Twelve WA bond determinations, and what they actually turned on.

The Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2024 overhauled bond release. Any party on the bond can now start a release application on their own, instead of everyone needing to sign the same form. Where another party disputes it, or does not respond by the date on their notice, the application is referred to the Commissioner for Consumer Protection for a decision. Before this, the only alternative to agreement was the Magistrates Court.

Usually not the full cost. A bond claim compensates you for your loss, and your loss is the remaining life of the item rather than a brand new one. Carpet commonly treated as having a ten year life, damaged in year eight, is a claim for the two years that were cut short. Not for a new carpet.

The harder version of the same rule: an item already at the end of its useful life carries little or no claim value, however bad the damage looks. That applies to carpet, blinds, appliances, hot water systems and paint alike. It is the most common reason a well documented claim still comes back reduced.

Replacement cost, multiplied by remaining life, divided by total life. A $3,200 carpet with a ten year life damaged in year eight has two years left, so the claim is $3,200 times two tenths, or $640.

There is a calculator further up this page you can put your own numbers into. The useful life figures are reference points rather than law, and you have to be able to evidence the age and starting condition of the item, which is why installation invoices matter.

This is the least settled area right now and outcomes are being reported both ways, so treat any confident answer with caution, including ours.

Advertising is generally accepted as a reasonable cost of reletting. The unused portion of the letting fee has been refused in several determinations, on the reasoning that it is an arrangement between the agent and the owner rather than something the tenant is party to. Condition report and final inspection costs have been allowed in some determinations and refused in others, and the published guidance on end of tenancy costs does not fully line up with those outcomes. Rent has in some cases not been awarded past the date the tenant handed the keys back.

Underneath all of it is the duty to mitigate. If the property relet quickly, or at a higher rent, the genuine loss may be small regardless of what the lease says. Talk it through before you take a position.

The court forms are still available, and they have to be, because the Commissioner cannot determine a matter where a party lives in another Australian state. Applications have been lodged directly and rulings obtained, particularly where a dispute was certain or the claim exceeded the bond.

Lodging with the court takes the matter out of the Commissioner's hands, and it is worth notifying the Commissioner so no determination issues in parallel. Whether it is the better path depends on the amount, how contested it is, and what the waiting times look like at the time. It is a judgement call rather than a shortcut.

Only where you can show a loss beyond fair wear and tear, and the age of the carpet decides what that loss is worth. Odour that persists after a professional clean is a much stronger claim than odour alone, so a cleaner's written report is worth more than a line on the outgoing report.

Adding pet specific clauses to the lease is not the answer people expect it to be. Additional conditions have been overruled where the standard lease already requires the tenant to keep the premises clean. The practical move is to raise cleanliness at routine inspections during the tenancy, in writing, rather than saving it for the end.

Anyone on the bond. Tenant, landlord or managing agent. Agents must lodge through BondsOnline. Private landlords can use BondsOnline or the paper form. Tenants use the paper form. Paper applications are currently taking up to four weeks to process in most cases, so if you are self-managing, that delay sits in front of everything else.

Silence is treated the same as a dispute. If not everyone responds within the timeframe, the application is referred to the Commissioner automatically, even where the tenant would have received the whole bond back. The bond is then held until a decision is made and the appeal period ends. Ignoring a notice does not preserve anyone's position. It just removes their chance to put their side first.

The application goes to the Commissioner. Everyone on the bond has to respond for it to be paid out by agreement, so a single co-tenant who has moved, gone overseas or simply cannot manage the online process will send the whole matter to determination even where every other party is settled. Chase signatures actively rather than assuming a majority is enough.

Yes. If everyone signs the release the bond is paid out and nothing more is needed. But if the file goes to the Commissioner for any reason, the agreement does not carry the claim on its own.

That happens more easily than people expect. One co-tenant who does not respond is enough to send an otherwise settled matter to determination, where the agreed amount is assessed on the documents behind it. Claims have failed at that point for want of an invoice, including where the tenant themselves had asked for the cost to come out of the bond.

