Tenant wants deposit back the day of move out .

[Matthew Paul]

Decent tenant of 4 years  moved out , only gave 2 weeks notice . I schedule a move out inspection the day he is leaving . They call for a east coast snow storm so he calls me and tells me he is leaving 2 days early and wants me to meet him . I tell him I am out of town and will be there on the scheduled day . He is upset , wanted money before he left , I told him I have 45 days  he leaves . Fast forward a week , I email him pictures of the damage , 2 bedroom doors , a broken kitchen drawer , drywall repair , big time inside  cleaning , leaves were not raked up and crap in the yard , 1 broken window and 5 torn screens  and black film on all walls .

I tell him I have a contractors starting next week to fix everything . He gets loud and says "YOU are a CONTRACTOR , you can fix it it will be cheaper . I had to break it to him that since I cant charge for my labor , and  I am busy on paying jobs , I am hiring subs to do the work . " You cant charge for painting you have to repaint between tenants "   I replied to him that he did a crappy job painting an accent wall in each room without permission , and smoking pot in the house left a  dark film , so yes I will charge to repaint . I also told him I am NOT charging for the carpet damage ( it looked good at move in but was old ) . He said there was snow on the ground and couldnt do the leaves ( No snow in December and it was warn )   I told him to read the lease , it is all spelled out . And he will get a list of all charges against his deposit and will either get a check or a bill for the balance .  He isnt too happy .

[Bill Ward]

My first tenants were nice and the place seemed clean during my visits. Gave them deposit back 2 days before they moved out. Mistake! Had to do flea treatments for carpets, nasty air filters they didn't replace, the new ones were still in the laundry room. Dog smell was awful. Lesson learned.