who pays for hot water cylinder

[jkmjoe]

Hi

I'm currently a tenant in a fast food premises and there was a leak in the hot water cylinder. I have already had a tradesman repair the hot water cylinder and have tried to make the landlord pay but the landlord does not think he should pay. We signed the lease back in around 2003 and as far as I know it is just standard without any variations. I will have to dig up the lease and read it when I have time.

What I want to know is, who should pay in this situation. I'm thinking hot water should be a service provided to the premises and therefor the landlord has to pay.

Also second question is, if the landlord is indeed responsible and does not pay, is there a way to make him or a process we can go through?

Cheers

[ripeka]

You will need to dig out your commercial lease to find out what it says. Our lease basically says the landlord is responsible for providing a building that is weather tight and structurally sound with heating. Everything else is the tenant’s responsibility.

[John the builder]

strictly speaking all maintenance is the LL responsibility but he can recover costs ( ripekas examples accepted)as out goings so you might as well do the work and control the spend

you need to read lease carefully and see who owns the cylinder and who is responsible as it may be a LL fixture that he has to maintain. Air conditioning is an example filters etc tenant but replacement is the LL

[Beano]

Without reading the lease I would agree with John the builder
If you fix the HWC yourself it will generally be cheaper as you can shop around
Ps 100pc of my Auckland commercial tenants would have to pay for the HWC repair
I would very surprised if the LL pays and does not recover from the tenant

[jimO]

you get to take it with you when you leave

[John the builder]

you get to take it with you when you leave

No but this is why it would be not be fair if replacing the building service occurred the day before the tenancy ended?

ADLS 2012 for example says;
8,3 that the tenant isnt responsible for building services but only maintenance contracts if an outgoing.............

[jkmjoe]

I had a read of the contract and it says:

Landlord's Maintenance
11.3 - The tenant shall be liable to reimburse the landlord for the cost of any such repair, maintenance or service contract if it is an outgoing listed in the first schedule

First schedule
7 - Cleaning maintenance and repair charges including charges for repainting, decorative repairs and the maintenance and repair of building services to the extent that such charges do not comprise part of the cost of a service maintenance contract, but excluding charges for structural repairs to the building(minor repairs to the roof of the building shall not be a structural repair).

Also under
Maintenance and repair of premises
tenants obligations
8.1 - ... Tenant shall not be liable for wear and tear.



At this point does it look like it is something we as a tenant would have to pay? And based on this information, would there be any situation where we wouldn't have to pay

[John the builder]

replacing a HWC is not maintenance it is structural repair.? there are definitions that have to be considered

A worn out HWC is wear and tear. Maintenance in a lease sense is the cost of servicing not replacement of building elements and services

[cb14]

I have a standard 6th edition lease and if I’m reading it right I can charge the tenants the cost to fix a toilet (slow to fill) and service the alarm? Any advice appreciated.

[Scouser]

Generally, if it's not structural or capital investment it's down the tenants to pay. I'm too lazy to read the specific contract but that's been quite consistent for decades.

[John the builder]

S
HWC replacement is structural, a leaky w.c. is maintenance?