Tenant does not want to pay the rental deposit - damage is time-barred

Core outcome?

We have now received the letter from the court and first have to advance the court costs. Then hopefully a clarification will finally be achieved...

the outcome

how much are the costs you had to advance now if I may ask?

and how high is the amount in dispute?

The rental deposit is about 900 euros... the landlord wants to withhold this + about 300 euros extra because the total damage is "allegedly" about 1,200 euros.

As I said, not a small amount... but it makes a difference whether I pay 1,200 euros for a totally battered apartment or, as in our case, for an approximately 25cmx25cm stain on plain beech PVC flooring, which was never replaced...

We now have to advance about 160 euros in court costs...

Here is the current status of the Neverending Story:

I have paid the court fees and a "hearing for a conciliation meeting" was scheduled for sometime on the third of September... but the "defendant's representative" is not available then... so it was postponed to the fourth of September...

It's interesting to see that Mister "I don't take a lawyer - I'm right anyway - everything they say is just nonsense" apparently did get a lawyer after all. His mouth was obviously bigger than the rest...

I also looked into conciliation hearing dates and find it shocking how they try to straighten things out in Germany... from what I have read, the judge will try to put pressure on our lawyer and "force" a splitting of the costs. Then he has less work and is off the hook... the lawyer might be used to it, but a regular person would give in... even if they are right.

Well then, good luck.

The settlement negotiation is over and we were offered €250 as a compromise. So we pay €250 for the damage and get the rest (€600) paid out. But then we have to share the court costs, which amounts to about €500 for each party. So I am left with €100...

Or we continue to go on the offensive... then we risk losing the rental deposit and paying €1,000 in court costs...

Since it is still clear to me that the landlord failed to report the damage to us, I am sticking to the offensive!

New date in a month...

Your decision. I would have closed by now. Alone because of the mentioned amounts: They are not in any way proportional to the latent risk of the next (now "real") instance.