Caution - words:

Okay, so we bought a house, terminated our lease in a condo early and paid the ETF. At the condo, we paid a pet deposit of $250 and a regular security deposit of $100.

Upon move in, the carpet was REALLY old and worn very thin. The tack strips were coming trough on the stairs and around places where tack strips exist in traffic areas, ie where carpet met linoleum. We marked this on the form they give you when you first move in to note issues.

So my wife's cat didn't like a closed door and would paw underneath a bedroom door and it tore a hole in the carpet there. Ordinarily we'd expect to have to pay for this, but since the carpet was so old and it needed to be replaced anyway we didn't think much of it.

Now we get a bill for over $1200 to replace the carpet.

Okay, so realize we're liable for the holes, but from what I can figure according to the law, we're only liable for the "lost life of the carpet". IOW, if the carpet is expected to be good for 5 years, and it had been replaced 3 years ago, we'd be liable for 2/5 of the cost of replacement. According to neighbors the people who lived there before us were there for something like 7 years without the carpet being replaced and we were there for 3.

So I sent a certified letter to the landlord stating that we would be willing to pay for the fraction of the cost of replacement of the carpet for any lost life left from a 5 year lifetime on it and requested copies of the receipt from the last time it was replaced and from the current replacement.

Does this sound reasonable?

TL/DR - Landlord wants full replacement cost of really old carpet, we only want to pay for any lost life. Reasonable?

[Edited on May 24, 2011 at 5:25 PM. Reason : *]

5/24/2011 5:21:22 PM

Unless they have pictures of before and after I wouldn't give them anything but that's just me. Anything covering any of this at all in your lease?

5/24/2011 6:41:27 PM

It's my understanding that in most states, the landlord can only charge you for damage done. And you are correct, he can only ask you for damage outside of normal wear and tear. If he had an old carpet when you moved in, he can't just charge you for replacement costs of a brand new carpet.

I highly doubt he will try to take you to court over this. However, you might have to take him to court to recover your security deposit.

Did he give you a list of everything that was wrong when you moved out, and a cost associated with it? Did his written reason for retaining your security deposit come in a timely manner?

In most cases, the burden of proof is going to be on your landlord. Use this to your advantage if you end up in court. He's a dumbass if he thinks he can walk into a court room with a receipt for a 7+ year old carpet, and expect to get replacement costs.

5/24/2011 7:40:55 PM

^^ No pictures that I know of. Lease is a standard lease in that it's vague.

^ I doubt they'll want to go to court over it too. And really, they can keep the $100. The pet deposit was non-refundable.

They did list off that the screens were damaged and there was some damage to a window sill. Both of those were accurate, along with the $1200+ for the carpet were listed. One thing they did screw up is they hadn't credited for the ETF we'd already paid, so I listed the check number, the amount and the date it cleared from my account, as well as the picture of the cancelled check from my bank in my response.

Timely manner... Well it was about 2 weeks after we moved out. We received it on the 13th. We tried to just call them to talk about it. Made several calls and got none returned until a VM that said "Put it in writing." In their letter, it said we had 15 days to either pay all of this or have it reported as a bad debt to the credit bureaus. I sent our response certified with signature receipt on the 21st and they got it on the 23rd.

5/24/2011 8:57:38 PM

the exact same thing happened to me when i bought my house. yes, they will report it to the credit agencies if you don't pay it. i ended up having to pay because i didn't want to take the hit on my credit.

(it was lake johnson mews... they did a bunch of other shit to screw me over... also the apartment complex that towed all of the cars during spring break to pave the parking lot and refused to reimburse the people when they got back.)

[Edited on May 24, 2011 at 9:01 PM. Reason : ]

5/24/2011 9:00:57 PM

$1200???

if you're already closed on the house, let the hit come. how bad could it be? how exactly would this show up on your credit i wonder.

sounds like you did the right thing by sending the certified letter and asking for more information.

5/24/2011 9:54:35 PM

Don't accept the hit on your credit. Make him file for it. Contest it with the credit companies. Don't just roll over and accept it, make him fight for it. You're in the right here, so don't let him take advantage of you. I do think you'll have to live with not getting your security deposit back.

5/24/2011 9:57:24 PM

Yeah I'll contest anything like that. And I've been told to talk to a lawyer about a lawsuit if they do fuck with my credit.

