u/Zefiron

Hi all,

Lived in The Hague for 5 years and recently moved to Denmark.

My landlord came in with his realtor for the preinspection about a month ago and said the apartment looked great and said I would get the full deposit back (4,000 EUR) as long as there were no holes in the wall hiding behind the couch he joked.

I moved out August 30th and now he's giving me a list of things that we went over during the inspection that he's trying to charge me for?

>"We have checked the apartment and we have a few things we want to discuss.

>The apartment overall is very dirty, including the kitchen cabinets , oven and fridge. Also the bathroom, washing machine and dryer, the closet of wasmachine and all the windows and luxeflex are really dusty. A professional company is cleaning Monday the apartment, we don’t know what price they will charge. we will let you not if everything is done.

>We miss the tv-ontvanger van KPN we found the remote control but the receiver is missing. We have to return this part or you have to pay for this, we have to ask KPN.

>The frontdoor cleaning mat is broken and needs to be replaced, costs € 181,51 for the material, no labor costs will be charged I will cut it and change it myself.

>The cabinet in the bathroom we had to change, the mirror was already broken when you get in, but now the doors are also broken. We take this for our account.

>Expensive part is the kitchen plate; do you take there is a change we can handle this with your insurance? I checked with our insurance and they don’t pay for it because it is caused by tenants. Did you had and ‘inboedel’ insurance?

>Pleas let me know about de TV from KPN. I will get back to you when I received the invoice of the cleaning company and KPN or not.

>Best regards,

>Landlord"

I'm fine with keeping a few hundred for professional cleaning. I did my best with a vacuum and cleaning supplies I had, but what can you do.

I don't know anything about his TV receiver - we never watched Dutch TV we just streamed. There was nothing about it in the contract either.

The frontdoor cleaning mat was broken because his father came to fix the floor boards that were shifting - he broke it that day and said don't worry about it.

The bathroom cabinets were broken when I moved in - the hinges became loose after a year and I repeteadly asked him to replace them - he said since the previous tenants installed them - they were not his responsibility. So now how is it my responsibility?

As for the kitchen plate - there was a crack by the sink that happened randomly one day while I was watching a movie - I heard the plate 'pop/crack'. His addition on to the apartment had shifted soo much he needed to have a carpenter come and shave a door down to the add on room because it had become so slanted - the wall of that room was also against the kitchen counter - you could see the caulk had fully cracked from being pulled - and I went over this with him during his pre-inspection and he said he understood - now it feels like he is trying to pin it on me?

I'm have done a bit of research on my end but may have understood this - apparently landlords are supposed to come do some sort of yearly inspection? He never came and inspected once in five years or did any kind of upkeep checks - so not sure if that's any kind of help.

Again, I'm fine with being charged for a deep clean - but everything else he tacked on is completely out of left field. I've been a good tenant and paid rent on the 1st every time and really don't see myself as having been a problem so I'm a bit insulted over this.

I wrote back to his email explaining my position and asked him to call me. I have also tried calling him several times but he is not answering.

What are my possible legal paths to get my deposit back?