This is total bullshit...

[blas]

So in the mail yesterday I got the notification from my previous landlord listing all the charges that they had totalled from the walk-out of the last apartment, basically everything that they had to replace and/or clean for us.

I am never renting from these idiots again. I lived in the fricken ghetto for 9 months, NOT the Hilton....

Bear in mind, I moved out June 1. My ex roomate either stayed a few extra weeks OR moved out right on June 30, the last day of the lease. I figured it was only fair that each of us be responsible for moving our own stuff out and cleaning HALF of the apartment ourselves. Considering ex roomate refused to get off the lease, he was responsible for something still!

They charged $28 for toilet cleaning. I bleached the toilet and cleaned the exterior of the toilet the day I moved out. Now, my roomate had to have stayed for at least a few weeks before the lease was up, and either he dirtied the toilet back up or it sat and accumulated dust and dirtied itself........Well JEEZ! I wish I could have gotten $28 every time I cleaned a toilet at all my last jobs!

They charged $20 to clean the bathroom floor. I SWEPT and mopped the bathroom floor the day I left. Again, either roomie stayed home for a while (maybe him and his gf got in a fight again for a few days?) or it dirtied itself after a few weeks.

They charged $45 to clean the tub and shower head. Again, I had cleaned both of those before I left. They were not dirty unless someone made them dirty!

They charged almost $100 total for cleaning the oven, the counters, the fridge, and the sink. Again, I CLEANED THOSE before I left! They also charged an extra $40 for "Food splatter" on the walls! Now out of the two of us, who do you think flings food at the walls?

It gets better.

My roomate must have moved all of his shit out and refused to do any cleaning at all, because there was over $200 in charges for the carpet. Now, he DID order carpet cleaning done, which was $109 (cheaper than I had originally thought), but here's the stupid part. My roomate REFUSED to vaccuum before he moved out. They charged EXTRA for vacuuming. Now who do you think is going to be blamed for that? Of course.....me..

To make matters worse, they put both of our addresses on the note. So now my roomate knows where I live and knows where to find me.

The charges exceeded the security deposit by a little more than $100. I am waiting, just waiting for the harrassing phone calls and maybe even the court papers from my ex roomate.

This is total bullshit and I am irate over it. I did my half and left the place as clean as I COULD before I moved out.......and he obviously figured he didn't have any responsibility in leaving it clean. So any charges acrued are on his shoulders, not mine.

Rrrr.....

[Crazeyal]

I even took pictures and they just shrugged thier shoulders and said they couldn't make out details. I got too busy to fight with them, but I FELT like going to court.

[myswtghst]

Gah. This is why I'm glad I live alone, but also not looking forward to moving out, as even though my complex does a generally crap job on maintenance, I know they're going to ask for every penny they can get when I move out. :p

I've already contemplated talking to my godfather, who owns a carpet company, about just replacing the carpet for me when I move out, as it would undoubtedly be cheaper/easier/more fair.

[Spiffy McMoron]

I sympathize. At the grey house that I rented with my friend, we had a damage deposit of $500. When we left, me, my buddy, and his girlfriend spent three striaght days cleaning that house--I doubt it's ever been that clean before or since. The other thing that was wrong with the house was a mysterious pink stain in the middle of the living room floor--and the professional steam-cleaners couldn't get rid of that. (Yes, the management company sent over a steam cleaner to clean the carpets. Not a big deal, except we were still cleaning up the freaking house at the time!)

How much of the damage desopit did we see from them? Not one red cent. And it wasn't like the money went to a contractor's salary or anything--trying to get those guys to come out to fix something was an effort in futility. Cheap bastards.

[digilight]

There are certain limitations to what they can charge you for, and how much (it is usually called "a reasonable amount"). Find out what your local laws entail.

My former boss was a landlord, both here in southern california and in oregon for many years. He told me that the laws are almost always in the tenents favor on these things.

Did you know that by law in some area's they can not charge you for the carpets after a certain number of years. In our area its three years.

And they have to give you an itemized accounting of where the money is going. They can't just say "cleaning apartment $500.00, the have to break it down and include hourly charges if required as well as receipts (if I remember right, they can't turn a profit on the cleaning/repairs.

[powerboy]

That is Bullshit. Just because your jerk of an Ex-Roommate, is an ass.

Now I have to clean tomorrow, now that it was mentioned.

[blas]

I spoke last night at work with some coworkers who have lots of experience with sucky landlords, sucky ex room mates, and one that went to court over excessive charges after moving out (and won!).

They weren't as helpful as I'd hoped, but one pointed out something very parculiar. If my ex roomate was being so overly frugal (ok, not frugal, fucking CHEAP) and refusing to pay bills and not wanting anything to be accumulating bill/charge wise while he was still on the lease (again, why the hell did he refuse to move out? We'll never know), you would have imagined he would have swallowed his pride and actually cleaned his heart out, to make cock sure that they wouldn't take any extra out of his precious security deposit. But no, it appears that either the place sat empty and dirtied itself OR he got angry with either me or his girlfriend or something or another and trashed the place before he left....

What the hell is his problem......oh well, I'll hear about it soon enough, and you guys will be the first to hear it!

