Any landlords? Deposit deduction question.

[Justworkplease]

Any landlord that can maybe give me some advice? Having a hard time with my ex-landlord.

If you have a tenant leave your property and on inspection there are issues that require deductions from the deposit, do you give the tenant a breakdown of the deductions?
eg/ £50 cleaning, £50 broken X, £30 garden maintenance, £30 broken Y = £160 deduction.
or just “£160 deduction for breakages and cleaning/maintenance”?

Surely they go through TDS- landlords don't just get to deduct.

Deposit should be protected via the tenant deposit scheme , the landlord should put the claims in and you can dispute it if you feel it’s incorrect.

We provided a breakdown of what we were deducting (and went via TDS, obviously).

Deposit is definitely held in TDS 👍🏻 Property was let through a letting agent who have a property manager that look after tenants in situ. We had nothing but problems with the landlord and only stayed 6 months (month by month lease).

We requested our deposit release through TDS as instructed to do at the end of our tenancy. All inspections have been done and I’ve been sent a copy of the check out inspection inventory. I had an email from the property manager (24 days after inspection) to say LL wants to deduct £110 from deposit for “cleaning and maintenance issues”. I responded that day asking for a breakdown of the issues and charges. I called after not hearing anything for a week and was promised a return call with information but it didn’t happen. I’ve had another email back (2 weeks later) saying that he’s spoken to the LL and she’s advised it’s for “cleaning and garden maintenance”.

It’s not a huge amount off the deposit (deposit was £795) but while I’m happy to pay for any genuine issues caused by us, I refuse to pay any more money to her than is necessary.

There was a dusty windowsill and dust behind the bottom of the towel radiator in the bathroom that have just been missed when we were cleaning before leaving. These are documented on the check out inventory and I’m happy to pay for these issues However, there are no issues in the garden as far as we know so I refuse to pay for that without knowing what I’m paying for!

You should get a breakdown yes and the chance to dispute anything you think is unfair through whoever protects the deposit (I use the DPS). You don’t have to accept their deductions- if you dispute it they have to justify the costs to an impartial adjudicator

I'm a landlord and yes, if any deposit is withheld I have to give a detailed breakdown and run it past my agent and tenant first, to make sure everyone is in agreement.

It's very detailed ie £10 replacement cooker switch (yes, they removed and list a switch off a brand new cooker), £10 broken electricity socket, £100 professional cleaning eith photo evidence of it being left clearly very dirty etc.

I hear lots about landlords always keeping some of the deposit but I do it very rarely and I'm sure my agent would prefer me not to. They seem quite reluctant to cause any deposit dispute.

There was a dusty windowsill and dust behind the bottom of the towel radiator in the bathroom that have just been missed when we were cleaning before leaving. These are documented on the check out inventory and I’m happy to pay for these

You 100% shouldn’t be paying a penny for that. I have only deducted for cleaning when it was filthy. I’m talking 2:hrs to clean the fridge filthy. Remediating what you describe would take seconds and £0 for the landlord. There’s no way TDS would allow a deduction for that.

Dust does not count as dirty.

When I insisted on a professional clean, there was 3 years worth of built up limescale around the taps, dirty marks on the carpet, mildew on the bathroom ceiling (because they never wiped it clean or opened the window to air the room), watermarks all over the new kitchen work tops, as well as all the normal hoovering and dusting. It took a very efficient, professional cleaner 5 hours to sort out and I ended up still doing some extra cleaning myself before the new tenants moved in.

A bit of dust really wouldn't even be noticed.

You need to ask for an inventory of costs and how much cleaning the 2 dusty areas cost and the time taken.

Yes you need a breakdown and then you can dispute it. Deposit schemes are very fair. I helped a friend dispute a £900 deposit deduction claim and got back every penny.
They can't claim for dust!

Helped my friend claim her deposit back via the DPS dispute scheme. She was LL and the tenant left the house in such disarray with lots of damage, refused to do a joint inspection on check out etc. We had to do a very very detailed report, prove that it wasn't 'fair wear and tear' and that the damage was caused by the tenant.

