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Depósitos de seguridad en Tennessee: qué dice la ley

Mi arrendador se quedó con mi depósito

Ley estatal

Lo que dice la ley

Se exige estado detallado: Sí
Límite de reclamos menores: $25,000
Sección del código: Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301 (Uniform Residential Landlord and Tenant Act). CRITICAL SCOPE LIMIT: the whole chapter applies only in counties with more than 75,000 people according to the 2010 federal census (§ 66-28-102(a)) — 17 of Tennessee's 95 counties.
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Outside those 17 counties Tennessee has NO residential security-deposit statute at all.
Quién atiende quejas: No Tennessee agency adjudicates residential security-deposit disputes, and none licenses or supervises landlords statewide.
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The nearest thing is the Tennessee Attorney General's Division of Consumer Affairs, which takes written complaints under the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act (615-741-4737; [email protected]; P.O. Box 20207, Nashville, TN 37202; online form at https://agtnprod.powerappsportals.us/DCA/) but states on its own page that it 'cannot give legal advice or represent private individuals' and 'cannot make formal decisions on whether a person or business has breached the law as only the courts can do this.' Whether the TCPA even reaches a residential landlord's retention of a deposit is not settled here (see open_questions). The real remedy is a suit in general sessions or circuit court. In Davidson County only, § 66-28-107 requires landlords to register with the local building-code agency and provides a $50-per-week fine for failure to register, enforced locally.
Deposit cap: No cap. Nothing in § 66-28-301, or elsewhere in Tenn. Code Ann. tit. 66, ch. 28, limits the amount of a residential security deposit, and there is no last-month's-rent or pet-deposit ceiling. Verified by reading the complete current text of § 66-28-301(a)-(h); the section is silent on amount.
Coverage split: Tennessee is two states for this purpose. The Uniform Residential Landlord and Tenant Act applies only in counties with more than 75,000 people according to the 2010 federal census (Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-102(a)) — seventeen of the ninety-five counties.
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The statute is locked to the 2010 census and carries no 'or any subsequent census' clause, so a county that grew past 75,000 after 2010 is still outside the Act. In those seventeen counties the tenant uses the § 66-28-501(a) fourteen-day notice. Everywhere else Tennessee has no residential security-deposit statute at all: the claim is an ordinary breach of the lease, the fourteen days is the writer's own reasonable deadline rather than a statutory one, and there is no statutory penalty and no statutory attorney's fees. A Tennessee letter has to say which of the two it is on, because the remedies are not the same.
Local stacking: Almost none, by design. § 66-28-102(e), added by 2021 Pub. Ch. 182 § 1 effective July 1, 2021: 'In the counties in which this chapter applies, this chapter occupies and preempts the entire field of legislation concerning the regulation of landlords and tenants.
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The governing body of a county subject to this chapter shall not enact or enforce regulations that conflict with, or are an addition to, this chapter.' Separately, Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-35-102 bars local governments from enacting rent control. The one surviving local layer found is § 66-28-107 (residential landlord registration), which by § 66-28-107(c) applies only to a county with a metropolitan form of government and more than 500,000 people per the 2000 or a later census — i.e. Metropolitan Nashville/Davidson County: landlords must file name, phone and physical address plus each unit address with the local codes agency, may be charged up to $10/year, must report ownership changes within 30 days, and face a $50-per-week fine after a hearing noticed at least 15 days out. No Nashville, Memphis, Knoxville or Chattanooga security-deposit ordinance was found. Note that the preemption sentence names the governing body of a COUNTY; whether it equally bars a municipality inside a covered county is untested (see open_questions).
