No dryers, no Christmas decorations, and “definitely no parties”: landlords adding these clauses to tenancy agreements could be on shaky ground under the law.
Members of a tenancy support group on Facebook who sent their tenancy agreements to Stuff said they were hesitant to argue the clauses with their landlords.
One contract said lawns should be cut every two weeks, and that glow-in-the-dark stars were not to be stuck to walls. Ceilings, which the tenant said were “filthy” on moving-in day, were to be cleaned “at least” every six months, and no Christmas decorations were allowed on the outside of the house.
“Definitely no parties”, read another clause, and the tenant was unsure if that extended to the gathering she’d hoped to have for her young child’s birthday.
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“It does have a huge impact on being able to make this a home for myself and my child,” she said. “[But] I also can’t really afford to go anywhere else, so I have to just settle.”
Another tenant, whose tenancy is managed by a large property management company, has a clause forbidding the use of a dryer or clothes rack inside.
Daniel Spase/Unsplash
No dryers allowed: Some landlords sneak some bold clauses into their tenancy agreements.
On wet days, she and her flatmates dry their laundry in the carport, she said.
“It mostly works … but the carport leaks and our clothes started freezing yesterday. So they just stay on the line for at least three days.”
She hadn’t pushed the issue with her landlord. ”It’s hard to find good houses in our price range close to work, I wouldn’t want to risk him kicking us out.”
“Our landlord is not allowing candles,” said another tenant. “If we had honoured that we would have had a hard time during Cyclone Gabrielle.”
Andy MacDonald/Stuff
“If you can’t have a party for your child, how is that a home?” asked tenancy advocate Brenda McQuillan.
Allan Galloway, acting head of tenancy at Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment, said landlords cannot write clauses into agreements that conflict with the Residential Tenancies Act (RTA).
”The Tenancy Tribunal may consider such clauses to be unenforceable – meaning they have no effect and in some cases these clauses may amount to an unlawful act.”
With the RTA not referring specifically to clothes dryers or racks, a Tenancy Tribunal would need to be satisfied that a restriction was necessary – for example, in the case where ventilation was too difficult, Galloway said.
“Here it may be that the dryer requires ventilation to the outside, or the property may have sufficient outside space to effectively dry washing, or the tribunal may find the clause too restrictive on the tenants’ rights to quiet enjoyment of the property.”
Liz McDonald/Stuff
In the case of a forbidden dryer, a Tenancy Tribunal hearing would have the final say on whether this was a realistic rule.
Brenda McQuillan, a tenancy advocate from Nelson, said rules like forbidding parties breached a tenant’s right to quiet enjoyment of their property.
“If your rental property is your home, in your home you celebrate birthdays, good news, graduations – all those things that go into making a home.
“If you can’t have a party for your child, how is that a home?
“What property managers and landlords don’t understand, is that people will take more care of their property because it’s their home,” she said.
“If these non-enforceable contracts are so narrow and leave no wriggle room for tenants, where’s their buy-in to say, this is my home, and I’ll care for it like my home?”
While tenants and landlords should work together, in a “difficult housing market”, tenants might feel they should have to comply to unenforceable contracts, McQuillan acknowledged.
Since an overhaul of the RTA in 2020, tenants can ask landlords for permission to make minor changes to their rental properties, and landlords can’t decline without good reason.
Minor changes are considered to have a low risk of damage, and can be easily reversed: like baby-proofing, or new curtains.