Comment by drglitch | Hacker News Reader

Comment by drglitch | Hacker News Reader

Somewhat related: landlords in NYC have been pulling similar stuff on renters for years when they move out, often forcing people to leave thousands of dollars behind in forfeited security deposits due to "damages", because most people never put up a fight.

Two anecdotes from personal experience, both in rental buildings ran by large RE holdings mind you:

- a building claimed a scratched sink and subtracted $600 for replacement. After multiple discussions and a firm stance that I will pay it only if they provided me with physical scratched sink they've swapped out, the charge magically dropped to $70, as they "were able to polish out the scratches instead and there was a miscommunication with maintenance staff".

- another building claimed a vanity was destroyed by water and had to be replaced at a cost of a bit over $2,000. After multiple emails and threats to go to court, I've won. The key was showing them that EXIF data on photo "evidence" they sent me showed it was taken 3 months BEFORE i moved into the apt in question and also that the marble pattern on photos did not match several photos i've had of the bathroom of the apartment.

Similar stories happened with rental cars a few times.

Sadly, it's a lesson i've learned for life - whether its a rental car, apartment, or anything of value really, taking video evidence is almost necessary nowadays.

Rental cars is an interesting one. The Munich airport rental car companies contract with a third party in returns. Myself and a friend were both told by the rental companies that the third party is incentivized to come up with BA scratches, etc.

Being diligent is important. Pictures, notes, properly filled out forms.

I take pictures, insist on a walk-around, and insist the employee on the walk-around with me notes all observed defects.

Sometimes, they'll say "don't worry about it". I politely, hopefully somewhat adroitly and politically, insist.

In many situations, e.g. storm damage, I've taken to taking a bunch of pictures -- maybe also a video, in which all the observations "hang together" and have contemporary commentary.

I may never need to use this, but digital memory's cheap, these days, and it also saves me from worry about trying to recall details at a later date.

Just yesterday, I was looking in on an older artist friend who has a combination of care-givers and an handyman through the house on a daily basis. Part of one of her heavier, wall-mounted ceramics had crashed to the floor, with the top end leaning against the dining room table.

What happened? I'm not sure (the friend is confused, at times). But I grabbed my phone and took some pictures. The handyman probably has it cleaned up by now. But if something needs to be done -- even just an insurance claim, depending on the details of their insurance that I don't currently know -- I can supply the pictures.

On the other hand, I feel a bit at times like I'm expressing/demonstrating paranoia. And the whole "surveillance society" thing. I try to limit this to immediately relevant subjects/events, in my own life. Not "watching the neighbors".

A friend of mine had a similar problem. He leased a flat (New Zealand term for a rental of various sorts) and took photos of the place, including the thread-bare carpets. When he moved out, the landlord decided that they hadn't cleaned the place properly and wanted to charge them for it. Friend hired a carpet cleaner, and went back in, scrubbing every square centimeter of the place. Landlord insisted that it wasn't properly cleaned, so the Tenancy Tribunal got involved. In the end, the landlord took half the bond, and my friend got the other half of the bond.

The landlord still won.

When I vacate an apartment, I don't let my landlord keep the security deposit. I stop paying my last two month's rent--or whatever is equivalent to the security deposit. That way if he thinks I owe him money, he can come after me and take me to court if need be, instead of the other way round. I've been burned too many times.

Depending where you live, fraudulent charges against the security deposit can be very lucrative for an informed tenant - a bad faith charge against the security deposit opens the landlord up to treble damages.

Interesting, thank you for sharing. Regarding EXIF data, how did you prove you didn't fake it? Or did you have an email and have to show that the email attachment was the same file? (Did you have to prove the email was sent by their domain, with DKIM etc.?)

Deep into the dispute, the building's head of maintenance sent the "evidence" photos, which still had the metadata on them, along with lengthy email referring to photos, so there was no chance to contest that email was fake.

The moment i've pointed that out and threatened to bring up their fraud, they sent the check for full amount along with a note that "please consider this matter resolved from our side". I wish I had the time and energy to pursue the fraud further but never did so.

Wow! Yeah, no kidding... I would've wished I would've had the time and energy to pursue the fraud too. I'm glad you at least caught it... most people wouldn't even know about EXIF data, let alone think to check it. I hope they don't keep doing what they did to you to other tenants...

While application fees are non refundable, they do cut this sort of crap out. Plus it's way less then a security deposit. I can walk away without worries and they only have the 500 I put up originally.

> While application fees are non refundable, they do cut this sort of crap out. Plus it's way less then a security deposit.

Application fees and security deposits (and associated deposit fraud) are not mutually exclusive.

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