Looking For Recommendations Regarding Security Deposit

[Zachary Taylor]

Hi all,

I own a townhouse in Bellingham, MA that I have rented for the past four years.  Our tenants lease came up at the end of December and we are now under contract to sell at the end of January.  The tenants left the property filthy (our lease requires the property to be left broom clean).  We cleaned it as best we could but it needs a professional cleaning.  There was some minor to moderate damage to the interior outside normal wear and tear. They changed not only the locks but the entire dead bolt and door knobs on the front door (both of these are specifically prohibited in our lease).  But the biggest thing for us was they took two kitchen carts, a microwave, curtains, and the shelves from our closet shelving systems with them.  All added up they stole about $800 worth of property.  The tenants now claim that all this was theirs.  I photographed all of the damage and I plan to put together an itemized report to give to the tenants.

Unfortunately, none of these things were specifically mentioned in the lease agreement, but we do have pictures prior to their move in of most of these things in the unit.

I'm hoping for suggestions on how I should go about charging the tenants for all of these things?  Should I try to only charge for certain things?  Should I try negotiating with them in regards to all of this?  Should I just let it go and write it off as a loss since we're selling the property and none of these things were specifically entered into the purchase and sales?

I really don't want to travel to Massachusetts to go to small claims court over it all in the event they fought back.  We bought the townhouse when we lived in MA, but have since moved an hour and a half north to New Hampshire.

Thank you all in advance.