Deposit dispute

[ikhjardine]

I need some help regarding a letter I am writing to dispute part of our deposit which was witheld. We are in Texas.

We complied with notice, etc... nothing ill-intentioned going on. We steam cleaned the carpets, mowed the lawn and thoroughly cleaned the house top to bottom. There was a 1 foot stain on a bedroom carpet (we have two dogs and a 6-year old, so anyone's guess!) They were present the day we vacated, however declined our invitation to walk the house with us. Odd.

Our landlord is being pretty nit-picky: We are being charged for steam cleaning all three bedrooms, when only one needed any efforts. He also charged us to mow the lawn two weeks after we moved out, when we completed those efforts the day before we vacated. He has also charged us for a "missing antique planter" which we never saw, nor did he point out.

We hung pictures and had to hang two sets of curtains as none were provided in two rooms and herin lies the rub:
They are charging us $650 for repaininting rooms. The house had just been painted a very renter un-friendly grey/blue color when we moved in. They assured us that there was residual paint left over for touch-ups for the grey/blue rooms and bedrooms too. However, when time came to paint - the paint cans we had seen and verified, but not opened, turned out to be the wrong colors! The landlord's wife advised us to match the paint at a local store, we attempted to do so with paint chips, then with the computer matching - no luck. So we touched up some holes with the "no luck" matched paint and left some nails in and removed some, leaving tiny holes.

So who is obligated to pay? We are assuming that they probably repainted the grey/blues a more friendly white, but cannot prove that. He was really slack about repairs, but we didn't file any complaints... malfunctioning smoke detector and he never replaced a missing pane of glass on a double hung window.

We want a chunk of our money back! I met with a free lawyer, he advised to write a demad letter to them but I need some laws to quote, if I am in the right. For example: window coverings, is he obligated to provide those? And the paint debacle, there were some major verbal misunderstandings there.

HELP!!

[OHlandlord]

To dispute this deduction:

First the steam cleaned carpets, did you do it yourself or have a professional do the work? Did you provide the LL with the receipts for the cleaning? If you did not have the work done by a professional or failed to show him receipts of the work, he can have the carpets cleaned. (You have 2 dogs - I'd make sure those carpets were cleaned too. He may not take your word for it if there was a stain still.) You are responsible for any stain in the carpet that you caused. If it did not come clean, he can have the carpet patched at your expense or charge you a depreciated cost for the carpet in that room.

If there was no planter when you moved in, you merely state in your despute letter that there was no planter at the residence and you should not be charged for it. Was your lease up when you moved? If so, there is no reason to charge you for mowing 2 weeks after you left. You should point out the date of mowing is far beyond your end of obligations and you should not be charged for this.

As for the painting, how long did you live there? How many holes (and what size) did you put in the walls? A paint job normally lasts 2-3 years in a rental at most. If the paint is not 3 yrs old and I must repaint after a tenant, I charge a prorated amount for painting the unit or room. It doesn't matter what color the walls were when you moved in. What matters is how long you lived there and whether it had to be repainted. It sounds like it may have needed repainting since you didn't sufficiently match the colors (I'd have just left it unpainted if the color didn't match). He could have gotten a quart of the correct color and just charged you for the touch up instead of repainting. Please post how long you were in the unit.

His lack or repairs is a moot point now. The time to complain about that was when you were living there. They don't matter now.

Lots of LLs don't do walk-throughs with our tenants present. Many tenants just want to argue every point we list on the inspection sheet (whether or not they were going to be charged for whatever we wrote down). It is easier and less trouble to do these after the tenant is out and gone. To protect yourself, you should do numerous photos of the places to show how you left it.