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Washington State-SEVERAL issues with landlord - Please Help.

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Washington State-SEVERAL issues with landlord - Please Help.

Postby dvaughn » Mon Mar 23, 2009 9:36 am

Hello:

I'm hoping that someone can answer my question for me. I am going to be moving out of the house I have been renting since Nov 2007 and when I moved in I had to pay a $300 non-refundable pet deposit for each dog and I have two dogs, so I paid the landlord $600. When I moved in the inside of the house, primarily the walls, and the carpet, were in bad shape. I did take picutures of everything for my own documentation. Over the time of living here the landlord was pleasant to deal with, but now that I am moving out, she has become impossible to deal with. I painted the entire interior of the home with colors that I showed her and emailed her prior to painting. The main living room is kind of a pumpkin color and now she says she wants it back to the color it was before, which it had never been painted before. It was still the original construction white, and this house is 30 years old so you can imagine what the walls looked like. She approved these colors with no mention of repainting when I moved out. I told her that I would consider repainting it to the flat white that it was before and she doesn't want that. She wants me to paint if a cream color, so it seems as if she doesn't want the pumpkin color which she originally approved of, but instead of putting it back to the way it was when I moved in, she wants it another color.

So that is issue number 1.

Issue 2: There was a mirror glued to the ceiling in the master bedroom when I moved in and I immediately started trying to take it down but the entire back of the mirror was glued so it was only chipping off. Again I notified her that I wanted to remove the mirror and she approved of that but since I hadn't removed it entirely, I told her that I would just get another mirror cut and glue that overtop so it would look identical to when I moved in, or, I would go ahead and finish removing the mirror, which would tear up the ceiling drywall and then I would put another mirror there. She doesn't want this done either. She is expecting me to remove the mirror and texture the entire ceiling.

Issue 3: This home is located in the mountains in Washington State and moss grows on everything. She is telling me that it is the tenant's responsibility to clean the gutters and to get up on the roof and powerwash the moss off? Is this true? I see this as going way above a tenant's responsibility.

Issue 4: I have two dogs, under 25lbs each, and paid a $300 non refundable pet deposit for each dog, so in all I paid $600. When I move out I want to have the carpets professionally steam cleaned and in past homes that I have rented, I was able to use the pet deposit for carpet cleaning, but this landlord is telling me no, that the money I paid was just for a right to have pets in the house.

She is being absurd and unwilling to work with me on anything. The kitchen had carpet in it when I moved in and I talked her into letting me
tile the kitchen, dining room, and entry way. The agreement that we had was that she would pay for the material, and every once in a while would take a little bit off my rent, which she never did. When I removed the carpet I nearly vomitted because there was so much mold underneath the carpet and the carpet padding nearly turned to dust when I rubbed it between my fingers. I have done so many little improvements to this house, which were definitely needed, and now I feel like she is trying to take advantage of me because I am moving out before my lease ends.
I gave her notice nearly two months ago that I was moving to Chicago for employment because I lost my job here, but she keeps saying that I am bound by my lease, even though she is acknowledging that she is using my last month's rent (that I already paid) for the month of April.

My main concerns are that she is trying to get me to repaint and texture the bedroom ceiling, but what I really want to know is if I am entitled to use the pet deposit to pay for carpet cleaning.

Thank You,
David
dvaughn
 
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