Kairos Living review: Move-out charges

All the glowing 5-star reviews you see are leftovers from when DR Horton owned these homes and there was a wonderful on-site leasing agent who actually cared. That ended the moment this foreign-backed private equity company out of Chicago took over in March 2025.
We rented this home from July 2024 until we moved out on March 20, 2026 (almost 20 months). Kairos never performed any baseline or move-in inspection when they acquired the property. Instead, they are treating a previously occupied, used home as if it was delivered in “pristine, brand-new condition.”
Their so-called “move-out inspection” is actually labeled “1 – INITIAL REHAB – Pre-Construction Walk Inspection” and was completed by a local scam artist that they contract with named Juan Guaviria on March 23, 2026 — three days after we moved out. In their April 1 response letter they claimed the home was in “pristine, new condition upon move-in” and that the wall smudges were “beyond routine living” and “highly concentrated on a single wall” which exceeds normal wear and tear. Their own Exhibit A photos (full of shadows, duplicates, poor lighting, and mislabeled rooms) only further weakened their argument — our clear, well-lit move-out photos easily disprove it.
Their “inspector” photographed shadows and minor scuffs to justify charging us $2,986.20 for a full interior repaint (part of the original $3,226.20 “damages” bill). He even snapped a picture of a dirty blue air filter to try to bill us — even though we have multiple dated emails and photos proving we changed only white filters the entire time.
Before we renewed and signed the lease with Kairos, we showed them our previous DR Horton lease that explicitly permitted small nail holes and hanging pictures. In their June 2, 2025 renewal email, Kairos told us it was “no big deal” and to simply inform the move-out team. Yet they still tried to charge us for normal wear and tear after 20 months of living here (only 8 months under their management).
This entire process violates Florida Statute §83.49, which strictly prohibits landlords from deducting normal wear and tear from a security deposit and requires a proper, timely itemized notice.
They first threatened to send us to collections after just 30 days. After we disputed with our own detailed move-out photos (the ones they required us to upload), they offered a “goodwill reduction” down to $1,825. They sent a court worker to hand-deliver the notice to intimidate us. The tenant portal wasn’t updated until yesterday. Today (April 10, 2026) they sent another email threatening legal action if we don’t pay TODAY — while we are actively disputing this with the BBB and FDACS. Any payment would be strictly under protest.
(See the attached 10 photos: photos showing what they used to justify a repaint — minor scuffs and shadows to justify the entire home being repainted vs our photos, the front page of their inspection labeled “Initial Rehab / Pre-Construction Walk,” pictures of Juan’s HVAC filter and ours, communication before leasing with them, the damages charge of over $3k, their response letter, and 2 weeks after the damages charge the email threatening legal action when we originally had 30 days or they would report to collections.)
This is a classic private equity money grab dressed up as property management. They openly advertise to contractors that they can make $1,000–$8,000 per turnover and happily pass those inflated costs to tenants. Plenty of other tenants are reporting the exact same shady move-out scams.