Texas security deposit law
Your landlord is on a clock, and most tenants never find out it exists. Here is what the statute actually says — quoted, with a link so you can read it yourself.
30 days after you surrender possession, your landlord must either return the deposit or give you a written itemized list of deductions.
- Itemization
- Required. A landlord who does not provide the written description and itemized list forfeits the right to withhold any part of the deposit, and forfeits the right to sue you for damage to the premises.
- If they get it wrong
- $100, plus three times the portion of the deposit wrongfully withheld, plus your reasonable attorney's fees.
- Statute
- Tex. Prop. Code §§ 92.103, 92.104, 92.109
The part most people miss
A landlord who misses the 30-day deadline is presumed by statute to have acted in bad faith. That presumption shifts the burden onto the landlord to prove the retention was reasonable.
A landlord who fails either to return a security deposit or to provide a written description and itemization of deductions on or before the 30th day after the date the tenant surrenders possession is presumed to have acted in bad faith.
Tex. Prop. Code § 92.109(d)
Where that leaves you
Work out the date you handed back possession, then count. If the deadline has passed and nothing arrived, that fact alone carries weight under Texas law — read the statute above and see where you stand.
If you are still living there, or about to move out, the most useful thing you can do takes fifteen minutes. Nearly every dispute reduces to a single question — was that damage there before you were — and the person holding dated photographs is the one who wins it.
Check your exact timeline for Texas
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How this was sourced: Statute text read at texas.public.law (§ 92.109), 19 Aug 2026.