What is the name of your state? Arizona
We moved here 28 months ago and were renting a house. About halfway through our year's lease we started looking into buying a house. Our LL wanted us to buy the house we were renting and we actually discussed this with them however they wanted us to pay for the appraisal that would have been necessary to even decide if we wanted to do it. Also, after looking at the home with an eye towards ownership we decided that with the owner's asking price and all the repairs and upgrades needed. we'd be better off buying new.
4 months before our lease was up we let our LL's know this and we had already put a downpayment on a home to be delivered around Christmas (this is a Manufactured home on four acres). During our build period, Katrina hit and set up back enough that we didn't close on our house until the end of March. (When hurricane's hit and do the damage Katrina did, all manufactured home places in the country stop ordinary builds and do nothing but build manufactured homes for FEMA)
At the time of informing landlord of our decision to not remain in the home, needing to stay past the end of our lease though, everyone agreed we would go month to month until we closed on our house and moved.
Once we were given a firm delivery date on our home I gave 60 days written notice to the landlords, paying the rent through 15 April, giving us nearly a month to move things.
In this time, I became ill and my ability to do things was greatly reduced (this is kind of a digression but I am forestalling some inevitable questions) therefore when the 15th rolled around, I had to call the LL to ask if we could pay an additional weeks rent in order to get carpet cleaners into the house. They refused to allow us to bring carpet cleaners in, saying we damaged the carpet and they needed the proof. I talked to the tenant that lived there before us and they told us the carpet was in bad shape before they moved in and that a good cleaning took care of it for them. Before our moving in, the carpet was 6 years old and had been through several tenants, one of them described as "the tenant from hell" who ran a cocaine business out of there, having a closet filled with garbage and dirty diapers before disappearing into the night.
Also, another point to mention is that there was a window in the front of the house which the former tenant tells me fell out on them while they lived there and the LL fixed it himself with caulk. While we were living there, the LL waited several days to fix the window following my informing him it was leaking. Due to the leaking windown, unbeknownst to me due to infrequent use of the item, rain water damaged my Bose radio which sat on the table in front of the window. I was changing the towels in the window several times a day due to it being monsoon season but for some reason it didn't occur to me to move the radio. The cost to replace this radio is $300 and to repair is $150 (I'd rather repair since I inherited this from my mother when she passed October 2004) While this might seem random at this time, I'm hoping my inclusion of this nugget will become evident later.
Also, we added two small outbuildings to the property with the approval of the LL with his statement of, "We'll pay for the buildings when you leave." (I also have a letter from them stating their awareness of our move and the need to "come to terms" regarding the outbuildings.) The initial outlay of the buildings is $1250.00 where the LL helped us build one (a 12x12 metal shed from, Sears) and our building the other one from a kit bought at our local hardware store (a 12x12 wooden barn-like building).
When we moved onto the property, there was trash on the property due to other tenants and their piling trash towards the back of the property. There was also an old VW Beetle body lying on the property which the LL said belonged to him. On the day we were moving and turning over the keys to the LL, we had a trailer on our truck in order to take trash to the landfill, we were just trying to finsh up the cleaning of the inside, which was immaculate and better than when we moved in.
Also left behind were an old washer and dryer we brought in. The LL's told us they'd pay us $50 for them since they were in good working condition (We bought a brand new front loading set from Sears that was delivered to our new house).
Now we get to the crux of all this... On the last day the LL informed us we were responsible for all damage to the carpet, saying it had to be replaced and we were being held comletely responsible. We had a deposit down of $725.00 which they said they were keeping, as well as not paying us for the outbuildings they agreed to pay for (since they now had the keys, our lease was up, if we were to take them at this point, it would be theft) and they weren't paying us for the Washer and dryer to help offset all damages. They also said we were being held responsible for all the trash left behind when we had our trailer with us to clean it up and they refused to allow us to do so.
The only real damage left behind which we can honestly say was us was a hole in the drywall when someone sat down to hard in a recliner (which they told us to not fix either since they wanted to replace several drywall pieces in the house) and a dent on one of the awnings posts that we had received an estimate to repair. This happened on the day we packed when hubby backed into porch. We informed LL of our willingness to pay for both of these, totaling $125 (porch post $48, remainder to repair drywall)
I don't know we have any recourse here and I feel extremely taken advantage of. I could probably take them to small claims but I'm not aware of Arizona law related to tenants and being charged for damages such as a now eight year old carpet that has been through several tenants, one of whom ran a drug house there (the neighbors told us this, as did the landlord.) I feel this is their punishing us for not buying the house from them. They did seem rather put out that we chose to go another way but that's life and we bought a new house for the same cost as what they were asking for their 25 year old house.
I have several photos of the house after we emptied and cleaned it as well as the bad window which broke my Bose. I know someone is going to come back with, "Let it go and move on" which some people would be willing to do but I am now disable and the money from the deposit would go a long way with us.
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post. I wanted to make sure all info was available.
