I protected my tenants deposit in September 07, but have just returned from a court hearing and am sad to report that I am now one of the 88% of landlords who lost their cases.

The evidence I had was dismissed out of hand which gave me the impression that the Judge had already made up his mind how things were going to proceed before I even turned up.

Comments such as ‘this is no palace is it’ and ‘perhaps this just hasn’t been the investment you expected’ left me highly surprised.

Most worryingly, It leaves me with major concerns about how to protect myself from this happening again in future. Short of recording a 10 minute video at the start and end of each tenancy (which would still not be able to prove the date it was filmed).

Even the content of the check-in report was used against me, despite there being no check-out report for comparison.