Rental law change seeks quick return of security deposits
A public hearing will be held Sept. 13 on a proposed amendment to the village’s Fair Housing Law that would dictate how quickly landlords are required to return security deposits.
The hearing is scheduled for 7 p.m. in Village Hall, 25 Plattekill Ave.
“It’s a pretty straightforward goal,” Mayor Tim Rogers said. “I think about when I was a young person renting an apartment, and you have the landlord come in and check out the apartment at the end of the term, you give them the keys back, they look around, they say everything seems fine. You say, ‘Great, can I have my security deposit back?’ And they say, ‘We’ll get back to you.’”
Under the proposed amendment, landlords would be penalized if a deposit is not returned within two weeks. They would have to pay the tenant an additional 25 percent in the third week after the tenant leaves, 50 percent in the fourth week, 100 percent in the fifth week and 150 percent in the sixth week.
Under the proposed amendment, landlords would be required to return at least 25 percent of a security deposit within the third week after the tenant leaves, 50 percent by the fourth week and 100 percent by the fifth week. If all the money isn’t returned by that point, the landlord’s obligation would jump to 150 percent.
The current law, Rogers believes, simply states a security deposit must be returned within 30 days.
“We’re in no rush to move this law forward unless we feel comfortable that we’ve received all the public feedback that we need to write a good law,” Rogers said.
Celeste Tesoriero, attorney for the New Paltz Tenants Union, contends the proposed amendment is written in way that discourages tenants from bringing court cases to recover their security deposits. She notes the proposal includes allowing some of a deposit to be withheld if a landlord says a tenant still is under obligations.
“I’ve never had a situation where a landlord didn’t claim that there was default of an obligation,” she said. “This was the part [of the proposed amendment] that was used ... to trick people into thinking this was going to do something really good.”
Tesoriero also contends that having a landlord as the person who determines whether a lease is in default is unfair, and she suggests the maximum time for returning deposits be shortened.
She also wants landlords to be required to provide itemized explanations for withholding any portion of a security deposit.
“After a leased space is surrendered, a landlord [should have] 14 calendar days to return a security deposit and itemized statement detailing any withholdings, and the reasons for withholdings together with receipts for those deductions,” she says in a written [proposal “On the 15th calendar day, if the renter has not received what they feel is the appropriate amount, they may institute an action for recovery, and the landlord, if found to have wrongfully withheld any dollar amount or not delivered the itemized statement within 14 days, is liable for 150 percent of the original security deposit.”