Welcome to the houses of horror - the real story of Manchester’s worst rented homes.

The M.E.N. last month reported how town hall chiefs are planning a crackdown on slum landlords as the city’s private rental market continues to boom.

So we asked for your experiences - and were inundated.

From mushrooms sprouting in communal hallways, to mice, fires, mould and sewage, angry tenants got in touch in their droves.

One pressure group has now warned of a ‘ticking timebomb’ for families living in damp conditions infested with pests, warning all political parties need to do far more to stand up for renters.

And a group of renters in Longsight are now so fed up they are holding an exhibition next month exposing the very worst conditions.

One of the most stomach-churning stories sent to us came from a former tenant of the Junction Works building on Ducie Street, which has since been taken over by new management.

Software developer Pete Birkinshaw, 42, submitted pictures of huge mushrooms growing in the hallway outside his flat.

“The electrics were dodgy - the lights would burn out every few weeks, and the management company would give a different excuse each time I complained,” he said.

“The electricity meters were numbered incorrectly, so some of the residents were paying each other’s bills. After my shirts started shrinking we discovered that the hot and cold water pipes on the washing machine were swapped.

“The flat next door had a leak in the bathroom that went unfixed for over a year, causing a damp problem in our flat and mushrooms to suddenly pop up every so often in the corridor.

“By the time we realised the water was under the floor of our flat our furniture had mildewed underneath. Just before we left, neighbours mentioned that the previous tenants had been flooded with sewage, so I hate to think what was actually under the flooring.”

Current managers Eddisons - who took over the building after Pete moved out in 2008 - said they had inherited a catalogue of problems but had since ploughed huge amounts of cash into sorting them out.

A spokesman added: "Eddisons have made a significant investment in the building to address the main issues reported including a recent re-roof, re-painting of the exterior and re-carpeting. The building is now well managed, properly insured and safe.

"Junction Works is now a significantly different building. However we continue with our rolling plan of improvement which has recently delivered apartment sales of more than £10,000 over the asking price."

Valeska Matziol was served with an eviction notice after complaining to her landlords Hilltop Properties last month.

Since the middle of January, she has been cataloguing the building work above her rented flat on Corkland Road in Chorlton - and has sent us photos of a huge hole in her ceiling as a result - as well as the dust and rubble it left all over her new printer.

She says works have been going on six days a week, 12 hours a day and one day she came home to find the fire service had been called out to a bonfire of rubble started by the builders.

She eventually got the council involved and forced officers to carry out an inspection - although she is still moving out. She said: “I’m German and used to much better legal protection for tenants back home. “Of course this a consequence of a much larger proportion of the population in Germany living in rented accommodation all their lives. However, considering that it becomes increasingly impossible for people to get onto the housing ladder in the UK, we really need to wake up to tenants rights in this country, too.

“Right now landlords can pretty much do with you what they want because if you try to complain they chuck you out.”

Hilltop could not be contacted for comment.

My newborn baby's clothes were covered in mould

Kiera Richard pursued her landlord, Arfan Sardar, through the courts after what she says was a nightmare experience.

When she moved into the flat at Queen’s Court in Heaton Mersey, she says she found it a mess - with damp problems that made her ill, daddy longlegs and slugs and filthy furniture.

She redecorated but the damp persisted, eventually covering her newborn baby’s clothes with mould.

When she eventually decided to leave, she was told she would not be getting her deposit back - and that it had not been kept in a secure scheme, as she had been originally told.

Having discovered he had already been successfully prosecuted TWICE before for bad practice - in both Manchester and Stockport - she took him to court, where she won shortly before Christmas 2013.

“I waited until the end of January 2014 and I never heard off my landlord about my payment, so Stockport county court said to try get an address to send a bailiff round,” she said.

She paid them £100 - but when the bailiffs visited they were told he did not live there.”

Mr Sarwar could not be contacted for comment.

One-in-four people in Manchester now rent - and need better protection

More than one in four Mancunians are now private renters, according to official statistics - up from 15pc in 2001.

So inevitably in the run-up to the election, the needs of ‘generation rent’ are rising up the agenda.

Labour are pledging a crackdown on ‘rip-off’ letting agency fees, new three-year tenancies to give renters ‘peace of mind’, a national register of landlords and - most controversially - a curb on rent rises.