Penalty detail: Two separate levers, neither of them a multiplier. (1) Forfeiture — § 66-28-301(c): 'No landlord shall be entitled to retain any portion of a security deposit if the security deposit was not deposited in an account as required by subsection (a) and a listing of damages is not provided as required by subsection (b).' Read literally the conjunction is AND, i.e.
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the tenant may have to show BOTH that the deposit was never escrowed AND that no damage listing was provided; whether Tennessee courts read 'and' conjunctively or disjunctively is unresolved here and is listed in open_questions. The escrow half is often the easier half to prove, because § 66-28-301(h) makes the landlord disclose the account's location at lease signing. (2) Fee-shifting — § 66-28-501(a): 'the tenant may recover damages, obtain injunctive relief and recover reasonable attorney's fees for any noncompliance by the landlord with the rental agreement or any section of this chapter upon giving fourteen (14) days' written notice.' This is what gives a demand letter real teeth in Tennessee: the letter IS the statutory 14-day notice, and serving it is a precondition to the attorney's-fee award. § 66-28-106(b) says written notice goes 'to the last known or designated address contained in the lease agreement'; § 66-28-302 requires the landlord to have disclosed a name and address for service of notices and demands, and § 66-28-302(c) makes whoever failed to disclose an agent for service. Also note § 66-28-301(d): a tenant who disputes the damage listing is limited to the items the tenant specifically dissented from in writing, 'otherwise the tenant shall not be entitled to recover any damages under this section' — dissenting in writing at the inspection matters more in Tennessee than any deadline does. § 66-28-515(a) adds a duty to mitigate damages.
County overlays: The chapter is county-gated and the gate is frozen at the 2010 census. § 66-28-102(a) (as amended by 2012 Pub. Ch. 847 § 1, then narrowed by 2021 Pub. Ch.
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182 § 2, which deleted the words 'or any subsequent federal census'): 'This chapter applies only in counties having a population of more than seventy-five thousand (75,000), according to the 2010 federal census.' Per the Census Bureau's own 2010 county file for Tennessee, exactly 17 of 95 counties clear 75,000: Shelby (927,644), Davidson (626,681), Knox (432,226), Hamilton (336,463), Rutherford (262,604), Williamson (183,182), Montgomery (172,331), Sumner (160,645), Sullivan (156,823), Blount (123,010), Washington (122,979), Wilson (113,993), Bradley (98,963), Madison (98,294), Sevier (89,889), Maury (80,956), Anderson (75,129). Because the 2021 act froze the reference to 2010, later growth does NOT add counties: Putnam County (Cookeville) was 72,321 in 2010 and 79,854 in 2020, so it is over the threshold today and still outside the Act. In the other 78 counties there is no residential security-deposit statute at all — Tenn. Code Ann. tit. 66, ch. 7 (the general landlord-tenant chapter) contains no deposit provision, so the lease and common-law contract principles control: no escrow duty, no itemization duty, no forfeiture rule and no § 66-28-501 attorney's-fee hook. A Tennessee letter template must branch on the county of the rental property before it cites § 66-28-301.
Deadline detail: Tennessee sets NO deadline for returning a security deposit. Never print a statutory refund due date for a Tennessee tenant. The lever is Tenn. Code Ann.
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§ 66-28-501(a): the tenant gives the landlord fourteen days' written notice of the noncompliance, and only after that notice can the tenant recover damages, obtain injunctive relief and recover reasonable attorney's fees. Read it as what it is — a precondition to the tenant's remedies, not a clause that ends the tenancy on day fifteen. Separately, § 66-28-301 requires the landlord to inspect and itemize, and it gives the tenant 60 days after notification to respond before the tenant's own claim is forfeited.
Penalty statute: § 66-28-301(c) (landlord forfeits the right to retain any portion of the deposit) and § 66-28-501(a) (damages, injunctive relief and reasonable attorney's fees for any noncompliance, on 14 days' written notice). There is NO multiplier, treble-damages clause or fixed statutory penalty anywhere in Tenn. Code Ann. tit.
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66, ch. 28 for security deposits.