We moved here 28 months ago and were renting a house. About halfway through our year's lease we started looking into buying a house. Our LL wanted us to buy the house we were renting and we actually discussed this with them however they wanted us to pay for the appraisal that would have been necessary to even decide if we wanted to do it. Also, after looking at the home with an eye towards ownership we decided that with the owner's asking price and all the repairs and upgrades needed. we'd be better off buying new.
4 months before our lease was up we let our LL's know this and we had already put a downpayment on a home to be delivered around Christmas (this is a Manufactured home on four acres). During our build period, Katrina hit and set up back enough that we didn't close on our house until the end of March. (When hurricane's hit and do the damage Katrina did, all manufactured home places in the country stop ordinary builds and do nothing but build manufactured homes for FEMA)
At the time of informing landlord of our decision to not remain in the home, needing to stay past the end of our lease though, everyone agreed we would go month to month until we closed on our house and moved.
Once we were given a firm delivery date on our home I gave 60 days written notice to the landlords, paying the rent through 15 April, giving us nearly a month to move things.
In this time, I became ill and my ability to do things was greatly reduced (this is kind of a digression but I am forestalling some inevitable questions) therefore when the 15th rolled around, I had to call the LL to ask if we could pay an additional weeks rent in order to get carpet cleaners into the house. They refused to allow us to bring carpet cleaners in, saying we damaged the carpet and they needed the proof. I talked to the tenant that lived there before us and they told us the carpet was in bad shape before they moved in and that a good cleaning took care of it for them. Before our moving in, the carpet was 6 years old and had been through several tenants, one of them described as "the tenant from hell" who ran a cocaine business out of there, having a closet filled with garbage and dirty diapers before disappearing into the night.
Also, another point to mention is that there was a window in the front of the house which the former tenant tells me fell out on them while they lived there and the LL fixed it himself with caulk. While we were living there, the LL waited several days to fix the window following my informing him it was leaking. Due to the leaking windown, unbeknownst to me due to infrequent use of the item, rain water damaged my Bose radio which sat on the table in front of the window. I was changing the towels in the window several times a day due to it being monsoon season but for some reason it didn't occur to me to move the radio. The cost to replace this radio is $300 and to repair is $150 (I'd rather repair since I inherited this from my mother when she passed October 2004) While this might seem random at this time, I'm hoping my inclusion of this nugget will become evident later.
Also, we added two small outbuildings to the property with the approval of the LL with his statement of, "We'll pay for the buildings when you leave." (I also have a letter from them stating their awareness of our move and the need to "come to terms" regarding the outbuildings.) The initial outlay of the buildings is $1250.00 where the LL helped us build one (a 12x12 metal shed from, Sears) and our building the other one from a kit bought at our local hardware store (a 12x12 wooden barn-like building).
When we moved onto the property, there was trash on the property due to other tenants and their piling trash towards the back of the property. There was also an old VW Beetle body lying on the property which the LL said belonged to him. On the day we were moving and turning over the keys to the LL, we had a trailer on our truck in order to take trash to the landfill, we were just trying to finsh up the cleaning of the inside, which was immaculate and better than when we moved in.
Also left behind were an old washer and dryer we brought in. The LL's told us they'd pay us $50 for them since they were in good working condition (We bought a brand new front loading set from Sears that was delivered to our new house).
Now we get to the crux of all this... On the last day the LL informed us we were responsible for all damage to the carpet, saying it had to be replaced and we were being held comletely responsible. We had a deposit down of $725.00 which they said they were keeping, as well as not paying us for the outbuildings they agreed to pay for (since they now had the keys, our lease was up, if we were to take them at this point, it would be theft) and they weren't paying us for the Washer and dryer to help offset all damages. They also said we were being held responsible for all the trash left behind when we had our trailer with us to clean it up and they refused to allow us to do so.
The only real damage left behind which we can honestly say was us was a hole in the drywall when someone sat down to hard in a recliner (which they told us to not fix either since they wanted to replace several drywall pieces in the house) and a dent on one of the awnings posts that we had received an estimate to repair. This happened on the day we packed when hubby backed into porch. We informed LL of our willingness to pay for both of these, totaling $125 (porch post $48, remainder to repair drywall)
I don't know we have any recourse here and I feel extremely taken advantage of. I could probably take them to small claims but I'm not aware of Arizona law related to tenants and being charged for damages such as a now eight year old carpet that has been through several tenants, one of whom ran a drug house there (the neighbors told us this, as did the landlord.) I feel this is their punishing us for not buying the house from them. They did seem rather put out that we chose to go another way but that's life and we bought a new house for the same cost as what they were asking for their 25 year old house.
I have several photos of the house after we emptied and cleaned it as well as the bad window which broke my Bose. I know someone is going to come back with, "Let it go and move on" which some people would be willing to do but I am now disable and the money from the deposit would go a long way with us.
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post. I wanted to make sure all info was available.