a face-to-face hearing you can always raise your hand and say that something is untrue, but with a paper based case there is no opportunity to do so. Yes, I dealt (still do) with a sh*tty LL but I suspect you may have a normal one who will be afraid to put anything false in writing.
I could advice you to make your submission easy to read, just give your submission to read to a friend or family member who has never heard your case before and see if they understand all your points. Each argument you made back it up by evidence, e.g:
- My Landlord, John Murphy, emailed me on 12/07/2020 stating that he will not return my deposit (evidence no 3, page 14). I replied on 14/07/2020 stating that there is no base to retain my deposit and I expect it to be returned in full within 1 week from my tenancy termination (evidence no 4, page 15). And so on...

I also prepared a timeline of events in a form of a table with 3 columns (Date, Event that took place, Evidence). If the case is simple and straight forward then you are ok without the timeline but my case had many twists and turns so it would have been very hard to see the whole picture if I didnt have the timeline. It not only helped the Adjudicator but also to me to keep everything is the right place.

Roski707

Thanks - that's all great advice. He's been a pretty bad landlord in the past but none of those things (threatening, taking ages to do repairs etc) form the basis of my case.
I think my case will be v straightforward though. Although he's made a number of minor errors in the notice (each one would be enough to invalidate it I think) the main thing is him backdating the notice to pre-level 5. He needs to submit evidence of me receiving the notice when he says he sent it. As I 100% did not receive it or sign for it I assume he doesn't have that evidence and the notice will be deemed invalid.
The ironic thing about it is that I think he backdated it to avoid Level 5 restrictions (thinking there'd be an eviction ban) but didn't realise that backdating it has no benefit to the timeline at all. And by trying to pull a fast one he will have delayed the process significantly.

Pkiernan

Curious1002 wrote: »

I feel that the phone adjudication would give a huge advantage to my LL because he would be sitting at home surrounded by his solicitors and they will tell him what he should say over the phone, you know the "say yes" or "say no", "say can't ....
.

.

Do you really think that your landlord will have a team of solicitors present for a phonecall???

Curious1002

Pkiernan wrote: »

Do you really think that your landlord will have a team of solicitors present for a phonecall???

Of course, 100%. He had 2 solicitors, 1 barrister and his super "smart" son (another landlord of 20+ flats) with him at the first hearing so defo he would be surrounded by the same crowd of advisers at the second one. My LL played an old vulnerable man at the hearing, he had a walking stick with him (!!), he looked like a freaking Harvey Weinstein at his hearing. He played confused, asked the same questions to be repeated 3 times to get more time to figure out some answers, he talked nonsense like "I love my kids very much" kinds thing, it was a parody. This was not the LL I knew, not the harsh talking smarty pants bully that has been pulling the same sh*t on tenants for years. The fact that I have pics of him from a few weeks before carrying a small fridge to his car all by himself or a video of him jumping 3 steps up when getting to the 3rd floor proves my point. I have never seen anything like that before! If he plays stupid again at his appeal I will pull a few pics and the video to show the Tribunal who we are really dealing here with.

Curious1002

Roski707 wrote: »

Thanks - that's all great advice. He's been a pretty bad landlord in the past but none of those things (threatening, taking ages to do repairs etc) form the basis of my case.
I think my case will be v straightforward though. Although he's made a number of minor errors in the notice (each one would be enough to invalidate it I think) the main thing is him backdating the notice to pre-level 5. He needs to submit evidence of me receiving the notice when he says he sent it. As I 100% did not receive it or sign for it I assume he doesn't have that evidence and the notice will be deemed invalid.
The ironic thing about it is that I think he backdated it to avoid Level 5 restrictions (thinking there'd be an eviction ban) but didn't realise that backdating it has no benefit to the timeline at all. And by trying to pull a fast one he will have delayed the process significantly.

Just be careful about the small mistakes on the Notice - many of them can be put under the "slip rule", which means that the Adjudicator may confirm that despite it's an obvious error, it's a harmless one and will be "forgiven". I know that the slip rule does not apply to the Statutory Declaration, yet in my case some of the slip-ups and omissions in the document were accepted by the Adjudicator. Thankfully I won because of all the other things the LL did illegally but I was, like you, so sure that the Notice will be invalid immediately only because of the number of small errors, which surprisingly it was not the case. My surname was spelled incorrectly, the flat number was wrong, the solicitor didnt state his first name, there was no legal firm's stamp, there was no signature of the witness, the address of the solicitor's firm was unreadable - I had no clue who these people are, etc - yet it all was argued and was put under the "slip rule", which sadly the Adjudicator has agreed with. But...you have a very strong point about the date and it's something that there is no way he would get away with that, unless he will produce a totally fake post office receipt. So make sure to investigate this evidence in advance - simply go to the post office and check if it's a legitimate receipt, they will check the number on it. Your LL has to upload the evidence no later than 5 days before the hearing so you can download his evidence from the RTB website then. If for some reason he will not upload it in advance of the hearing but somehow will produce it at the hearing - state clearly that you do NOT agree for this evidence to be accepted by the Adjudicator as you had not seen it before and had not investigated it. Anything that your LL wants to show on the day - you do not agree for that. The same will apply to you so make sure you upload everything necessary 5 days beforehand.

In the absolute worst scenario that you lose your case - buy yourself some time by appealing the case within 10 days from receiving the Determination Order (I think there is €100 fee for the appeal). Your appeal will take place sometime in May-July 2021 and by then you will move out on your own anyway.

meijin

Curious1002 wrote: »

Of course, 100%. He had 2 solicitors, 1 barrister and his super "smart" son (another landlord of 20+ flats) with him at the first hearing

I had a similar experience at the first hearing. Mine had 2 solicitors, barrister, 2 family members, and an estate agent who wrote the lease. I was just representing myself (and was very happy with the outcome :cool:).

Curious1002

meijin wrote: »

I had a similar experience at the first hearing. Mine had 2 solicitors, barrister, 2 family members, and an estate agent who wrote the lease. I was just representing myself (and was very happy with the outcome :cool:).

Well done!! It just shows that if landlords operate shady business and do illegal and nasty stuff then no matter how many professional legal aid they bring at the hearing - they will lose anyway. It's a double win for us when we think of how much money our LLs had to spend for the solicitors and barristers to still lose! Love it. Hope you won some good compensation as well - a triple win for us.