Deadline statute: None exists. § 66-28-301 sets no deadline for returning the deposit and no deadline for delivering the damage listing.
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The only clocks in the section are: § 66-28-301(b)(1)(A) (move-out inspection on the day the tenant completely vacates or within 4 calendar days after; the landlord's optional notice of the tenant's right to be present is due on the landlord's request to vacate or within 5 days after the landlord receives the tenant's written notice of intent to vacate); § 66-28-301(f) (60 days for the TENANT to respond to the landlord's refund notification); § 66-28-301(g)(1)-(2) (landlord may charge for later-discovered physical damage only if found within 30 days after the tenant vacated or abandoned, or 7 days after a new tenant takes possession, whichever is earlier). The 14-day clock the tenant must run before suing is in a different section: § 66-28-501(a).
Interest or escrow: Escrow required, interest NOT required. § 66-28-301(a): 'All landlords of residential property requiring security deposits prior to occupancy are required to deposit all tenants' security deposits in an account used only for that purpose, in any bank or other lending institution subject to regulation by the state or any agency of the United States government.' § 66-28-301(h) requires the landlord to tell the tenant the LOCATION of that account at lease signing (the account number need not be given).
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There is no requirement that the account bear interest, no requirement to pay accrued interest to the tenant, and no administrative-fee allowance. § 66-28-301(e) lets the landlord pull the money out of the account and apply it to unpaid rent or other amounts due if the tenant leaves owing; § 66-28-301(f) lets the landlord pull it out and keep it if the tenant does not respond to a mailed refund notification within 60 days. § 66-28-305 relieves a landlord who sells the property in good faith of liability once the tenant has written notice of the conveyance and the deposit is transferred to the purchaser.
Limitations detail: UNSETTLED — § 66-28-301 contains no limitations clause of its own, so a general period supplies it, and no Tennessee case fixing the period for a security-deposit claim was verified here. The likely answer is six years under Tenn. Code Ann.
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§ 28-3-109(a)(3), 'Actions on contracts not otherwise expressly provided for,' because a deposit claim is contractual. The competing candidate is the three-year period in § 28-3-105 — (1) 'injuries to personal or real property', (2) 'detention or conversion of personal property', or (3) statutory-liability claims — and a claim framed as conversion of the deposit or as a statutory penalty could draw three years instead. Do not print a filing deadline to a Tennessee reader until the owner resolves this; treat three years as the safe outer limit in any copy that must state one.
Small claims statute: Tenn. Code Ann. § 16-15-501(d)(1) — general sessions courts have civil jurisdiction 'to the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000) in all civil cases, both law and equity', with unlimited original jurisdiction in forcible entry and detainer and in actions to recover personal property; § 16-15-501(d)(2) excludes attorney fees, court costs and discretionary costs from that cap.
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Tennessee has no separate 'small claims court' — general sessions IS the small-claims forum. Venue for deposit disputes: § 66-28-301(d) ('a circuit or general sessions court of competent jurisdiction') and § 66-28-105(a) (general sessions and circuit courts have original jurisdiction over conduct governed by the chapter).
Itemized list statute: § 66-28-301(b)(1)(B) (mutual inspection: landlord and tenant 'compile a comprehensive listing of any presently ascertainable damage to the unit that is the basis for any charge against the security deposit and the estimated dollar cost of repairing the damage'; both sign; a tenant who refuses to sign must state the…
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dissented items in writing) and § 66-28-301(b)(2)(A) (tenant unavailable or ineligible to inspect: the landlord may inspect alone and compile the same listing, and must send a written copy by certificate of mailing 'upon the tenant's written request'). Forfeiture consequence in § 66-28-301(c). Dispute route and dissent limitation in § 66-28-301(d).
Limitations period years: 6

