Free Texas Security Deposit Return Letter

A Texas Security Deposit Return Letter is the written accounting a landlord sends with the deposit refund at the end of a tenancy. Under Tex. Prop. Code Section 92.103, the landlord has thirty days after the tenant surrenders possession and provides a written forwarding address to deliver this letter with the refund, or with a written itemized list of deductions. Deliver it late or without itemizing, and Section 92.109 exposes the landlord to a one-hundred-dollar penalty, treble damages on the withheld portion, and the tenant’s attorney fees.

Complete the builder below to generate a state-compliant Texas Security Deposit Return Letter, ready to print, sign, and send by certified mail. Enter the original deposit, itemize each deduction, and the generator subtracts the deductions from the deposit to compute the refund balance automatically — both live on the page and in the downloaded PDF.

Watch: Texas Security Deposit Return Letter explained

▶ Watch overview

A Texas Security Deposit Return Letter is the written accounting a landlord delivers to a departing tenant along with the deposit refund, or along with the itemized statement of any lawful deductions. It is a letter, not a served court notice, but Texas law gives it teeth: the manner and timing of its delivery decide whether the landlord keeps or forfeits the right to withhold anything at all. Under Texas Property Code Section 92.103, the landlord must refund the security deposit on or before the thirtieth day after the date the tenant surrenders the premises. That single deadline is the spine of the entire subchapter.

Two events must both occur before the thirty-day clock starts to run. First, the tenant must surrender the premises under Section 92.107 — give up possession and stop treating the unit as home. Second, under the forwarding-address rule, the tenant must give the landlord a written statement of a forwarding address for the purpose of refunding the deposit. Until both events happen, the landlord is not obligated to return the deposit or to send the written description of deductions. Landlords should therefore date-stamp the day keys are returned and the day the written forwarding address arrives, then count thirty calendar days from the later of the two. A landlord who counts from move-out but ignores a late forwarding address risks missing the true deadline; a landlord who waits forever for a forwarding address should know the tenant does not lose the underlying refund right by failing to provide one.

When a landlord retains any part of the deposit, Section 92.104(c) requires a written description and itemized list of all deductions. The itemization is not a courtesy; it is a condition of lawfully keeping any money. Vague, lump-sum entries invite dispute and are routinely reduced or thrown out by Texas justice courts. Each line should name what was damaged or cleaned, why the charge was necessary, and the amount, and each should be backed by a receipt, invoice, or dated move-out photograph.

Section 92.104(a) frames what may be deducted at all: before returning a deposit, the landlord may deduct damages and charges for which the tenant is legally liable under the lease or as a result of breaching the lease. In practice that means unpaid rent, repair of tenant-caused damage beyond ordinary wear and tear, reasonable cleaning to return the unit to its move-in condition, and other amounts the lease authorizes. The generator above produces the deposit accounting exactly in this order: original deposit plus interest, minus the itemized deductions, equals the refund balance owed.

Section 92.104(b) is short and absolute: the landlord may not retain any portion of a security deposit to cover normal wear and tear. Texas courts read wear and tear as deterioration that results from the intended, ordinary use of the dwelling — the gradual aging every rental undergoes regardless of who lives there. Faded paint, minor scuffs, carpet flattened along a normal traffic path, and small nail holes from hanging pictures are classic wear and tear. They are the cost of doing business as a landlord, not a chargeable loss.

Damage is different. Deterioration caused by negligence, carelessness, accident, or abuse by the tenant, a guest, or an occupant may be charged — a cigarette burn in the carpet, a hole punched in drywall, a broken window, or pet urine soaked into the subfloor. The dividing line matters because a landlord who dresses up ordinary wear as damage and deducts for it is withholding money the statute forbids, which feeds directly into the bad-faith analysis below. When a line item is genuinely a judgment call, prorate for the item’s useful life and document the reasoning in the letter rather than charging the full replacement cost.

Texas has one of the most landlord-punitive deposit regimes in the country, and Section 92.109 is why. A landlord who in bad faith retains a security deposit in violation of the subchapter is liable for the sum of one hundred dollars, three times the portion of the deposit wrongfully withheld, and the tenant’s reasonable attorney fees in a suit to recover the deposit. Read that arithmetic carefully: the penalty runs on the wrongfully withheld portion, so a landlord who keeps money he was not entitled to keep can owe roughly four times that amount once the statutory one hundred dollars and treble damages are stacked, before attorney fees are even added.

There is a second, independent penalty for paperwork failures. Section 92.109(b) provides that a landlord who in bad faith does not provide the written description and itemized list of deductions forfeits the right to withhold any portion of the deposit and the right to bring suit against the tenant for damages to the premises, and remains liable for the tenant’s reasonable attorney fees. In other words, a landlord who fails to itemize can lose the money he was otherwise entitled to keep and lose the ability to counter-sue for the damage. The letter this page generates exists to prevent exactly that outcome.

The presumption in Section 92.109(d) is what makes the penalty easy for tenants to invoke: a landlord who fails either to return the deposit or to provide the written itemized description on or before the thirtieth day after surrender is presumed to have acted in bad faith. The tenant does not have to prove the landlord’s state of mind; the landlord must affirmatively rebut the presumption with evidence of timely, good-faith compliance. For guidance on the broader framework, see the comprehensive Texas security deposit laws guide, and prepare the upstream documentation with the Texas Move-In / Move-Out Inspection Checklist.