Earlier this month, the government said it would alter legislation so landlords who evict people for ‘speaking out against sub-standard accommodation’ - so-called ‘revenge evictions’ - will be breaking the law.

That policy has been driven through by the Liberal Democrats, who say it will crack down on the ‘minority’ of rogue landlords without letting bad tenants stop legitimate evictions.

Some will point to the difficulty in enforcing such rules, however.

Manchester council - which has a new rental strategy which aims to crack down on rogue landlords - admits there is already an ‘extensive’ body of legislation and regulation, but that often tenants are too scared to report breaches.

The town hall has issued more than 2,500 enforcement notices against landlords in the last five years, but only completed 31 prosecutions due to the difficulty and resource needed to prove cases.

It now plans a ‘zero tolerance’ approach by working more closely with the housing sector and the industry to share information. It also wants to the power to force all landlords onto a local registration scheme and keep fines from court action to help fund enforcement, instead of giving them to the government.

Gavin Dick, policy officer at the National Landlords Association, said it was ‘fully on board’ with the council’s plans.

“Their proposals for a better private rented sector are in line with their wider strategy to grow the city’s economy and they understand that a mixture of education and targeted enforcement is the most effective way to achieve this,” he said.

“We agree that Manchester council should be able to retain the money generated from prosecutions against criminal landlords as it will give them the resources to implement a long-term enforcement strategy and put an end to the worst offenders who exploit tenants and give landlords a bad name.”

'Ticking health timebomb' facing families

Private renters in parts of south Manchester are facing a ‘ticking timebomb’ of pestilence, a leading campaign group has warned.

Generation Rent says the sort of cases revealed by the ME.N. are commonplace - and pests, combined with damp, are a ‘potential epidemic’.

Pollyanna Steiner, who set up the group’s Manchester office in October, said ‘very, very severe damp’ is a particular worry, adding: “The most common one I have seen is black mould, which does have toxic effects on people. I’m seeing health impacts of that on people, whether it’s young professionals or families.

“There are homes which are very, very cold. The levels of cold in properties is unacceptable - particularly with older renters.”

But pests, she said, were also a huge concern.

“In Rusholme and some of the areas where there are mostly terraced homes - Moss Side and Fallowfield and Whalley Range - I’ve heard second-hand and first-hand on the doorstep that they’ve massive problems with mice and rats, but also cockroaches in the damper properties. That’s family homes included in that,” she said.

“But people are scared of being evicted because they are all on assured-shorthold tenancies. They are worried about putting things on record.

“It’s a major concern because of the diseases carried by pests. Often families are living in a ticking timebomb, really. It’s an issue that just gets ignored because it’s put down to the structure of the properties, because they are all connected, and that’s the main excuse.

“It’s like a potential epidemic among families because the more families are moving into these properties, I can see things mushrooming into something horrific.

“Not to be catastrophic about it - just from the level of experience I’ve had across a number of wards that’s my experience in three months. So it’s very concerning, because I can’t see that getting any better.”

Generation Rent are not alone in their concerns.

One group of young renters in Victoria Park are now even collecting pictures from fellow tenant for an exhibition in March, some of which we have used in our gallery.

The Langdale Gallery will be held on Langdale Road on Sunday, March 1,

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MEN Comment: These rogue landlords need driving out, for the tenants' sakes and the majority of landlords who provide a good service

Rental properties is a huge issue for Manchester with one in for Mancunians now a tenant.

But some of the horror stories we publish today shows just how some these people are being exploited by a small number of rogue landlords.

Nobody should have to live in the conditions that we detail today. And the health implications, especially for families, is shocking.

We applaud Manchester council's crackdown on the landlords who fall well short of the standard their tenants deserve.

We also back their calls for the power to force all landlords onto a local registration scheme and keep fines from court action to help fund enforcement, instead of giving them to the government.

The election is looming and one-in-four is a lot of votes.

Campaigners such as Generation Rent should continue its good work press home this advantage.

The sort of conditions we show today that some people are living in belong to a different age - they certainly don't belong in in Britain's most virbranmt successful city. These rogue landlords need driving out, for the tenants' sakes and the majority of landlords who provide a good service.