Lee esto antes de confiar en los datos de arriba

Tennessee's residential security-deposit rules live in Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301, part of the Uniform Residential Landlord and Tenant Act. Before anything else, check the county. Section 66-28-102(a) says the chapter "applies only in counties having a population of more than seventy-five thousand (75,000), according to the 2010 federal census," and a 2021 amendment deleted the old words "or any subsequent federal census," freezing the list. By the Census Bureau's own 2010 county file that is 17 of Tennessee's 95 counties: Shelby, Davidson, Knox, Hamilton, Rutherford, Williamson, Montgomery, Sumner, Sullivan, Blount, Washington, Wilson, Bradley, Madison, Sevier, Maury and Anderson. Everywhere else — including Putnam County, which passed 75,000 in the 2020 census — Tennessee simply has no security-deposit statute, and your rights come from the lease and ordinary contract law.

Inside those 17 counties, the surprise is what the statute does NOT say. There is no deadline for the landlord to return your money and no deadline to send you an itemized list. From 2004 to 2011 the law did give the landlord ten business days to inspect and itemize, but the General Assembly deleted that subsection outright in 2011 and replaced it with inspection rights, so much of what you will read online about a Tennessee "10-business-day" or "30-day" deposit deadline describes law that no longer exists. What the statute does require is an escrow account used only for deposits at a regulated bank, whose location must be disclosed to you when you sign the lease (§ 66-28-301(a), (h)); a right to be present at a move-out inspection held on the day you completely vacate or within four calendar days after, at which you and the landlord compile and sign a comprehensive listing of damage with the estimated dollar cost of repairs (§ 66-28-301(b)); and, if you disagree with an item, a written statement of the items you dissent from — § 66-28-301(d) limits your later lawsuit to exactly those items. There is no deposit cap, no interest requirement and no administrative-fee allowance anywhere in the section.

There is also no multiplier. Tennessee has no treble-damages or double-damages clause for deposits. Two levers replace it. First, § 66-28-301(c): a landlord "shall not be entitled to retain any portion of a security deposit" if the deposit was not escrowed as (a) requires and a damage listing was not provided as (b) requires — note that the statute joins those two failures with "and," so plan on showing both. Second, and more useful, § 66-28-501(a): a tenant "may recover damages, obtain injunctive relief and recover reasonable attorney's fees for any noncompliance by the landlord with the rental agreement or any section of this chapter upon giving fourteen (14) days' written notice." That fourteen-day notice is the whole point of a demand letter in Tennessee — it is a precondition to the fee award, and § 66-28-106(b) says written notice goes to the last known or designated address in the lease. One clock does run against you: under § 66-28-301(f), if the landlord mails a refund notification to your last known or reasonably determinable address and hears nothing back for sixty days, the landlord may take the money out of escrow and keep it.

If it goes to court, Tennessee has no separate small-claims court — general sessions courts handle these, with civil jurisdiction up to $25,000 (attorney fees, court costs and discretionary costs do not count toward that cap), and § 66-28-301(d) lets you file in either general sessions or circuit court. No state agency decides deposit disputes; the Attorney General's Division of Consumer Affairs takes complaints but says plainly that it cannot give legal advice or represent individuals. Local ordinances are essentially off the table: § 66-28-102(e) declares that in covered counties the chapter "occupies and preempts the entire field of legislation concerning the regulation of landlords and tenants," and no city deposit ordinance was found in Nashville, Memphis, Knoxville or Chattanooga. The lone local overlay is landlord registration with the codes agency in Metropolitan Nashville/Davidson County under § 66-28-107, which carries a $50-per-week fine for landlords who fail to register.

