Problems with a boiler - apartment heating

Our boiler is making a funny noise, it sounds like the pilot light is clicking on and off every 6 seconds or so and then in the display it pops up 'E8' - now that says to me there's something wrong. We pay for our heating incusive in the rent. Is this up to the landlord to get it overhauled or is it up to us?

can't be certain of the legal position in every contract, but as far as I know the landlord/lady should come up for anything that is actually wrong, i.e. malfunctioning. In most contracts you would normally be responsible only for getting your boiler "entkalkt", often every 2 years, as that counts as general maintenance. If you haven't done that, and the problem could be traced back to a build up of chalk/lime deposit, then you would be liable to fix it. But otherwise pretty definitely not. If you haven't been in the flat long enough for the Entkalkung to be due, then you should have no worry.

Ah, I saw another thread on this. I've been here just over a year and as far as I know, the previous tenants may not have done this...

Plus we get about 10 minutes of hot water before it stops, so this could be exactly it.

I had to have my boiler serviced and my land lady had to pay for it.

ok, so then you have the problem of the defect which needs to be fixed...but you are off the hook as far as being liable goes. You are not responsible for what the previous tenants didn't do. Most landlords, by the way (or Hausverwaltung) will bug you every two to three years to ensure you do it, as they know that a boiler may end up with damage AFTER the negligent tenant has left. I used to get a letter whenever mine was due (about 2 months before)
Call the landlord - or whoever the contact is. Very unlikely you'll have to foot any of the bill. I even had an entire bolier replaced once, and the whole boiler replacement was paid for directly by the landlady (and very luckily it was exactly when the Entkalkung was due, so that go me out of paying it altogether that year..)

Don´t even think about paying, the boiler (which it isn´t, it´s quite likely a Durchlauferhitzer) is the part of the property and doesn´t belong to you. You pay for the gas and in the rental-contract is usually a maintainence charge (upkeep of all sanitary fittings etc) When the Instalateur comes make sure he writes in the bill, the owners name or the firm or whatever, you sign it, €5 Trinkgeld for the tradesman, bye. Bill goes to owner.

My block has a hausmeister who is supposed to take care of all this. His services (includes brushing the Tiergarage once a month) are covered by the rent. The exact same block beside mine has a Hausmeister who seems to work two days a week and does a great job on the gardens, paths, external doors etc but I assume they have to pay more to him than our landlord pays the eighty year old codger that does my place which is like a jungle. It is so overgrown that you really have to be careful if coming home a little tipsy at night.

When the boiler went during the winter an expert had to come in, it took him three days to repair it but the bill went to the landlord. Bloody freezing it was too.

Sea king is right.You rent the thing.A normal thing in the rent contract is that you are liable for Schonheits reperatur for up to €150 a year.Owt else has to be the owners responsability.You can even get it fixed by a comopany and send the bill on to the owners.Schonheits Reperatur are things like sealing rings on taps and the like

It sounds similar to my flat about a year ago. I needed to talk to my landlord about but kept putting it off untill he came by to fix my tub ( it was leaking to the flat underneath me ) I told him about and his response was " Why did you not tell me about ?" The next day someone was there to fix it although the leak was not fixed for another month.

The landlord is legally binding to fix it and also the de liming of the boiler comes under maintanence costs.Your landlord is liable for this.
www.mieterbund.de expalins it all

Mine is a rented house. I had to keep resetting the boiler to make it fire up.
I contacte the house owner and he arranged for the engineer to contact me. He came round and replaced the part. at no cost to me. My rental aggrrement states that it is his responsability.

I have had no problems whatsoever with my landlord. Very pleasant people. (& very wealthy)