I haven't gotten a response just yet, but I'm expecting it anytime. We'll see what they say.

5/26/2011 9:41:36 AM

Quote :

"how exactly would this show up on your credit i wonder. "

The landlord can go to court and get a judgement against you.

5/26/2011 10:19:01 AM

^ yep. He also can file a lien against your house, which is ridiculously easy to do in NC.

North Carolina tenant law states you are only responsible for damages beyond normal wear and tear. Print out article six of the Landlord and Tenant General Statutes, highlight section 42-52, and mail that to the jerk.

5/26/2011 11:08:47 AM

The only thing I'm really not too sure on is where did you get the carpet service life of 5 years from? Id explain that portion in a letter to him but remind him that you were willing to pay for any small damage you acknowledge. Everything else looks righteous on your end.

5/26/2011 8:00:52 PM

^ I just looked online for the average life of apartment grade carpet. Found a few court cases where it was accepted as 3-5 years. One said 5-7. In my response to them, I split the difference and said 5 years.

Got the response from them yesterday. They said "while we do not think that allowing a pet to tear a hole in the carpet is normal wear and tear, we will revise the charge related to the carpet to one year of life at $237.42". We never said in our letter that it was normal wear and tear, we just questioned whether there was enough prior normal wear and tear that they would still be liable for replacing the carpet themselves.

Regardless, we're going to just pay the $237.42 and call it a day. I'm pretty sure I could still press the issue, as they did not include any copies of receipts, so it's likely they couldn't prove that the carpet wasn't already 5+ years old, or 5000 years old for that matter, but if we did wind up in small claims court for such a small amount, I'd lose more money than I gained by having to take time off from work.

So it all worked out reasonably well. I'm quite certain that they send these letters out asking for full replacement cost to anyone and everyone and bank on the fact most people don't know the law and aren't going to be bothered to look it up. One half an hour research session and writing a quick letter saved me $1000.

5/27/2011 11:33:26 AM

Quote :

"but if we did wind up in small claims court for such a small amount, I'd lose more money than I gained by having to take time off from work."

You have to remember that they are saying the same thing.

That being said...you're probably doing the right thing.

5/27/2011 11:41:34 AM

He's not doing the right thing -- he's getting bullied.

They knew the law and still tried to get him to pay the price for a new carpet. Their demonstrated behavior was to suck as much cash out of him as possible before he left.

It was not good faith behavior.

5/28/2011 10:27:03 AM

My girlfriend and I moved out of our apartment the day after the Spring semester ended. A friend of ours was planning on moving out of her house and we were going to sublet for 2 months before moving in. At least that was the plan. The property manager of the house decided to go behind our backs and show the house to another tenet, fully aware that my girlfriend and I were planning to move in. We found out about this the day we were going to move in. Our old lease was terminated and everything was in boxes when we found it. We just moved into the subletted house 3 weeks ago and now we have to move again in 2 more weeks.

6/12/2011 4:58:20 PM

Quote :

"just pay the $237.42 and call it a day"

This is the easiest route definitely. I'd still report the issue actively.

6/20/2011 1:55:34 AM

I guess the question they are going to raise is who decides when a carpet is really end of life?

They are going to argue that the carpet was not in need of replacement until your cat worked it over. Can you prove that is was going to be replaced even if your cat did not tear it?

A cat clawing the carpet is not normal wear and tear....it is damage. Normal wear and tear is the breakdown of the carpet under normal usage.

Another defense might be if the damage was only in one room, only one room needed to be replaced. If they decided to do it all at once that's on them. You should only be billed for the part that was actually damaged by your animal.

7/17/2011 12:27:19 AM

Just curious-- is the landlord Jerry Hailey?

7/21/2011 6:50:41 PM

Can the apt people charge you to clean it?

7/23/2011 10:33:14 AM

So let's say for sake of argument the life of carpet is 5-7 years, and you move in on year 8. Also, let's say that the landlord has taken really good care of the carpet, and it is in very good shape despite its age. Does that give you the right, as a tenant, to do anything you want to that carpet? Could you let animals chew it and pee on it, could you extinguish cigarets on the carpet, could you leave semen stains everywhere.... and not expected to get charged anything?

This is just a hypothetical.

7/30/2011 8:19:17 PM