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Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301 (2025 Tennessee Code) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — Complete current text of the security-deposit section, subsections (a)-(h), plus the History line ending 'Acts ... 2011, ch. 272, §§ 6-9; 2012, ch. 887, § 1' (no amendment since 2012). Tennessee publishes no free official code; this is the consolidated-text source, cross-checked against the official Public Chapters below.
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301(f) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — The only 60-day clock: it runs against the TENANT after the landlord mails a refund notification, not against the landlord
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301(c) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — Forfeiture remedy, phrased conjunctively ('and'): no escrow AND no listing
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-301 (FindLaw) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION, second source — Independent reproduction used to confirm the subsection lettering and the 5-day / 4-day / 60-day / 30-day / 7-day figures; readable by WebFetch (Justia returns 403 to the WebFetch user agent)
2011 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 272, §§ 6, 8, 9 (H.B. 1760), eff. Oct. 1, 2011 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW (Tennessee Secretary of State) — THE key document for the no-deadline finding: § 6 deletes former § 66-28-301(b) in its entirety and substitutes the present text, which contains no return or itemization deadline; § 8 substitutes the present (c); § 9 substitutes the present (g) with its 30-day / 7-day limits
2005 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 156, § 2 (H.B. 735) — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — The REPEALED 10-business-day rule, quoted so the owner can see exactly what the web still repeats and what 2011 Pub. Ch. 272 § 6 removed
2004 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 683, § 1 (S.B. 2314), eff. July 1, 2004 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Earlier version of the same repealed 10-business-day inspection-and-listing rule
2012 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 887, § 1 (H.B. 2913) — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Substitutes the current § 66-28-301(h) (duty to disclose the escrow account's location at lease signing); the last amendment of any kind to § 66-28-301
2001 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 153, § 4 (S.B. 1098) — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Substitutes § 66-28-301(e), letting the landlord take the deposit out of escrow and apply it to unpaid rent or other amounts owed
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-102 (2025 Tennessee Code), 'Application — Preemption' — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — Current consolidated text of the county-population gate and the 2021 preemption subsection; History line ends 'Acts ... 2012, ch. 847, § 1; 2021, ch. 182, §§ 1, 2'
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-102 (FindLaw) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION, second source — WebFetch-readable confirmation that the current (a) stops at 'the 2010 federal census' with no 'or any subsequent federal census'
2021 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 182, § 2 (H.B. 716), eff. July 1, 2021 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Freezes the county gate to the 2010 census by deleting 'or any subsequent federal census' — the reason Putnam County is still outside the Act despite passing 75,000 in 2020
2021 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 182, § 1 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — The preemption language itself (now § 66-28-102(e)), which is why covered counties have no local deposit ordinances
2012 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 847, § 1 (H.B. 2683), eff. Apr. 27, 2012 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Raised the gate from 68,000 / 1970 census to 75,000 / 2010 census (the phrase 'or any subsequent federal census' survived here and was deleted only in 2021)
2008 Tenn. Pub. Acts ch. 1067, § 1 (S.B. 2885), eff. Oct. 1, 2008 — OFFICIAL SESSION LAW — Predecessor gate (68,000 / 1970 census), included so the owner can see the full chain of the applicability clause
U.S. Census Bureau, Centers of Population by County, Tennessee, 2010 Census (CenPop2010_Mean_CO47.txt) — OFFICIAL FEDERAL DATA — Machine-readable official 2010 county populations used to derive the 17-county coverage list; 95 rows, 17 above 75,000, Anderson the closest at 75,129
U.S. Census Bureau, Centers of Population by County, Tennessee, 2020 Census (CenPop2020_Mean_CO47.txt) — OFFICIAL FEDERAL DATA — Shows Putnam County at 79,854 in 2020 (72,321 in 2010): over the 75,000 line today, still outside the Act because § 66-28-102(a) is frozen to the 2010 census
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-501(a) (FindLaw) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — The 14-day pre-suit written notice that unlocks damages, injunctive relief and reasonable attorney's fees — the closest thing Tennessee has to a deposit penalty
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-501 (2025 Tennessee Code) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION, second source — Same text plus History 'Acts 1975, ch. 245, § 4.101; 1978, ch. 735, § 1' — unamended since 1978, which is why no online Public Chapter exists for it
Tenn. Code Ann. § 16-15-501(d) (2025 Tennessee Code) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — $25,000 general sessions civil jurisdiction (Tennessee's small-claims forum); (d)(2) excludes attorney fees, court costs and discretionary costs from the cap
Tenn. Code Ann. § 16-15-501(d)(1) (FindLaw) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION, second source — WebFetch-readable confirmation of the $25,000 figure and the fee/cost exclusions in (d)(2)
Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-109(a)(3) (FindLaw) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — Six-year limitation for 'Actions on contracts not otherwise expressly provided for' — the probable, but unconfirmed, period for a deposit claim
Tenn. Code Ann. § 28-3-109 (2025 Tennessee Code) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION, second source — Same six-year contract limitation; § 28-3-105 (three years for injury to or conversion of personal property) is the competing candidate
Tenn. Code Ann. § 66-28-107 (2025 Tennessee Code) — UNOFFICIAL REPRODUCTION — The one surviving local layer: landlord registration with the local codes agency, $50/week fine, limited by (c) to a metropolitan-government county over 500,000 (Nashville/Davidson)
Tennessee Attorney General, Division of Consumer Affairs — The only state-level complaint channel; a clearinghouse under the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act, not an adjudicator of deposit disputes
Tennessee Attorney General, Division of Consumer Affairs — File a Complaint — Complaint intake: online form, 615-741-4737, [email protected], P.O. Box 20207, Nashville, TN 37202; the page disclaims individual representation

Última verificación: 2026-09-04

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