So, my tenant serve me with paperwork that he wants me take me to small claims court over his $1200 security deposit, after all repairs were made, I gave him back $250, but he wanted pretty much all of it.
Could anyone tell me what to expect as I have never gone to small claims court before?
One thing that I'm concern is that I have the tenant the move-in inspection checklist and instead of having him sign the original with ink, I had him fax it to me. Not sure if that matter or not since he could just write all over it after he moved out, stating an item was already broken and basically lying in court.
I do have documentation and pictures as well and kept a pretty good log as to what happened.
Any information I could get would be greatly appreciated.
Rental Property Investor · Mercer Island, WA · Member since 2008 · 22k+ posts · 14k+ votes
13y
When I make deductions from the security deposit, I include copies of the actual receipts. I only deduct for money actually spent. I never charge a tenant for my time. Never. Maybe it would hold up, but I don't want to lose that argument and end up refunding triple damages for that. If I'm going to charge the tenant for painting, I hire a painter. If they're going to be charged for cleaning, I hire cleaners. If you're charging the tenant, say, $500 for 10 hours of your time, I think you're on very shaky ground in front of a judge. A judge could decide that was something you could have paid much less to hire someone to do. For example, the cleaners I use charge me $90 an hour for a three person crew. If they take two hours, its $180. If it took me 8 hours to do the same job, and I charged $50 an hour for my time, that would be $400. A judge may well completely disallow such a charge. If its double damages (that's what I read in Phillip Dwyer's link), that $800 you have to give back. OTOH, if you have $500 of receipts, you're on solid ground.
You got lucky. I am sure it wasn't intentional on your part, but you pretty much had the whole gougers checklist going there:
Calling wear-and-tear item damage? Check
Unreasonable number of hours for repairs? Check
Unreasonable hourly wage? Check
Yah I was thinking the same thing. Got lucky on this one, as many a judge would side with the tenant based on some of the items here depending on where you hail from.