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Comment by newhouseb | Hacker News Reader

I don’t think this is just violent crime.

I am currently suing a former landlord in NYC — a lecturer at Columbia Law school no less! — for illegally withholding our security deposit in an open and shut case.

We’ve been “awaiting a court date” for over a year now. We don’t need the money and were planning on donating (the significant) damages to non-profits helping people who wouldn’t otherwise have the resources to get justice, but it’s still super depressing that the court system basically gave up during COVID and doesn’t appear to be trending in the right direction to be fixed anytime soon.

No doubt our legally sophisticated landlord knew this and took the bet that we would have no real recourse for over a year toward anything they did.

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> suing a former landlord in NYC — a lecturer at Columbia Law school no less!

Your leverage is in embarrassing them. Counsel should be able to advise you of ways to do this.

There should be no need for leverage. Counsel should be advising they use the courts as intended to cause compliance with contracts and laws that should be enforced and respected. If your only remedy is causing embarrassment, that's a sign that the system is badly broken.

This is like saying "Don't bother contacting support, raise a ruckus on Twitter or contact an insider if you have a problem with <insert tech company>."

Yes, maybe maybe public embarrassment, Twitter, and insiders are the most practical, effective ways of resolving issues today, but that's not the way it should be.

> should be no need for leverage

Lawsuits are part of a negotiation. Everyone wins if the parties can settle out of court. In most lawsuits, the court is a bogeyman: you’re posturing to show you’ll win and that the other side should capitulate before wasting everyone’s time and embarrassing itself in a public forum.

> counsel should be advising they use the courts

Counsel should recommend what works. New York’s courts work. But they work slowly.

> like saying "Don't bother contacting support, raise a ruckus on Twitter or contact an insider

No, it’s saying consider doing all those things.

> Counsel should recommend what works. New York’s courts work. But they work slowly.

Sorry, I was using a different kind of "should" - you were thinking of the pragmatic, I was speaking philosophically. In a hypothetical, just, efficient, utopian society, I think that world would be a better place if lawsuits were judged and enforced more consistently and more quickly, and if people in that society chose to avoid using public embarrassment as leverage to circumvent the courts. Obviously, we don't live in that world, so the pragmatic approach is to use the tools that are most functional. I wish that we could change our actual society to conform more closely to that hypothetical one.

The courts are the last resort, you shouldn't use them unless you cannot resolve your issues via negotiation. Embarrassment can be a very useful tool in negotiation.

The asterisk here is that they teach social media / libel / defamation law. At this point I know tenant law as well as one can, but yelling about them by name on the internet would likely play into their hand.

It goes both ways.

When Cuomo told people they couldn't get evicted and didn't have to pay the last month's rent, I had tenants with white collar jobs decide to leave an apartment I rent a mess b/c "hey, you have no security deposit".

I could have gone to the courts but would have been the same outcome: wait a year and who knows what would have happened.

Dude, at least they left! You got off easy!

> I don’t think this is just violent crime.

Because speedy trial is a matter of Constitutional right in criminal trials, it is almost certainly more of a problem for non-criminal trials than criminal ones.

Can't you just slap a 10% interest rate on your claim, starting from the date the deposit should have been returned?

You could, but because it wasn't part of your original contract, the courts will likely find it invalid. You're not allowed to impose interest that was not agreed upon beforehand.

Also, part of a trial is to make the judge/jury like you. No matter how right you are, if you're an arrogant person, you won't get much sympathy. It's much better to wait for the courts to settle the issue, where a judge could impose punitive damages (interest).

Often, the law will stipulated a legal rate of interest on damages from the point at which the breach occurred until damages are fully paid or specific property transferred.

New York seems to have this, for instance, with a 9%/yr annual rate. See, e.g., https://www.propertyinsurancecoveragelaw.com/2020/07/article...

Security deposits aren't held in escrow?

Not a third party escrow, at least for renting in NYC.

It is an interest free loan to the landlord or management company for the entire time you live there.

Usually it's the management companies that are really difficult to work with.

Shame. UK has had enforced escrow for rental deposits for 15 years and it’s basically solved the problem. https://www.gov.uk/tenancy-deposit-protection

Where I live (Ontario, Canada) security deposits are illegal. Simplifies everything and levels the playing field. Key deposits are also illegal. Only thing a landlord can charge is rent (first and last up front) and its legally required to pay interest on the last month's rent (although good luck milking that from most landlords). No need for escrow since to get your last month's rent back you just don't pay your last month.

There are, of course, landlords who do not follow the law. As with drug dealers, pimps, and phone companies they generally prey on the less fortunate. Legal aid and the landlord-tenant tribunals keep busy.

No it’s not. As a landlord you’re required to hold the deposit separately in a bank account and provide information on which account to the tenant.

It’s not escrow, the landlord has full control over the account. But it’s not a loan either.

Weird, here in Switzerland it's the same but opposite - As a tenant, I have to transfer my security deposit to an account with my own bank and give my bank the permission to tell my landlord which account and how much is in it.

Tenancy laws in some places I've lived require the landlord to pay it back at the end of the tenancy, plus interest.

But the interest rate is set by the tenancy act...

So where I live now, legally, landlords have to pay your security deposit back plus an interest rate of 0%

Hilarious stuff

Even if they were supposed to be held in escrow, you'd need access to courts to enforce it.

Not in the UK at least [0]. Claims and counter-claims go through an independent third party. I've had a landlord try to claim £3k from my deposit, only for this scheme to award them £200. Decisions are final. It can take a few weeks.

https://www.tenancydepositscheme.com/

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