Any advice on taking landlord to small-claims over unfair cleaning charge?

Well, as always, it comes down to what YOU want to do.

Is it worth it to you on a level of stress, court dates, negative communications and being obsessed with the issue, perhaps for months until a court date?

I agree with the principal of taking a stand against fraudulent behavior, but, on the other hand, I always look at the emotional ‘cost’ of pursuing something in how it effects my well being.

I know you don’t buy into this concept, but, karma will get her one way or another, eventually. Call it cause and effect.

You need to decide if you want to be the effect and what that will mean to you.

@Coloma, remember who you’re talking to here, re: emotional stress. I mean I argue on the Internet as a hobby. :)

@Qingu

Haha..touche…well then, guess yer up to the challenge. Sic ‘em boy!

@Qingu, have you checked to see what the landlord/tenant laws are in your area? Was the deposit held in an interest bearing account? Some states require that. The first mistake you made was not being present when she did the final walkthrough. Ask her to do another walkthrough with you present. Also, tell her that you need an itemized list from the cleaning service for the work they performed and the final bill. Explain that this is being used in reference to the dispute and your attorney requested the itemized statement.

@bkcunningham, the deposit was held in an interest bearing account. She e-mailed a list of things she thought needed cleaning, which I disputed in an e-mail back. She said she’d give us an itemized bill for cleaning. I expect this will devolve into her taking the bill out of our deposit, and then me filing the claim.

I’ve looked at the laws and if I have proof that the apartment was in bad shape when I got here (and I do) I think I’m in the clear.

Also, we did request a walk through, though it was a little last minute. I think she acted in bad faith though, since she did not call us to complain immediately after doing the walkthrough; she waited until the next day and simply notified us we would be billed. But I think that’s a tangent; the basic problem is that we left the apartment clean by any standard, and much cleaner than we found it, and she shouldn’t be able to charge a cleaning bill for that.

Sounds like a perfect opportunity to meet Judge Judy.

I think you should definitely pursue this further. Is there any chance of including other past tenants whom she may have defrauded similarly?

Are your friend reluctant about your use of other emails which you gleaned from her emails to you. It’s certainly not illegal since the oversight was hers. It’s not like you’re using them to send out spam advertisements for penis enlargements or something. It seems like a perfectly legitimate use to me.

You never know how many of them have had similar experiences with her acting in bad faith and would be delighted to help out in seeing justice done.

And if there might be one or two who are less than thrilled with being contacted, perhaps you could add a little paragraph stating that this will be the only communication which they will ever receive from you unless you hear from them to the contrary. You just might be pleasantly surprised by how many will be delighted and offer their support or request an update.

Who knows, you may just be the agent of karma for what seems like long overdue consequences for her.

I’m sure she will be surprised that someone had enough foresight to take “before” pictures. This removes it from the realm of merely the he said/she said type of scenario upon which she had counted on in the past. Good for you.

I would leave past tenant out of it.

Organize your material and your points.

1. Apartment was not well cleaned when you moved in. Show photos to prove that.

2. You left apartment in immaculate condition. Show photos to prove that.

3. She is charging for wear and tear.

4. She has a history of doing this.

The only legal hurdle to clear is “preoponderance of the evidence”. You already have that with your documentation of the “as received” and “as left” photos documenting the condition of the apartment at both turnovers (to you and from you). Emails and other back-and-forth communication are over the top and unnecessary (the kind of distraction that just eats time and adds to the “drama” on those boring television small-claims court shows.

Here’s a question for you, though: How can you prove that the “before” and “after” pictures are really “before and after” and not “after and before”? In other words, what evidence will show that you took the “before” photos before you moved in, and that the “dingy appearance” isn’t what you left behind? Show me that as the judge and you win the case on the spot.

I’m confused… you want to sue your landlord because she’s asking you to pay for cleaning? What, exactly, would you be suing for? Injunctive relief?

