Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Wisconsin

Your girlfriend's back and she wants her deposit back!

Landlord is not allowed to keep that deposit for two reasons, probably. Most states -- and I'm sorry but I don't know the law in your state -- have a statutethat covers this specifically and in many cases grantsa nearly automatic treble (old word for triple) damagesaward if you file suit (even in small claims court if you have one of that name, even if it exceeds the normal dollar limit)to penalize landlords who would routinely cause tenants to have to fight to get their money back. Check up on that andmaybe tell the landlord if you want to give him a shot at payingup.

The second reason is that landlords are not entitled to take a month'srent, say, just for the inconvenience of having to write up a leasewith a new tenant (which, by the way, can be considered an advantageto the landlord since it extends the lease and does so obviously by his preference -- he benefitted from this chicanery for sure). If he didn'tlose a month of rental (or even if he did but didn't have to because thenew tenant had been willing to come in on your girlfriend's lease), you should not lose the deposit.

There are "default" (if you like computer lingo) rulesabout subletting which require a landlord to give permission unless he has a good reason not to, which doesn't seem to be the case here. The good reasons, by the way, are not to include "can get a higher rent" or "can extend the lease". However, even so, he is apparently letting you out of the (remaining) lease so you don't really have any damages, do you? (Was your girlfriend planning tocharge HIGHER rent to the sublettor?) However, if there's any language about subletting in the lease, it would override the defaults;it may even prohibit subletting or it may say that it's allowed withthe landlord's written permission, in which case what he did is not atall illegal.

You might be better off justnot having an effective lease anymore, since, for example, if the sublettor were to have moved out prematurely, your girlfriend couldhave been back on the hook for the balance of the lease period; or ifthe sublettor damaged the apartment, ....

It's possible that the would-be sublettor wanted a new (longer) leaseperiod anyway and who knows who suggested this during their phone call.(I assume landlord was given her number and called her up before refusing to let your girlfriend sublet to her.)