Guides

The calculator tells you what you are owed. These tell you how to get it.

• How to ask your landlord for security deposit interest

  The three things a request needs, a template email you can copy, and a different template for the states where no rate is published.

• What to do if your landlord won't return your deposit

  The order of operations: what to document before you move out, how to write the demand, how to read an itemisation, and when small claims is worth it.

• Security deposit return deadlines by state

  All 51 deadlines in one table, generated from the same verified dataset as the state pages — plus the thing the table cannot show you, which is what the clock starts from.

• How much can a landlord charge for a security deposit?

  How caps work, and the five exceptions — pets, furnishings, small landlords, last month’s rent, alterations — that legitimately push a deposit above the headline number.

For the rule in your own state — whether interest is owed, the deadline, and the statute that says so — start here.