Quote: Originally Posted by Gentlegamer That's why you have to send registered mail with return receipt.

Yea, and now we're wishing we had. We figured including the letter with the rent check and showing the check as cashed would be our safeguard. I'm pretty sure that'll fly but it would be tons easier if we had done it registered.

Quote: Originally Posted by fatherofcaitlyn You're out one month's rent if you lose, right?

Yes and no. We're out a month's rent if we lose, but the landlord never sent us a letter detailing what the situation was with our deposit. In Texas, a landlord is required to do so within 30 days of moving out or it is automatically assumed that the landlord is acting in bad faith and we would be awarded 3x the rent, plus $100 and attorney fees (which we're going to absolutely destroy him with).

We're confident we can easily beat his pathetic small claim. What we really want now is to get the judge to side with us that the claim was brought in bad faith. If that happens, getting the 3x deposit plus attorney fees should put him somewhere in the $7-8k range owed to us. A bad faith claim will show that he did it intentionally to withhold the deposit and would be a slam dunk.

He's teased us out of our inertia. Now we want it all.

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