You mention a ”$100 cleaning bill”. Are you certain it’s not worth simply paying that versus all the trouble and hassle of a courtroom dispute… which you risk losing in any case?

And also, you might want to consider what this might mean for your credit history. Your landlord can easily report that as unpaid debt… which likely will mean difficulty for you when trying to prove good faith in another lease agreement. That could lead to providing a higher security deposit, more expensive rent, or simply having a hard time finding a landlord to accept your application in the first place.

Is this a battle you really want to choose to fight?

@CWOTUS, I don’t actually have “after” photos, unfortunately.

The Before photos are timestamped on our phones.

@robmandu, I would be suing if she takes the cleaning bill out of our security deposit. Though actually I don’t know if “small claims court” counts as suing.

I’m aware of the risks but I’m pretty sure we can win. I think the only reason landlords get away with this is because nobody ever takes the (considerable) time and effort to challenge them.

Can you provide us with the contractual terms of your lease agreement that explain your responsibility for cleaning as it pertains to the security deposit?

We cleaned it according to the contract and left it much cleaner than when we found it.

From the limited experience I’ve had with small claims, winning the case is one thing and collecting from the other party is quite another. Basically you have no help doing that, and if they decide not to pay up, there’s nothing you can do. So you might prove your point and uphold the principle without seeing the results in dollars. Just a factor to consider.

Is it for $100, @Qingu. I mean, I understand the principle and all that, but was it clean to my standards. I’m pretty clean. Did she do a white glove test?

I’m with @Jeruba on this one. I’ve been personally involved with two different small claims court cases, both were won by the plaintiff and money awarded, but not one cent was ever collected.

A collection agency wanted to buy the rights to the court award of several hundred dollars less than one hundred.

Is she saying she is going to withhold the money from your deposit? What state are you in?
Did you also take pictures of the condition you left it in as well as the condition you received it in?
Haven’t read the other answers yet, but here is the scoop as I know it. (I’m a Landlord in California.)
The photographic evidence (if you have both move in and move out are great.)
If you rent from a management company, go to the local hall of records and find out the name of the owner. Make sure you have the owner served as well as the Landlord. The Owner pays the management company so they won’t have to deal with this kind of petty stuff. Chances are, the management company will pay you off just to keep the owner from having to appear in court.
What it really comes down to is a crap shoot. Can you convince the owner that you left it cleaner than you found it, and what kind of mood is the judge in.
It’s best to just present provable facts and not get emotional when in the court room.
Good luck. If the truth is on your side, then by all means go for it. It is managers like this that make the rest of us look like Snidely Whiplash!

(OOPs, I said ”if you can convince the owner….” instead of “If you can convince the judge.” to late to edit. sorry.

^Agree with @Judi (I’m a property manager in WI).

I’d like to say further, if you really did clean @Qingu, it doesn’t look good for her to not have come to a walk thru with you at the time you turned in your keys. Here in WI, the judge would most likely rule on the side of the Tenant just due to that fact, alone.

Like @Judi said, if there is a separate owner, contact them. They will most likely drop this quickly. If not, and you are willing, go to small claims.

My first apartment I had a 1 yr lease but it had fleas that were attacking me. I called the landlord who said they sprayed it while I was at work but for some reason they were still there. This went on for a few months before I ended up going to my sisters because it kept getting worse. I ended up finding a new place and gave my notice and moved out. The landlord then expected me to pay for a few months rent plus clean up. I just refused to pay anything and they took me to small claims court and I stated my case to the judge explained why I left and broke the lease in full detail because I kept the dates of when I called. The landlord sent an attorney to plead their case but they neglected to tell the atty of the flea situation and when the judge asked if it were true about me calling abt fleas the atty had to go call them and then confirmed to the judge it was true. I got a letter a few weeks later saying I won the case. My advise is always take notes, dates and pictures if need be especially if you hear this type of thing is typical with a landlord. The landlord is expected to do reasonable cleaning and maintence of an apartment so if all your stuff was out of there and it didn’t have garbage all over they are expected to have a place given back to them with reasonable wear and tear. I would refuse to pay the $100 and let them take you to small claims court, if they took it from your security deposit then I would take them to court. Its one date not many and its just the judge, the landlord and yourself in a small private room. They hear both sides then send you their decision in the mail.