You should 100% query this. Especially as you have the check out report stating that everything is fine (ignoring the dust, no sensible deposit scheme would deduct for dust). These schemes were put in place to protect the tenants, just to back and refuse the release to the LL and state that if your full despising isn't returned, you insist on disputing. Sounds like the LL is changing their arm because the dispute process takes some time.

Thanks for your replies, they’re really helpful. As I said, we had nothing but problems with the landlord so it doesn’t surprise me that this is no different.

We actually didn’t get our keys until 2 days after our tenancy started as she was staying there at the time and hadn’t yet vacated the property herself to allow the inventory to be done 🤯 so we payed from the 1st and didn’t get keys until the 3rd. On arriving at the property it was FILTHY. Food on the kitchen floor, fridge was disgusting, food splatters all up the cupboard doors, no cupboards wiped out, bathroom hadn’t been cleaned.

I reported every issue on our check in inventory and emailed a complaint to the property manager. The landlord “didn’t agree that the property was left dirty” but could arrange for a cleaner to come within 3-5days. By this point we had already had to deep clean the place to allow us to move in.

We had a property inspection with an independent clerk about 2 weeks before we handed in our notice. The landlord insisted on being there too. She asked our permission to have her own gardener that she likes to use take over the maintenance of the garden. We had maintained it (weeded, cut grass, cut hedges) but hadn’t pruned plants etc to the way she likes them kept. We agreed that we were happy for him to take over care of the garden and would allow him access. The landlord made it clear that she would organise this. I only have this as verbal (although the independent clerk was there and may be able to back us up) but I hate that she’s now trying to bill us for maintenance of the garden when she asked our permission to have someone else take over it 🙄

The thought of going through a dispute and having to keep going back and forth with her is awful but at the same time, I just can’t bring myself to give her a penny more then she deserves!

Push back, you should be able to take it to adjudication and in all likelihood they will find in your favour.

Others might know better than me, but I would want to detail the state you found the property in in relation to minor dust on leaving.

I agree with the PP, landlord can't deduct for costs they haven't actually incurred. Take it to the deposit scheme - they always err on the side of the tenant and landlords can only defend what they can prove they've paid for.

I'm a LL, I only ever deduct bare minimum and that's only if I've genuinely incurred that cost, and in which case I give a full breakdown.

Deposit scheme will sort you out.

I'm so sorry you've experienced such an awful landlord, it's not fair at all :(

If you have a copy of the check out report then it should say in there what the deductions are for/point out the difference in check out/check in report

We moved out this year and our deposit was protected . Landlord tried to deduct so much of the deposit for removing a tv bracket and repairing the wall after this luckily I had a copy of the check in inventory which proved the bracket was indeed installed by last tenant . They also tried to charge us for cleaning carpets with no proof this was actually done . Landlord actually marketed and sold the house with us as tenants and we knew from our old neighbours that no work was done after we moved out except landlord going the next day to pick up ladders etc they had left . Had to take deposit to dispute resolution and getting more than 2/3 of it back but it’s so bloody long each stage takes so many working days .
on a related note but slightly different I think the deposit situation is awful in terms of how long the process is to get it returned especially at the moment when every penny counts .

Thanks @Setyoufree 😊 I know there are loads of great landlord out there - unfortunately we just seemed to end up with a terrible one 🙈 luckily for us it was only ever meant to be a temporary situation but we had to leave earlier than we had planned as she was just awful (turning up unannounced and letting herself in 🙄😬 taking a horrendous length of time for basic but important repairs etc.)
Im happy to pay for anything that we actually caused or whatever but I’m just not happy to line her pocket for nothing. I’ve asked for a full breakdown of costs and said that if I can’t be provided with this then I’ll be referring it to the deposit scheme and it can be looked into by them

We were told £100 would be deducted. Asked why, told the windowsills were dusty. Pointed out that would be 10 hours of a cleaner's time. Where was the invoice from the cleaner? They dropped the request. Landlords are still used to the good old days of automatically keeping part of the deposit.