Oh I might also want to mention, regarding how much landlords can charge.......on the list are the actual prices of what they charge to clean/repair/etc but of course underneath that it states "estimated cost" or something or another...meaning it will either be that price OR higher. Usually the latter I am assuming. The list is a page long of any little thing you can think of even down to spiderwebs. That's right. $38 per spiderweb. We got one of those, too. I had left it there because it was intertwined among my roomate's shoes. He could have done that himself.

There is a very small chance that all my roomate didn't do was vacuum but everything else was ok, and the landlords just went stir crazy and charged us everything they could think of....but I'm pretty sure my roomate left the place an added mess and the landlords took advantage of any little thing that wasn't perfect.

Because of course, considering my ex room mate and I were the only people in the building that actually had jobs (well it appeared that way considering our vehicles were the only ones that ever moved on a daily basis!), I probably shouldn't be TOO surprised that the charges were racked up so high and so unreasonable. He and I had (legitimate) jobs and (legitimate) money. It would be a sure thing that he and I HAD money available so they knew that they'd GET money from us. Other tenants like my neighbors who were dirt poor, on drugs and had no jobs.....they probably trashed their apartment beyond repair and they will never owe a penny because a) they have nothing that can be liquidated and b) what are the odds that the landlords will even locate them after moving away? People like that are always on the run from someone.

[LostMyMind]

I hope you took pictures before you left or did a walk through with them? Did they give you a list of what was "wrong" and needed to be fix after the walk-through?

My suggestion is to tell them to bleep off. I would bet that they're running up the charges just so you don't get your security deposit back.

[blas]

I moved out first, so I didn't do the walk thru. Very stupid of me. I should have known better. I'm not sure if it's required or not? I figured the last person out is the one who is responsible for the walk thru and the one who leaves it the way it was found when moving in.

I should have just done the walk thru, but do you think it would have made me look very mature to point at every little thing and say "It was him!" "It was him!" "That wasn't my fault!" I'm pretty sure if I saw the food splatter on the wall or the filthy bathroom I would have flipped out and make an ass of myself.

I don't think ex roomie did the walk thru. He would have protested every charge as well. He must have just altogether said the hell with it and just moved his shit out and left and let them have a hayday charging us.

[Kiwi]

I wonder if the landlords including both of your addresses on the notice is a violation of your privacy?

[blas]

It very well should be! I never wanted him to find out where I moved to.

I never told my roomate where I was moving and never gave him my address. I know if he really really wanted to find me, he could, but this way it would make it much more difficult and time consuming. And he'd give up before trying too hard.

But, now I know where he lives. If anything develops off of this, I know how to get a hold of him now as well.

I ain't scared, just really really pissed.

[blas]

BUMP!

Had to bump this one because there has been some breaking news.

So ever since last Wednesday, ex roomie has been calling me and leaving voicemails saying he wants to "talk". Now, bear in mind, I will not answer or return his call until he specifically says what about. So the sneaky bastard starts calling me from his gf's phone (I'm assuming it's hers, it registers as a number I don't know). Well I don't answer calls from unknown numbers either!

The reason I would not speak with him directly is because I was not about to waste any daytime minutes, let alone any time at ALL beating the already already already dead horse. We've had this conversation time and time again. He didn't live there, blah blah blah, but he wasn't ready to move out or get off the lease, but he still didn't want to pay any bills, etc etc etc......I didn't want to hear it again.

So it looks we only actually owe $40 from the security deposit that wasn't covered. I should have read the list better. They did not charge us for vacuuming (it said N/C next to it, I thought that meant "not clean" but my mother said it meant "no charge") so that knocked off about $90 or more.

So you'd think he could just swallow his pride and pay up the farking $40. Wrong. He left me a voicemail yesterday IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY WHILE I WAS SLEEPING, saying "Since you aren't answering your phone, I'll just let you know that in case you didn't already get it in the mail, YOU owe $40 to the old landlord."

So when I woke up I texted him "No, you owe them the $40 fucking dollars because you were the last one out and you refused to clean"

Then he said "If you're going to be like that, then you ALSO owe ME $225 for the damage to the garage, $210 for your half of the deposit...well hell, you might as well just reimburse me the ENTIRE security deposit since you actually lived there and I didn't and you left it a mess as well before you left and I cleaned up YOUR mess!"

Um no. The final bill for that apartment would not have been so expensive if he had truly cleaned like he said he did. And not to mention the damage to the garage, the landlords could NEVER prove it was us. He had no right to blame it on me OR demand I pay him back.

I also made a thread on this before about the security deposit. He moved in first. He paid it all. I moved in a month later. He said not to worry about paying him half, it was no biggie, he just needed a roomate to split the bills. Then 4 months later after he'd moved out to live with his gf and he started supporting her and her baby, he turns around and DEMANDS half the security deposit. Then he threatens to get off the lease and says I better get a new roomate. So I found a potential one. Then he says NO, he isn't moving out, he will NOT get off the lease, he isn't ready, and I can forget about the new roomate.

No way in hell is he getting any money from me. He will have to take me to court for it. He is not entitled to anything from me. Nothing was ever in writing saying I would, and he can't pretend I said it anyway because it's "hear/say".

It's too late to tattle on him for living with a person on welfare for free, but it's not too late to prove to a judge (I have over 20 witnesses) that he had minimal possessions at that apartment and was never there. I have proof that I was required to reimburse him for the cable and electricity after he threw the "I don't live here YOU PAY IT!" threat.

So I texted him back "Forget it, I'll just pay the $40 and be done with them and hopefully you as well."