RIGHTS OF LANDLORDS

Evening Post, Volume XCIX, Issue 70, 23 March 1920, Page 7

RIGHTS OF LANDLORDS

NEW INTERPRETATION OF THE LAW.

In view "of the extensive buying and selling of houses, now going on throughout the Dominion, a great deal of interest will be aroused in a judgment delivered by Mr. F. K. Hunt, S.M., at Pukekohe last week in. a. case in which J. T 11 'Arthur sued J. W. Johns for damages for trespass. The defendant had purchased the house of which th« plaintiff was tenant. Plaintiff had been given notice on 21st January to vacati* the house in four weeks, but he had not done so, believing that-he had right to longer notice. It was alleged that between 14th- and 16th February, in tha absence of the plaintiff and his family, the defendant unlawfully ' broko int<i and took possession of the residence and appurtenances of plaintiff. * The defendant admitted' entering the house through an open window, and placing plaintiff's effects in two rooms.

In delivering judgment the Magistrato said that once the notice to quit had: been held to be good and sufficient, the tenant then was tii* trespasser. The defendant had his statutory remedy to apply to the Court in a legitimate manner for an order for possession, as has beevi customary in this and other dis tricts,'but defendant also had his.common law remedy of quietly obtaining possession of the premises if he could without committing a breach of the peace. This course apparently the defendant decided to take upon himself without obtaining legal advice on tho matter. During the original hearing of the ease his sympathies had been with the plaintiff, as he considered it a monstrous thing for a- landlord to gain access to the tenant's property and act in the manner in which'the defendant had done. Such action was greatly to bo deprecated, and he trusted lid would hear of no similar cases of this kind in this district. Thfi Court was there, and the law made ample provision for a landlord to legally obtain possession of his premises. The defendant had been saved damages .through the opportune arrival, a few days before the final argument, of the report of an English case, decided in the English Court of Appeal, and which decision he was bound by. This case had decided that what had previously been considered and act^d upon for many years as good law, was now bad in law. The defendant was very fortunate in. having judgment given in his favour. ,By this' decision, added Mr. Hunt,,h'e did not wish it to go abroad that landlords had legal right- to go into or break into a house occupied by a tenant. It was a bad thing for a landlord to break into a house either forcibly or peaceably. He was sorry he could not give plaintiff judgment, as he was bound by the English Court of Appeal's decision. The decision of this case re- • versed the interpretation of the law which had been accepted since 1841.