Hawaii's §521-44 is short, fast, and unforgiving of missed paperwork — with a pet-deposit allowance added on top of one of the country's stricter base caps.
How much can a landlord charge?
One month's rent as the security deposit — plus, where pets are allowed (service animals excluded), an additional pet deposit of up to one month's rent. Nothing else may be collected as security, however labeled.
The 14-day clock
Within 14 days of termination, the landlord must return the balance together with a written itemized notice of every amount retained — unpaid rent, damage beyond ordinary wear and tear, and cleaning to the move-in standard — including copies of invoices or estimates where repairs are claimed. Miss the 14 days or skip the itemization, and the landlord forfeits the right to retain any portion.
The penalty
Beyond forfeiture, wrongful retention is recoverable in small claims court — Hawaii's district small-claims division was practically built for deposit cases, and landlords who withhold without the statutory paperwork lose on procedure before condition is even discussed.
Why Hawaii deposit disputes are documentation disputes
Fourteen days, invoices attached, total forfeiture: Hawaii's procedure is airtight, which routes every surviving dispute straight to the substance — condition at move-in versus move-out, in a climate where salt air and humidity make the wear-and-tear line genuinely blurry. Blurry lines go to whoever holds the sharper record.
SealMove is the sharper record. Every photo and video is cryptographically sealed the instant it's captured, independently timestamped, and locked with Face ID into a tamper-evident archive. At move-out, the walkthrough lines up room-by-room against the sealed baseline — and either party can send the other a report to review and acknowledge, no app required.