The tenant who does not participate in the exit inventory does not escape repairs which would be linked to his damage, ruled the Court of Cassation.
The court can in fact be satisfied with an inventory of the exit premises established by the owner alone, if it finds sufficient elements to judge that there is excessive damage which would not be linked to normal use or vtust.
A tenant contested his conviction by arguing that the inventory of the premises, in view of which he was being asked to pay more than 3,000 euros, had been established non-contradictorily, by the owner alone, and that it was difficult to understand. Nothing says, he maintained, that the attached photos were taken in the apartment and when the premises were vacated. In addition, it includes equipment which was not mentioned in the inventory of fixtures and the difference in writing between the two inventory reports makes any comparison difficult.
However, the court sovereignly assesses what is submitted to it, recalled the judges of the Court of Cassation. And in this case, the condition of an apartment is a fact which can be proven by any means. Equipped with the inventory of the premises at the time of entry, the description of the owner after the tenant left and the photographs, the court was able to consider itself sufficiently informed, they explained. It was up to the outgoing tenant to contest and prove that these damages, for which he is in principle responsible for repairing, were not his fault.
(Cass. Civ 3, 7.9.2023, G 22-16.172).
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