Landlord to face tribunal over unpaid rental deposit

A Joburg tenant has dragged her former landlord to the housing tribunal after she failed to pay her back her R6,000 rental deposit.

Kgomotso Molehane sought the intervention of the Gauteng Rental Housing Tribunal two weeks ago after her former landlord, Sarah Mudobi, allegedly failed to pay back her deposit after terminating her lease in October and moving to her new house at the end of January this year. The property in question is a two-bedroom flat in Malvern East, Johannesburg, which she rented for six years. 

Molehane told Sowetan Consumer last week that in December, she had  the carpets cleaned   and also painted the interior. 

“I did that out of the goodness of my heart and I didn't expect to experience any problems when I left. I was shocked when the landlord told me that she was not going to pay back the deposit because she had done some repairs to the property that I was not even aware of,” said Molehane.

The landlord claimed she paid R5,855 to fix cracked loose tiles, bought new hinges for wardrobe doors and bought a new battery for the gate motor, including fixing the geyser twice in 2017 and in 2020, which cost her a total of R1,000. 

“I don't know anything about the repair work shewas talking about because even the gate was still not working. I suspect she did not have the money to pay me back but she should have told me instead of trying to defraud me. She should have been honest with me and I would have accepted a payment plan,  even if it was over a period of five months,” said Molehane. 

Mudobi insisted that she did repair work in the unit and her mistake was not to pass on the bill to Molehane immediately after the job was done. 

“They'd call me to fix this and that and once the work was done I'd assume that they knew that the money would be deducted from their deposit when they left. I've looked at the paint job that they did before they left and unfortunately its wrong because they used two colours instead of one. Now I'd have to repaint because even the new tenants don't like their colours,” said Mudobi.

About being taken to the tribunal, Mudobi said: “She can do whatever she wants, I know my truth.” 

The Keletso Makeng from the tribunal said that the matter was receiving attention and a case manager has been allocated. The mediation process is set for February 28.  

“I'm ready for it (mediation). I know I'm not in the wrong because I wouldn't have gone this far if I knew I was wrong. I did everything correctly during the handing over of the property back to its owner and I even went as far as to look for new tenants for her,” said Molehane.