Advice wanted for rental house carpet.

In My Humble Opinion
1

(long rambly OP, sorry)

I’m living in a shared house- in the UK, with one housemate. A while ago, my housemate managed to accidently leave the iron on the floor, still hot, in her bedroom. It’s left a lovely clear iron shape burnt into the carpet.

She’s agreed that it was her own fault, and she’s responsible for getting it sorted out, but neither of us are exactly sure what’s the best thing to do. It won’t brush out, it’s a crappy artificial fibre one, and it’s melted into big lumps. It’s looking like the carpet is going to need replacing, or there’s no way we’re getting much deposit back.

It’s a very small room, and the carpet is actually mouldy along one edge, as they forgot to put in a vent when converting the room- which last year resulted in us paying full rent for two months while they (sort of) sorted it out (apart from the mushrooms growing out of the ceiling). Despite this, from what’s happened to friends and family, I suspect that if we left it as is, they’d try and get a free carpet upgrade out of our deposit, and we’d barely get anything back- we costed it out ourselves, and it should only cost about a fifth, given the size of room, and local pricing, professionally fitted. We could do it ourselves much cheaper.

My housemate has helped fit carpets before, so is quite happy to give it a go, and will probably do it to a fairly good standard (very likely much better than the handyman they send around to do any repairs here, who cuts every possible corner, and always does a very shoddy job). They’re pretty lax about repairs, and the place was in a bit of a state when we moved in, but this is very clearly damage that has been done recently.

The whole house is carpetted in the same cheap speckly off-grey, but it’s quite faded, so getting a perfect match is probably not going to be possible.

Incidently, I have not recieved a copy of the house survey- which they should have sent, and claimed to have sent, despite asking multiple times. I’m not actually sure if they ever really did one. This might wind up meaning they can’t actually prove it was damage done during our tenancy, and frankly it’s unlikely to be a source of distress to any further residents prepared to live in this dump. Still, I think it’s probably better that we try and fix it.

The main problem is, neither of us have much money- even though it’s really her problem, she can’t afford to lose the entire deposit, so I probably would wind up with her owing me money when we move out.
So, this is what I’m wondering- should she;
a) Repair the carpet with as close matching colours as possible, and don’t tell the agency?
b) Try and find a ‘patch’ the same shade of carpet, and carefully replace just that bit, without telling the agency?
c) Tell the agency, and offer to replace the carpet at her own cost?
Option c) is certainly the one the landlord would prefer, but it’s very unlikely anyone would notice a), and b) is very cheap, if difficult to do well, whereas c) could wind up with them insisting we have to buy a specific carpet, which can wind up very expensive, as I suspect they’d take the opportunity for a free upgrade.

Any advice? Futher options? I don’t want to do anything illegal, but it’s hard to work out from the lease if we can just replace carpets ourselves or not.

Thanks for any help!

2

I vote for repair/replace yourself. The result will be better than what was there and there should be no complaints when you leave. Sometimes people will patch a carpet using a piece from inside a closet.

3

Probably best option- there’s no closets or similar places to nick bits from, unfortunately, or that would be the best option.

Mainly just checking in case we could get in trouble for doing something like that without consent…

4

Is there a place that sells carpet remnants? I once had a very small room carpeted using a remnant for next to nothing.

5

I would think they should be able to charge no more than the value of the current carpet … not the full replacement value of a new carpet. How old is the current carpet? How good was the carpet when you first moved in? How much has the carpet depreciated due to normal wear & tear since you moved in?

If the carpet was already old and beat up when you moved in and has only gotten worse with normal wear & tear, then the landlord shouldn’t be able to stick you with replacement value.

If you install a replacement carpet yourself that is worth more than the carpet provided to you at move-in, less normal wear & tear, and less carpet damage caused by the landlord, then the landlord has suffered no damages.

Document the current condition of the carpet, including the mold damage. Be prepared to tell the landlord that the carpet had no value even before the iron damage occurred.

6

Is the rate of carpet depreciation something that’s usually defined by a state or local ordinance?

7

There’s likely a statute somewhere that says the landlord is entitled to recover damage to the premises caused by the tenant, excluding normal wear and tear. The case law is where you’d be most likely to find how the courts apply that statute to carpets. Maybe the state or local authority has a carpet statute. I don’t know. You’d have to look through your state and local laws.

8

Replace the carpet in that room yourself.

Don’t worry about trying to match the rest of the place – pick a color that you like.

If ever challenged about it, simply claim “that one room always had a different, non-matching carpet”. Since they obviously don’t have any detailed records, they won’t be able to prove any differently.

(If you had a decent landlord, you could do it the simple way – tell them you accidentally damaged the carpet, and offer to replace it if they will pay for the materials. easy deal, everybody happy. But you obviously don’t have that kind of a landlord.)