My friend come across this problem:

He stayed in a house without a valid tenancy agreement.
Last weekend the house water pipe leaked and thus several places in the house wet and my friend's mattress, books, router and some minor things get wet and cannot be used anymore.

So he contacted the landlord and landlord didn't fix the issue at first, resulted in my friend need to find place to stay for few days.

Finally the landlord asked people to fix the problem, my friend want to move out since the unit is messy with water, dirt and stinky smell in his room. The landlord refused to compensate the losses incurred nor give him back the deposit.

I remember a lawyer friend of mine told me that in this case, it's a act of god or "force majuere" and the tenancy agreement is voidable (but he didn't sign any tenancy agreement with the landlord) so my friend should get his deposit back. Is that true? Because according to him, it is the house condition that deters him to stay furthermore and not because my friend want to void the agreement, so my friend just want to move out and get back his deposit. I tried to contact the landlord but the landlord was so arrogant and did not want to listen to us. All he said was because it is agreeable that the tenant must give 2 months notice in order to get back the deposit.

Another thing is the landlord opened up my friend's room without my friend's permission during the fixture of the pipe. Is that a breached to the law?

And the unit is partitioned from 3 rooms to 6 rooms. Where can we complaint about this issue?

Hope someone can help my friend in this matter. Thank you.

so simple. you call up the landlord and tlel him if the deposit is not returned, you'll report him to the authorities for partitioning 3 rooms to 6 rooms and then that the landlord has barged into your room and stolen items.

he still don't do that, you tell him you are at the police station going to make report already and ask him to think clearly.

lesson learn from this is the importance of legal documentation, in this case a tenancy agreement. With that agreement, it is clearly stated that the landlord should fix the prob immediately. and also, in the same agreement the tenancy is voidable if the landlord could not continue providing a 'tenantable' place, which in this case the deposit could be recovered.

as ebackbone has stated, you could 'threaten' to report to the authorities on the partition (if it wasnt legal), but i doubt you could make a police report about bargin in your room (there is a time frame to make a report on a crime - but do correct me if im wrong).

Thank you all. Just now I called up the management office HQ to complain about his unit to be noisy and I told them I asked the tenant inside, telling me there were 6 rooms and it was noisy. So the management said will investigate this matter. Eventually the management called the landlord regarding this.

Just before I want to make a report to the Land Development Department, the landlord called up my friend but my friend missed the call. The landlord then sms him and finally came immediately to settle the thing and return all the deposit.

I already told my friend to tell him that we already lodged a police report but the landlord surrender too fast, my friend have no chance to do so.
Kathlynn was right, we need to lodge a police report ASAP and it does has a time frame. Details we should ask lawyer to explain further.

too bad the landord this the partition, or else he could get away with this