Good luck, I hate hearing about a landlord taking advantage of people. I know my last on may have been slow to fix things they were very nice people and didn’t try to take extra money from people. They also kept rents very low and never raised it in over 7 years even though with the prices of heat going up I expected it but it they didn’t. It was a very nice place in a great area but they own several properties and they were paid for long ago so all they expected were good tenants and if you were good to them they were good to you. So there are good landlords out there, you just have to look for them and when you do you stay there as long as you can. I had 2 apartments with these people a 1 bedroom and then when I needed it a 2 bedroom which was my last one I was in for 7 years the 1 bedroom I was in for 5 years all and all I was with them for approx 12 years and when I just bought my new home my landlord was very happy for me but sad to see me go.

The difference between @creative1‘s situation and yours is that they already have your money in the form of the deposit, which you’re hoping is returned.

Is the deposit more than $200? If so, I’d wait until I had my deposit back and they had actually taken the money from those funds. Saying you’ll take them to court now may cause them to hold the balance while it’s sorted out, which could take months.

I had a situation where we moved out of an apartment, cleaned, took pictures, and later received a notice that the carpet had to be replaced and they would be charging us for it (~$800). We had no pets, only a 1-year lease, and nothing notable happened to the carpet while we were there. After some research it seemed the carpet was due to be replaced anyway and they were just trying to offset those costs.

We had a letter drawn up by a lawyer friend stating that we didn’t believe anything was due and had evidence to support that. We took all the formal steps, used their letterhead, sent it certified mail, copied the property owner, etc. We never heard from them again and never paid anything.

Maybe something similar would be a better option than going straight to court?

I’ve also been to small claims court, won, received a judgement in my favor, and then had no way of collecting. It’s essentially your responsibility to track down the person the judgement is against, find something valuable that they own, then hire the court to come and confiscate their property and sell it if necessary. $100 probably won’t cover your costs, which says nothing of the time involved.

Principal is great, but you’ve got things to do.

@funkdaddy, I plan on waiting until we get the security deposit back to initiate court proceedings (and obviously I won’t if we get the whole thing back—only if she takes the cleaning bill out of it).

And thanks for the advice everyone. I know lots of landlords who are the salt of the earth. The fact that this is such a small bill makes me more mad, like it’s explicitly designed so that people will think it’s not worth the effort to dispute in court. If she thinks she can do this to us (we were great tenants) I’m sure she does it to everyone.

I don’t like that it happened to you @Qingu. Good luck. Take it as a lesson for future leasing. Always have an initial walkthrough with the landlord and a final walkthrough with the landlord. I hope you get the entire deposit back.

@bkcunningham thanks. But honestly, it’s not that big of a deal to me. I feel like I should do this for other tenants who have to deal with her scams.

Whatever outlet she used to advertise the place when you found it, @Qingu; or the place it is being advertised now, whould be where I voiced my complaints. Sorta like a complaint on ebay. You know word of mouth to warn others about bad business practices. Or letting someone on Craigslist or a local trading journal know that when dealing with specific businesses, caveat emptor.

I once found a website that rates doctors. And I voiced my concerns, after-the-fact, about this particular quack. I was one of about four complaints at the time. Word of mouth and telling people about this specific site, the complaints soon grew and he had to close one of his offices. (I wish he had just gotten some f-ing bedside manners, but that is neither here nor there.) I told him what I was doing and why. He apparently didn’t care.

If she held out my money, I’d let her know my dissatisfacation and that I was going to let others know her business practices. That may be more of a warning to others than a civil suit you may or may not win and others wouldn’t know about anyway. She’d probably pay you if she lost and keep on with her little underhanded operation.