How much security deposit should you hold? The general rule of thumb is one month’s rent but over the last few years we have noticed that tenants are just leaving lots of personal property and not really cleaning their rental upon termination of their lease. They are expecting the landlord to dispose of their trash and unwanted property. We’ve had some rentals that had so much stuff in it that it was as if the tenant had not moved out!
It is expensive to trash-out a home. It’s a cost that either the landlord or the owner ends up absorbing. So, we are now adding an additional $300 to the security deposit of one month’s rent just to cover the removal of personal property. If the tenants cleans up the rental when they leave, they get this back as well. You’ll find more and more landlords looking for additional security deposits and just won’t rent the unit if the tenant can’t pay it up front. Leasing your property to a tenant not able to financially handle moving into a new place is probably a sign of bad things to come.
