Most deposit disputes a landlord loses are lost on procedure: the statement went out late, a deduction was not itemized, or the tenant was charged full price for a five-year-old carpet. Check your deadline here for free. The report turns your move-out photos into an itemized statement, with each item prorated for its age.
Free. Nothing here is sent anywhere except to work out the date.
One-time payment, no subscription. Card statement shows LEASEHELPER. Photos are processed to build your report and are not stored on our servers; the copy kept in your browser so you can finish later is deleted after 72 hours. Not legal advice.
Add a room, then its photos. Up to 8 photos per room, 60 in total. Photos are resized in your browser before upload. No move-in photos? The analysis still works, but with lower confidence. Next time, the move-in condition checklist that comes with every LeaseHelper lease gives you a baseline.
Charges that are not damage and are never depreciated, such as unpaid rent or unpaid utilities the lease makes the tenant responsible for.
Only items you have ticked are included. Depreciating items need an age.
A tenant who damages a carpet owes you for the damage, not for a new carpet. If the carpet was four years into a five-year life, four-fifths of it was already used up by ordinary wear you could not have charged for. Courts and housing agencies prorate deductions for exactly this reason, and a statement that charges full replacement cost is the easiest kind for a tenant to challenge.
The report uses the useful lives in HUD’s Sample Life Expectancy Chart (Special Claims Processing Guide, Appendix 5D) where it lists the item. Carpet is 5 years, flat interior paint 3 years, appliances 10 to 20 years. For items that chart does not cover, the figure is labelled as an editable assumption on the statement. HUD’s chart is guidance written for HUD-assisted housing, not a statute, so use the figure you can best justify.
Every state gives you a fixed window after move-out to return the deposit or send an itemized statement. In many states, missing it means you lose the right to deduct anything, and some add double or treble damages. A tenant does not have to win an argument about stains if the statement was late. The date shown above is the earliest reading of your state’s rule, so a statement sent by then is on time whichever way the rule is read.
On the other side of the same dispute, tenants use our deposit recovery calculator, which works the arithmetic the other way.
The $9 move-out checklist gives you a room-by-room inspection form to fill in on site.
Move-out checklist — $9 Deposit limits by state