Most people hope they’ll get their security deposit back when they rent an apartment.

This tenant’s landlord initially makes it sound like getting the security deposit back will be easy, but everything changes when it’s time to move out.

Thy take the landlord to court, but that’s just the beginning of the revenge.

Let’s see how the story unfolds…

Screw me out of my security deposit & throw a tantrum? Enjoy loosing your gig with the City &; foreclosure!

About 5-6 years ago, I was desperate to get out of an abusive relationship with my ex.

I found a decent apartment, didn’t pay attention to the lease (stupid, but I was in a hurry), signed it and slapped down the deposits.

Two weeks later, my kiddo and I are happily installed.

Now, to give you a bit of background, I work in property management.

I have for the last 4 years, but at the time I was just a medical records clerk. I knew nothing about the laws.

The duration of my time in my little apartment went by without a hitch.

My SO moved in about a year after I did, and there was no mention of him applying or anything else.

The lease renewal came with his name and mine on it, so he was officially a tenant.

She and her SO got ready to move out.

Time comes to move out, and we give our notice.

We’d planned to be out of the unit over the 4th of July weekend, and my landlord said it was no problem- he wouldn’t charge me for the couple of days I was in there.

He said not to worry too much about the carpet, it was old and he was going to replace it anyway.

Swell!

I wasn’t given a checklist of things to clean so that my security deposit wasn’t ate up by charges, so I just used the one I give to my tenants.

(It’s about 2 pages, and pretty detailed.)

SO and I spent about 3 days cleaning the apartment after everything was out.

We moved the stove and cleaned under it, replaced the burners, waxed the floor, cleaned the cement on the patio, the whole enchilada.

Time for the final walk-through, and I’m stuck at work and can’t leave.

SO says he’ll go instead, and meets the old landlord at the unit.

The landlord found a lot of problems.

The landlord brought along his wife, and they both look irritated.

They mentioned how the carpets were “filthy”.

SO said that we’d vacuumed, but we’d been explicitly told not to shampoo them since they were going to be replaced.

(I had also vacuumed religiously during my lease due to allergies.)

Landlord (LL) said there was holes in the wall from nails.

We’d made sure to use small nails and had filled them in with spackle, but it was possible that we missed a few.

LL pointed out some scratches in the kitchen flooring.

LL complained that we hadn’t repainted, even though we were told not to.

Basically, he nit-picked the entire unit for over an hour.

The landlord wanted to send her a bill.

LL left me a voicemail later that day saying he was not only withholding my entire $600 security deposit, he’d be billing me for an extra $300.

I was livid.

He’d also gone ahead and decided to charge me for the 4 days I lived in the unit for the month of July.

After several years of tenancy with no problems, I was getting a bill for $975?!

I don’t think so, scooter.

She knew the law was on her side.

So, now that I was working in property management, I knew a skoach more about how the laws work, and I wasn’t going down without a fight.

I pulled out my lease and noticed two glaring mistakes: #1: LL didn’t tell me where my security deposit was being held and #2: he didn’t give me a move-in condition checklist.

According to the law, without those, I was owed my entire security deposit back.

And, legally speaking, without the move-in checklist, the lease was null and void, nor was he allowed to collect a security deposit from me.

I sent him a very professional letter outlining how I had enjoyed my tenancy, but I didn’t feel the $975 charges were correct.

I included screenshots where he’d said not to worry about the carpet & rent.

I outlined the specific statutes that he was in violation of, and offered to call it a day if he agreed to have no balance owing from either party.

Armed with the law, I expected him to take it and go.

The landlord tried to ask for even more money.

Nope. He doubled down.

Not only was he not going to take it, he wanted me to pay an additional $50 to add my SO to the lease…after the fact.

He claimed to be exempt from the laws, (I had triple checked- he wasn’t.)

His voicemail was pretty nasty, but I will give him credit for the inventive cursing.

Okay, you piece of cow spooge, let’s play.

I wrote back reiterating my points, and pointed out that due to the fact that he owned more than 4 properties, he was not exempt.

I pointed out that should he attempt to run a background & credit check (as he’d implied) without my SO’s express written consent, he’d be in violation of federal laws to boot.

It’s time to go to court.

Response: I’ll see you in court. (In a much more profanity-laden way.)

Yeah, you will. But you ain’t gonna like it.

So, I filed in small claims court for the balance of my deposit. He filed a countersuit for $975. A court date was set.

Court date comes, and he shows up smugger than Dracula working in a blood bank. He think he’s gonna win this easy-peasy.

The landlord tried to discredit the evidence.

I presented my letters to the court, which again- had screenshots.

He claimed that those could’ve come from anyone.

I offered to call the number on the text messages with the judge watching.

He backed down.

The landlord was caught in his lies.

LL proceeded to tell the judge how I never paid on time (wrong) and how I had trashed the unit.

Judge pointedly asked him why, if I was such a bad tenant all those years, he’d never evicted me.

LL didn’t have an answer.

I reiterated to the judge that I had offered to simply zero out the balance and had not wanted to go this route, but the law was pretty black and white.

She wasn’t done getting revenge.

I was awarded my security deposit plus filing fees, his suit was dismissed entirely.

He…didn’t take it well. He called the judge and I crooks, which didn’t faze either of us in the slightest.

There were some other choice words, but he shut up once the judge told him, in a nutshell, to quit throwing a tantrum.

Now for the pro part: Afterwards, I looked up his construction firm online with the Department of Revenue and found his insurance-and ergo his license-had lapsed.

LL had brought up in passing when I gave him my notice to vacate that he had won a bid for a City job.

Without his insurance, he wasn’t legally able to bid on constructing a urinal, much less a City gig.

This is the real revenge…

I anonymously reported him to the City, and he was unable to even start the million dollar gig, which he was banking on to pay for the mortgages on his properties.

The City went with another contractor.

Last I saw, the property was in foreclosure.

Had he just accepted my initial offer or the judges’ verdict, I wouldn’t have bothered.

But no, he had to throw a tantrum and act like a child.

It’s a good thing she moved. The landlord was a complete liar.

I’m glad the judge saw through him.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story…

This reader wants to know more about move-in checklist rules.

Another reader wants to know if the landlord found out she reported him to the City.

This renter can relate to this story.

Another renter is pretending this is the same landlord.

Here’s the perspective of a landlord…

Landlords really need to know the rules.

And be committed to following them.

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.