Dilapidations and Accountants
and Your Accounts
Free phone us for a chat on dilapidations
We market the services of independent Surveyors. Surveyors pride themselves on a high standard of work. We can offer Schedules of Condition with regard to leases, Property Reports, Schedules of Dilapidations, Scott Schedules, Commercial Building Surveys, Structural Reports, Specific Defects Reports. Note these are not for bank lending but are to advise you how much we feel the property is really worth. If you have a property problem we may even already have written an article on it and we would refer you to the many articles we have on our website. All our independent surveyors are more than happy to chat to you about your property queries. Please Free Phone us on 0800 298 5424 and surveyor will call you back.
Dilapidations are as certain as death and taxes
If you've read our other articles you will know that we believe that dilapidations, or Schedule of Dilapidations, as they are often known and dilaps as they are called by Surveyors that specialise in dilapidations claims, are as certain as death and taxes. This certainty means that sooner or later if you lease a property you will have a Schedule of Dilapidations served on you by the landlord. Equally, if you are the Landlord sooner or later you will want to serve a Schedule of Dilapidations.
Dilapidations, equal and opposite
Dilapidations claims bring up an interesting scenario. The landlord wishes to have their property back in perfect condition. This will best enable them to rent it, with all the dilapidations repairs being carried out to a Rolls Royce standard. Equally, the occupier, or the ex-occupier, or the leaseholder, wishes to minimise their cost, carrying out the minimal standard required to enable them to give back the property without being sued as part of a long expensive dilapidations claim, which will normally lead to a Reliant Robin standard of maintenance, with the surveyors carrying out the Schedule of Dilapidations, trying to work at an average level of maintenance standard.
Negotiation, negotiation, negotiation on dilaps claims
In our experience the best way to deal with a dilapidations claim, whether you are the Landlord or the Tenant, is to negotiate on the potential dilapidations claim. If you are the Landlord you will need to forewarn the party of the likely costs. This is where an interim dilapidations claim can be of use to the tenant, as they see the type of things that you intend to claim on and can make a view. This is also where your bookkeeper or your Accountant comes into his own, as they can budget in your accounts for a future liability. However, in practice this is rarely done.
Our first experience of a Accountant and a Dilapidations Schedule!
In fact after many years of carrying out dilapidations claims for the landlord and defending the claims for the tenants, we have just been approached by our first accountant in an advisory capacity to comment on a potential dilapidations claim and the likelihood of the landlord succeeding in court and what sort of costs should be budgeted in future accounts for potential claims.
The benefits of your Accountant budgeting for a Dilapidations Claim
Whether you are the Landlord or the Tenant, time, or time and money, will be involved in the dilapidations claim and, in our experience, it is best to try and measure the likely costs in advance so you can then manage them.
How can a Surveyor help a Accountant?
We would say a Surveyor can help by giving a realistic view from both the building point of view and the legal point of view of a dilapidations claim. Whilst a builder may be able to offer you costs for the building work they will be unable to establish the extent of claim, whether, for example, it can include loss of rent, etc, or indeed of there is a breach of the Lease clause. Unfortunately, the scenario relies upon the Accountant realising what a Schedule of Dilapidations is and that there are likely costs to be associated with it.
Dilapidations is about maximising or minimising the claim, depending upon who you are
There are many grey areas within a schedule of dilapidations claim that can be negotiated on and are in fact essential to negotiate on. This is where an experienced Surveyor in dilapidations can give a very good indication to the Accountant what the likely costs are going to be.
Dilapidations, the unfair game
To some extent dilapidations is an unfair game if you are a tenant, as the landlord has written, or has had the lease written on their behalf, and usually have their costs protected and can therefore take their time and go into a lot of detail with a claim. The tenant, on the other hand, has to take a business decision with their Surveyor about when and where it's worth spending their time and money.
Free summary of your dilapidations issues
We are more than happy to discuss your dilapidations issues over the phone and offer a free summary as to where we feel your liabilities are if you are a tenant, or your opportunities if you are a landlord.
Happy dilapidations customers
We are more than happy to offer you references or examples of customers that we have worked for with regard to dilapidations claims and also tenants that we have worked with; saving them from dilapidations claims.
We even teach dilapidations to future Surveyors on university courses. We would be more than happy to come and do a presentation to your Accountancy practice.
Presentations for Accountants
Just in case you have missed the last paragraph, we would be more than happy to come and do a presentation to your Accountancy practice.
Have a look at our dilapidations website: Dilapidations Help
If you would like Dilapidations Help then please visit our www.DilapsHelp.com website and for Disputes go to our Disputes Help site www.DisputesHelp.com .
Expert specialist advice on dilapidations
If you need help and advice with regard to leases, dilapidations, schedules of condition, dilaps claims, scott schedules, building surveys, structural reports, engineers reports, specific defects report, structural surveys, home buyers reports or any other property matter please call 0800 298 5424 for a friendly chat. Please note we are independent surveyors.
Dilapidations articles to make you think
We hope you found this article interesting and if you have any experiences that you feel should be added to this article that would benefit others, or you feel that some of the information that we have put is wrong then please do not hesitate to contact us (we are only human).
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See our other articles on Dilapidations: