Tenant disputes move out charges

[Don Jackson]

This is a first for me. I hope some of my more seasoned BP friends can shed some light.

My SFR is managed by a property manager. The tenant recently moved out. They had $1,050 on deposit.

The property manager did an inspection and then prepared a letter to the tenant detailing all of the charges to be taken out of their deposit. The charges were more than their deposit so they were sent a bill.

I received a letter from an attorney demanding that the entire amount be returned to the ex-tenant. He threatened a lawsuit.

When I look through the list of charges, I am a little disturbed.

$100 to replace the furnace filters

$200 for gutter cleaning

$150 to change the locks

$50 Move out inspection fee

$200 Cleaning fee

$150 Floor cleaning

The list goes on. One large amount is for an unpaid water bill. I understand the tenant needs to pay for that, but I'm not sure if the tenant should have to pay for all of these other fees.

I understand that if the tenant doesn't pay out of their deposit, then I have to pay these fees.

I have two questions:

1) Is it standard for a property manager to charge all of these fees upon move out? Should I try to negotiate some of these fees with them? If they don't charge the tenant, then I end up paying for them.

2) How should I approach the ex-tenant? I thought I could write them a letter saying that I will split some of the costs with them and give them part of their deposit back. (the attorney stated in his letter that I should reply directly to the tenant and not go through the attorney) 

My goal is to avoid a lawsuit, but I don't want to just roll over and pay all of these fees myself.

Any thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

[James Qiu]

@Don Jackson those charges seem high to me, eg. filter costs $10 each and takes 5 mins to replace and also gutter cleaning should be landlord's responsibility unless specified otherwise in your lease, and you can't charge for changing locks if they're not broken. In CA, you're required to send the tenant the actual receipts justifying the expenses, not just estimates. If you perform the repair personally, you have to be reasonable in charging fair market rate. eg. if it takes 1 hr of your labor for some handyman's work, $20-30/hr is reasonable, even you're probably paid much more in your own line of work.

My suggestion is to first fire the PM who obviously wanted to skim some profit by inflating the repair cost while exposing you to lawsuits (remember you're in CA - a blue state and San Jose - a city with rent control). Second get a handyman/contractor to do the repair and send the actual costs to the tenant. If you can't finish it within 21 days after vacancy, send the tenant an written estimate from the contractor with some padding along with the remaining deposit, and send the rest when the repair is done. More importantly, read the rental guidelines of your city for what you can and can't charge a tenant. Some repairs are considered normal wear and tear, eg. depending the length of the tenancy you might not be able to charge for painting the interior of the house, cleaning (or even replacing) the carpet.