Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in California

I signed a lease for an apartment on Friday, July 8, 2010 but I was not going to move in until July 10th and that was noted in my lease as the move in date. When I got home, I found out that I was approved for a senior community apartment that I had previously looked at. I tried calling the management office but the apartment manager had gone home early. I immediately took the keys back and dropped them in her mailbox slot. The Manager was off over the weekend but I managed to get ahold of her...she assured me there wouldn't be a problem. On her verbal okay, I put a deposit down on the senior apartment on July 9th. I called her again on Monday...she again assured me there was no problem. I heard nothing so last night I researched who managed the apartments and sent them an email asking when I could expect my deposit (I'm a senior living on Social Security and having 2 deposits on two apartments has left me with $30 in my bank account). This morning I received an email from a Secretary with the management firm and she told me that they are waiting on the Property Manager's review of my settlement statement before they can give me a refund. We emailed back and forth and now she's getting really nasty...reminding me that (1) they have 21 days to return my deposit and (2) I am liable for six months of rent. They did not hold the apartment for me for even one day AND there are no charges to be levied for cleaning or repairing any damage since I did not move even one thing in. As a matter of fact, I didn't see the actual apartment I was renting until the day I signed the lease (the previous tenants didn't move out until the 5th even though I was told they'd be out on the 2nd) and the apartment was horrible! There was a huge chunk of the kitchen counter gouged out (the manager admitted that her repairmen did it when he put a new stove in), there were huge, ugly gouges in the cupboards and the bathroom light was so dim that I literally could not have seen well enough to take a shower in there. When I pointed it out to the Manager, she said there couldn't be anything wrong with it or the previous tenants would have said something...as she said this, she was standing with me in the bathroom with the light on! Since I'm presently living in a horrible rooommate situation, I went ahead and signed the lease even though I had serious misgivings. How can I get them to refund my deposit quickly?


Asked on 7/18/11, 3:12 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Roy Hoffman Law Offices of Roy A. Hoffman

Unfortunately there is no way to "get them to refund [your] money quickly." Once you signed the lease you were obligated to pay rent for the entire time you agreed to lease the premises, and the landlord could sue you to recover that entire amount, subject only to their obligation to mitigate their damages. If you didn't get the management company's written agreement to terminate the lease and refund your deposit, you probably will not see much, if any, of that deposit refunded to you unless you have something in writing describing the damages that existed when you saw the apartment. Finally, they do have 21 days within which to refund the deposit to you or provide you with a itemized list of what they used the deposit for together with receipts.

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Answered on 7/18/11, 3:32 pm


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