Background
Amanda and Gregory Verhaeg leased a residence from MAC Investment Group for nine months and paid a $1,400 security deposit. They vacated on May 25, 2024. The landlords later returned $447 in September 2024, accompanied by a letter listing repair costs and unpaid utility charges.
The Verhaegs sued under Illinois’s Security Deposit Return Act, seeking the remaining $953 and a statutory penalty of twice the security deposit. After a bench trial, the Madison County circuit court found that the landlords had not acted in bad faith, ruled for defendants on the tenants’ claim, and denied the landlords’ counterclaim and fee request.
The Court’s Holding
The appellate court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded with directions to enter judgment for the tenants for $953. The documentary evidence showed that the landlords did not provide an itemized damage statement within 30 days of the tenants’ May 25 move-out and did not return the full deposit within 45 days, as the Act requires when the required statement and receipts are not timely furnished.
The court rejected the landlords’ argument that the Act’s receipt exception extended those deadlines. It also held that the tenants, as the parties seeking relief, retained the burden to prove noncompliance. But the court affirmed the denial of the statutory penalty because that remedy additionally requires a finding that the landlord refused to provide an itemized statement or supplied one in bad faith. With no trial transcript in the appellate record, the court presumed correct the trial court’s factual findings that neither occurred.
Key Takeaways
- A landlord who misses the Act’s itemization requirements must return the full security deposit within 45 days of vacancy.
- The inability to produce receipts does not extend the statute’s deadlines; it requires specified substitute documentation.
- Late compliance alone does not establish the bad faith or refusal required for the Act’s enhanced penalty.
Why It Matters
The decision separates the remedy for a landlord’s untimely withholding of a deposit from the Act’s punitive remedy. Tenants may recover the wrongfully withheld deposit upon proof of noncompliance, while double-damages relief requires additional proof of refusal or bad faith.
It also underscores the appellate consequence of an incomplete record: factual findings tied to witness testimony, including bad faith, will generally stand without a transcript or acceptable substitute.