Wayne Gilkes in Leyton

Although seemingly nice enough, the landlord was clearly incredibly lazy and totally profit driven. He was content to leave us totally alone and was very hands off, which would work ok if the property itself wasn't falling apart at the seams. We had a serious damp issue which resulted in our bedroom being completely covered in black mould. It took 4 months to get him to fix it, in which time we had to sleep on the floor in the tiny combined kitchen/living room, meaning we spent the lockdown in one tiny room. The mould and damp was so bad that my partner and I were seriously ill, and I developed asthma which I still suffer from now. We were told the cause of the damp was the upstairs extension roof, which meant he dragged his feet fixing it as he clearly felt it wasn't his responsibility. It ultimately only got repaired once we had reported it to the council and they threatened legal action and we had brought private legal action against him as well. Aside from the damp issues, he had no interest in maintaining the property in any way - there were so many other long-running issues that were basically completely down to his neglect of the property. I would be surprised if he had ever visited the property himself, he seemed to treat it as if it was property-managed by the letting agents but (as they repeatedly told us).