@Scrabble I did wonder about this. This is the first time she has let it using a letting agent. She has let it out for about 7 years prior to us being there and always just did it all herself so I’m not sure how “official” things were. We only found out after meeting the neighbours that all previous tenants had left because of her 😬

Ours tried to claim for a load of stuff including marks on the carpet and hooks put up in the cupboard. None of which had been done by us. Thankfully it was after TDS came in so we rejected their claim, the TDS went back to LL for proof of claim and costs incurred. LL didn't bother replying (presumably as zero evidence or costs!) so deposit eventually reverted back to us.

Really annoying as we had to wait weeks for it to come back.

Just an fyi you can claim for cleaning required on a property and don't need to provide proof of invoice. Evidence that it's an acceptable cost is all that's needed so even if that's in the form of a quotation received. Landlords are also allowed to claim for their own time if they cleaned the property themselves or done any works needed, again provided It's a reasonable amount.

Used to work as a letting agent

Thanks @willithappen. I’m not sure if you’d be able to answer but based on your past experience does £110 deduction seem reasonable for the following:

• dust on spare bedroom windowsill
• dust behind towel radiator in bathroom
• back garden hedge not trimmed (hedge about 1.5mx1.5m and only 1 side of it belongs to the property - other side is neighbours.)

Those 3 points are all that are raised on the check out inventory report. I’m being billed for “cleaning and garden maintenance” but LL is refusing to give a breakdown of costs.

The only thing I'd look at would be the costs for the hedge trimming. It's certainly not reasonable costs for two places of dust.

Has this gone through the deposit scheme or has landlord just verbally said these to you? It will need to go through deposit scheme, at which point you can reject the claims and your landlord will have to provide the breakdown of costs to the scheme if they want to reclaim any costs. They'd need to provide the quote/invoice for hedge trimming and the minimal cleaning

(In my experience as a letting agent we'd likely advise landlord not to bother with the cleaning part - our inventory clerk would probably have dusted those two areas off herself when doing the report for all the time it takes)

See if you can contact a gardener and get a quote based off an image of the hedge on roughly how much they'd be to trim it

Thank you 👍🏻 We’re in Scotland so the deposit is held with My Deposit Scotland. There is a property manager at the letting agent so this information is coming to us through him and he is liaising with the landlord.

Verbally at a property inspection in August the landlord (who insisted on being present along with the independent clerk doing the inspection) asked if we’d be ok with her having her own Gardner that she liked using take over maintaining the garden (she lived there just prior to us moving in and is incredibly picky about the garden - she left me a document 2 sides of A4 long detailing every plant and shrub and exactly how they need to be maintained 😬). We agreed that we’d be fine to give him access and that’s the last we ever heard so we were under the impression that we were no longer to deal with the garden. This was only 6 weeks before we moved out. Just to add - the garden has absolutely NOT been left in a state or anything. The garden is done to what I would consider to be a normal standard, especially given the fact we moved out in October so there’s not much more growth now - she just likes things done VERY specifically in the garden.
The original tenancy agreement states that hedges should be cut twice per year. We lived there for 6months and it was cut twice during this time as it was right over the spring/summer.

I'm also Scotland so that's great!

Yeah, so I'd respond to letting agent saying you don't agree to the claims. I would also go to My Deposit Scotland and start the return proceeding yourself (if you haven't already). This should kick start a 30 working day time period in which the landlord and letting agent need to respond. So you put your claim in for the return of full deposit. Letting agent will then put their claims in if they decided to go ahead.
Once they do this you can dispute the claims. It should then go to dispute resolution (although these schemes like to try have landlord and tenant try resolve themselves first).
If it doesn't get resolved then you and the landlord will have to put in your 'evidence'.
Unfortunately a verbal agreement won't go down too well with the gardening. I'd add it in, but any adjudicator will look at what the tenancy agreement states only. If you have any evidence of it being trimmed then add that in, as well as any photos you might have of the property when leaving.
They will ultimately look at what tenancy agreement states.

They are quite good and look at what is reasonable and expected of a tenant and in this case I don't think any of these are reasonable to expect you to do.

It might annoyingly take a bit of time but I would dispute all the claims. Start the return proceeding now yourself :)

Don't even talk to the landlord just request the full amount through your deposit scheme. The landlord then puts what they want. If there's a discrepancy they will deal with it. I wouldn't even get into a discussion about it directly with them. The deposit scheme will ask for before and after pictures and then decide if it's wear and tear or not