Students living in a house in Cathays said they had spent their academic year dealing with mould, damaged fittings and ceilings collapsing - twice. During what was the final year of university for many of them, they claimed they had reported the condition of the ceilings to their lettings agent several times before they collapsed in two separate places.
Some tenants said the amount of black mould had affected their health and most of them had to sleep on friends' sofas or book Airbnbs when they claimed the condition of their house became too bad to live in, despite them claiming that the lettings agent had insisted it was habitable. One said she was "extremely disappointed," and felt the group's complaints could have been dealt with better.
When the group of seven first started moving into the house in late summer, 2022, they claimed they noticed issues including broken tiles and kitchen fittings, a missing toilet seat and a broken bed. They claimed the house already had issues with mould and damp, which got worse through the year with black mould appearing on bedroom windowsills and in the kitchen. The tenants claimed they started reporting these problems to the lettings agency, Kingstons Residential, who passed them on to the landlord. You can get more story updates straight to your inbox by subscribing to our newsletters here.
But one night in March things got worse when the kitchen ceiling started leaking, with water dripping down, making the carpet "soaking wet" and huge damp patches forming on the ceiling. The students claimed the bathroom above hadn't been used for "hours," with only two of the seven housemates in the house at the time.
They claimed this leak wasn't caused by a tap or shower being left on, but an email from the agent after visits from British Gas claimed it was "due to flooding of the bathroom which has occurred through use," and asked for "the person who is responsible for this" to come forward.
After weeks of back-and-forth in which the tenants denied this accusation and asked for a dehumidifier to be provided, the ceiling started leaking again, they claimed. Black mould had started to form on the damp patches, but they claimed Kingstons refused to give any compensation or rent reduction for the damage.
On May 6, a contractor was sent to visit. The tenants claimed he had started tearing up floorboards when one of the housemates heard a bang and a scream. The bathroom floor (and the kitchen ceiling) had fallen through, narrowly missing somebody who was standing in the kitchen.
They claimed the contractor then appeared to be "panicking," cleaned up some of the mess and left within 30 minutes. The tenants left the house overnight as they were worried it wasn't structurally sound, but some returned to pick up belongings the next day and found more of the ceiling had fallen through. They claimed pieces of the rubble were damp to the touch and mouldy.
The students claimed they had to wait until after the Bank Holiday weekend to get a full reply from Kingstons, despite trying to contact the company via an out-of-hours number. An email from the lettings agency then insisted "you are not at risk and the property is habitable," but the tenants said the fire service had advised them to turn the electricity off.
Kingstons also insisted the collapse was planned and that one of the housemates had been informed in advance - but none of the seven, who talk regularly, remembered being warned or having a record of it in writing.
"Obviously, if they had warned us, it wouldn’t have been a near miss," claimed one tenant, Naomi, adding. "Nor would we have had our stuff lying underneath the ceiling. We felt neglected by Kingstons telling us it was a planned collapse, which wasn't the case." The students did not want to provide their full names.
Lead tenant Maya, who dealt with the landlords on behalf of her housemates, claimed: "They said the ceiling collapse was planned, which it obviously wasn't because more of the ceiling collapsed and fell the next day when the contractors weren't there. We weren’t warned that anything would be falling through the kitchen. Kingstons were saying it was fine and habitable, they didn’t need to give compensation or anywhere else to live - I thought it was ridiculous."
The students said they spent time sofa surfing, with some of them booking into Airbnbs at their own, and their families', expense. Two of the tenants normally lived abroad, with Naomi saying: "They wouldn't have anywhere else to go."
But the problems weren't over. Before the first collapse, the tenants claimed they had reported a leak coming through to a first floor bedroom from the second floor bathroom. They claimed Kingstons sent a contractor around to fix the plumbing issue, but the leak continued - which Naomi, the resident of the bedroom, claimed caused an existing mould problem to get worse.
The students claimed the room was inspected several days later and silicone added to the floor of the bathroom, but that it continued leaking even without the bathroom being used. After the problem was reported to the landlord several more times, it collapsed on May 17.
The tenant wasn't in her room at the time but claimed the ceiling was left in its collapsed state for "a while," with insulation hanging out. While this was being repaired, along with the first floor bathroom, the seven tenants claimed they were left with one bathroom between them. This isn't consistent with Cardiff Council's regulations which require there to be two bathrooms for any property with between six and 10 occupants.
Naomi said black mould had been building up in the room before the collapse. She added that several of the tenants had been having problems with their health, including coughs and issues with asthma, which they believed was linked to the mould growing across the house, including in the kitchen and living area and several bedrooms and bathrooms.
The students claimed that Kingstons sent the tenants a list of things to do to prevent mould, and that they did what they could - but didn't want to turn the heating up because they feared a large crack in the wall would affect the building's insulation and drive their costs up. On one occasion, in the days after the first collapse, the tenants denied entry to contractors - which they said was due to being shocked and panicked as they tried to get out of the house.
Naomi explained: "We didn't really know where to go with things and who to contact. I've learned half these things about landlords, tenants and regulations which I shouldn't have to spend my last week before exams doing."
The housemates are still holding out some hope that they'll get compensation, with Naomi saying: "We’re extremely disappointed. Although our health is something that’s priceless, we really hope for some compensation for the conditions we have had to put up with, at the least."
Maya added: "I'm doing my masters so it's been very difficult to balance this and the degree as well. As I was the main tenant the agency asked me to do all the emails, which was a bit stressful for me personally.
She claimed: "I emailed multiple times about black mould right next to my bed where I was sleeping, and they said to clean it myself. After the ceiling fell in, I stayed on a mate's sofa which wasn't great because I had exams a couple of weeks after. I'm very glad to be leaving this house. Obviously, the people are lovely, but the house is not even liveable."
A spokesperson for Kingstons said: "We were aware of two leaks that have occurred within the property which has been reported to us via email from the contract-holders. The first of the leaks being from the first floor bathroom that was attended to by many contractors, in which it was advised by these contractors that the leak is being caused by the tenants. All plumbing was checked over in which no leaks were detected on the three attendances that were made."
They claimed that a message from a contractor from Dyno Plumbing, originally sent to Kingstons, said the boiler still had pressure at the time of inspection and the bathroom floor was wet, indicating the link was "within bathroom, above ground and nothing to do with heating." The contractor concluded that the bathroom was likely flooded by the shower, something which the tenants denied at the time and still do.
The Kingstons spokesperson continued, saying the bathrooms were due to be refitted over the summer but instead the work was carried out "imminently." The spokesperson said: "This was agreed with the contract-holders before any works were undertaken, in which the ceiling was taken down by the contractors in order to investigate the cause of the leak, the ceiling did not fall down on its own.
"The works were unfortunately then delayed from starting when the contract-holders refused access to the contractors who were attending to start the works. These works have now been completed and new bathrooms fitted.
"The mould in the property occurred due to the leak, a dehumidifier was provided to the contract-holders to help with this and further works were scheduled to be carried out to rectify the issues. Again, the contract-holders were made aware of this and provided notice of the contractors attendance. This also included HMO works that were scheduled to be complete within a 3 month time scale which included some of the below issues reported to us by the contract-holders.
"The bathroom leak on the second floor was a general leak not caused by the tenants which was also in hand and works were carried out by the contractors while completing the bathroom renovations."
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