Early Lease Termination and Security Deposit

[Sarah Miller]

Hello! A little long but I really value opinions here.....

We rented a house for a short time while looking to purchase a new one.  We signed a 12 month lease knowing there was a possibility we would find a house sooner than that.  Well, that's exactly what happened.  We had been in the rental for 5 months when we signed a purchase agreement for a new house.  We kept the property manager informed of everything and even told him when we would be out for sure 2 months in advance.  Well, he was able to find a tenant pretty quickly within 2 weeks after we moved out (we also continued paying rent since this overlapped a month beginning).  HOWEVER, he literally NEVER told us they found a new tenant.  We still had things in the backyard and my husband went over to get them and he was there the minute I got an email from the PM saying someone already moved in.  WE STILL HAD OUR KEYS!!  HOPE HE CHANGED THE LOCKS!! anyway.... The PM had done a walkthrough with us prior to that and said the place looked excellent and we would be getting back the majority of our security deposit minus just some hole patching on the walls (we hung TVs).  We cleaned the place from top to bottom and it was "move in ready" per his words.

The rest of the story is a little longer than necassary so anyway, he is trying to keep our security deposit 100% citing our lease agreement.  The lease states "The tenants will forfeit the security deposit if they vacate the premises prior to the full term of the lease expiring".  I understand that the lease says this, however as a landlord myself, I don't think this statement by itself is legal.  I thought the security deposit could only be held to mitigate damages.  Since they re-rented the house pretty quickly, and we continued to pay rent until that happened, I don't really see any reason why they could hold our security deposit.  (BTW this is in Ohio)

ADDITIONALLY, he is saying that he has until March 30th to get back to me on the security deposit.............. The law states that I am entitled to my itemized deduction list and refund check within 30 days of the date the lease terminates.  Now, I would think that the minute those new tenants signed their lease, that terminates OUR lease.... correct?  If they don't inform within that 30 days can't we go to small claims??

Any and all advice is welcome.  Pretty peeved off right now as this is a large sum of money!