Because both surrender and a written forwarding address are prerequisites to the deadline, Texas landlords need a clear, dated record of each. Surrender under Section 92.107 means the tenant has given up possession — typically evidenced by returned keys, an empty unit, a written move-out notice, or an abandoned tenancy. The safest practice is to fix the surrender date the moment keys are returned and to confirm it in writing to the tenant, so there is no later dispute about when the tenancy ended.

The forwarding address requirement is a shield for landlords and a modest duty for tenants. The landlord is not obligated to refund the deposit or send the itemized description until the tenant provides a written statement of a forwarding address for the purpose of refunding the deposit. That written statement is what starts the thirty-day count. A verbal address does not satisfy the statute cleanly, so landlords should ask for the address in writing — email counts — and preserve the message with its timestamp. Critically, a tenant who never provides a forwarding address does not forfeit the right to the deposit itself; the landlord simply is not yet on the clock and is not yet presumed to be in bad faith. When a landlord has no forwarding address at all, the conservative move is to send the letter and refund to the tenant’s last known address by certified mail, documenting the good-faith effort.

Landlords should also be aware of Section 92.108, which addresses a tenant who withholds the last month’s rent on the theory that the deposit will cover it. That practice can expose the tenant to liability, but it does not relieve the landlord of the separate obligation to account for the deposit properly. Keep the two questions distinct: what rent is owed, and what the deposit accounting shows. The return letter should reflect the true deposit math and treat any unpaid rent as a documented deduction, not as an informal offset that never appears on paper.

The strength of a Texas return letter rises and falls on its documentation. For every deduction, keep the underlying proof: a contractor invoice, a store receipt for materials, a cleaning company bill, or dated photographs showing the damage next to the move-in condition. A well-run file pairs each line item on the letter with a corresponding exhibit, so that if the tenant sues, the landlord can show the deduction was a real, quantified, tenant-caused cost rather than an estimate or a disguised wear-and-tear charge.

When a tenant disputes a deduction, respond in writing and reference the specific line item and its supporting document. Many disputes evaporate once the tenant sees the receipt and the photo. Where a charge is a genuine judgment call — a carpet with three years of life left, replaced after five years of use — proration protects the landlord: charge only the depreciated value attributable to the tenant’s damage, and explain the calculation. Courts and tenants both respond better to a transparent, prorated number than to a full-replacement demand that ignores the item’s age. Because Section 92.109 puts the landlord’s own attorney-fee exposure on the table, the economics almost always favor a documented, reasonable accounting over an aggressive one that a court may later find was made in bad faith.

• Counting from move-out instead of the forwarding address. The thirty-day clock does not start until the tenant gives a written forwarding address under Section 92.107. Starting the count too early — or too late — both create risk.
• Skipping the itemization to save time. Retaining any portion without the written description and itemized list of deductions can forfeit the entire withholding right under Section 92.109(b).
• Charging for normal wear and tear. Section 92.104(b) forbids it outright. Deducting for faded paint or ordinary carpet wear converts a lawful return into a bad-faith retention.
• Using vague line items. Entries like a lump cleaning charge with no description are routinely reduced by Texas justice courts; each deduction needs a specific description and supporting documentation.
• Keeping the deposit silently when deductions exceed it. Even when the refund balance is zero, the itemized letter is still required, and the tenant may owe an additional documented balance.
• Failing to keep delivery proof. Without a certified-mail receipt, a landlord has little to rebut the Section 92.109(d) bad-faith presumption if the tenant claims the letter never arrived.

• Section 92.101 — Definitions for the security-deposit subchapter (what counts as a security deposit and who is a landlord).
• Section 92.103 — Obligation to refund: the deposit must be refunded on or before the thirtieth day after the tenant surrenders the premises.
• Section 92.104 — Retention and accounting: (a) permissible deductions; (b) no retention for normal wear and tear; (c) mandatory written description and itemized list of deductions.
• Section 92.107 — Forwarding address: the landlord’s obligation to refund or itemize is suspended until the tenant provides a written forwarding address.
• Section 92.108 — Liability for withholding the last month’s rent as though it were the deposit.
• Section 92.109 — Landlord liability: one hundred dollars plus three times the wrongfully withheld portion plus attorney fees; forfeiture for failing to itemize; and the thirty-day bad-faith presumption in subsection (d).

Always confirm the current text before relying on it; verify Tex. Prop. Code Section 92.101 et seq. at the Texas Legislature statutes site.

• Document condition at both ends of the tenancy with a dated move-in and move-out checklist and photographs, so every deduction traces to a documented change.
• Send the return letter by certified mail, return receipt requested, to create dated proof that you met the thirty-day deadline.
• Attach receipts and invoices for every repair and cleaning charge; prorate replacement costs for the item’s useful life rather than charging full price for a partially worn item.
• Keep the signed letter, the itemization, supporting documentation, and the mailing receipt for at least four years, matching the Texas limitations period for a written contract.
• When deductions are contested, invite the tenant in writing to dispute specific line items within a reasonable time, which demonstrates good faith and often resolves disputes before court.
• Screen tenants thoroughly before move-in; the cleanest deposit returns come from tenants whose history was verified up front.

Published by Tenant Screening Background Check

Established 2004 · 20+ Years · All U.S. States & Territories · Statute-Based · Attorney-Reviewed

A Private Eye Reports™ service trusted by landlords, property managers, and attorneys.