Six to eight weeks has been common through 2026, and waits beyond two months have been reported. The bond stays frozen for the whole of it.

Even a bond everyone agrees on is held through the seven day appeal window, so funds typically move on day eight rather than immediately. If a decision is appealed, the matter moves to the Magistrates Court and the timeline runs into months. Waiting times are not published and do change, so treat this as a guide rather than a promise.

You have 7 days to lodge an appeal with the Magistrates Court, using a Form 12 Application for Court Order together with a copy of the Commissioner's decision, lodged through the Magistrates Court online portal. There is a second step people miss: to stop the bond being paid out you must also email the lodged Form 12 to Bonds Administration within those seven days. Lodging the appeal alone does not freeze the money.

Whether it is worth it is a different question. Adjournments and repeat listings are common and the process can run for months on top of a determination that already took weeks. Weigh the amount genuinely in dispute against that.

The big one catches interstate owners. If someone on the bond lives in another Australian state, and every party on the bond is an individual rather than a company, the Commissioner cannot decide and the matter goes to the Magistrates Court.

Both parts have to be true. A property owned through a company or a super fund stays inside the free process even if the director lives in Sydney. And only other states count, so a tenant or owner who has moved to Canberra or overseas does not stop a determination.

There are four other reasons the Commissioner will decline: the amount in dispute is more than the bond, a dispute about that tenancy is already before the Magistrates Court, there is not enough information to decide, or the bond is no longer held with Bonds Administration.

Fair wear and tear is the deterioration that comes from ordinary and reasonable use of the property over time, and landlords cannot claim for it. Faded paint, worn carpet through the hallway, small marks around light switches, grout that has discoloured. Damage is different in kind: holes in a wall, burns in carpet, a chipped stone benchtop, a lawn dead from neglect.

The line moves with the length of the tenancy. Six years of living in a house leaves more behind than six months. There is a fuller side by side further up this page.

You are in a very weak position, and there is no way to fix it after the fact. A property condition report cannot be edited or created retrospectively.

Without one there is nothing to compare the outgoing condition against, which means no way to show that a mark, a stain or a broken fitting was not already there when the tenant moved in. Claims in that situation are extremely difficult to sustain, and this is the single most common reason a self-managed bond claim fails.

You have a choice, and it is worth making deliberately. You can lodge a court application for the whole amount, which keeps everything in one place but is slower. Or you can let the Commissioner determine the bond portion and lodge separately for the balance, which gets the bond moving sooner. Which one makes sense depends on the size of the shortfall and how much of it you genuinely expect to recover.

It can, and this catches people. If part of the bond is refunded to the tenant, your insurer may treat that as affecting your ability to claim the same loss under the policy. Speak to your insurer or broker before you agree to a partial release, not afterwards. We are not insurance advisers, and this is exactly the sort of thing worth a five minute phone call to yours.

No. It is a free dispute resolution process. An expanded Consumer Protection team makes the decisions on the Commissioner's behalf, and avoiding court time and cost was the point of the reform.

Claims must be listed under set categories on the release application: damage caused by the tenant or their pet, unpaid rent, cleaning, garden maintenance, lost keys and other financial losses caused by the tenant. Fair wear and tear cannot be claimed, and neither can a brand new item where the damaged one was part way through its life. Every claim has to be supported by evidence, and the landlord must be able to show the tenant proof, such as a receipt. A number without a document behind it is not a claim, it is a hope.

No. Boarder and lodger bonds are held by the landlord rather than lodged with Bonds Administration, so none of this applies to them. Lodging arrangements sit outside the Residential Tenancies Act 1987 (WA) altogether, which is exactly why they need documenting carefully from the start. If you are running a room by room arrangement and you are not certain which side of that line you are on, ask.

The maximum pet bond rose to $350 under the same package of reforms. If you have an existing tenant, you can only ask them to top up to the higher amount at the next rent increase.