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How easy is it to break a rental lease

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Photo of Danielle v.
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7/10/2006 Danielle "The I come into a room like a happening Tornado" v. says:

I want to move- How easy is it?

  1. Photo of mokirobinson m.
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    7/10/2006 mokirobinson m. says:

    Usually very easy - esp. in this rental market.  Just talk to your landlord - he may want you to get an approved replacement but that shouldn't be terribly difficult.  How much time is left on the lease?

  2. Photo of B. n.
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    7/10/2006 B. n. says:

    If the landlord is nice and accommodating, it's always easy.  But it is kind of a pain to find a new tenant, and the landlord might not be immediately accommodating. If you want to make it easier, offer to do legwork for him/her - post an ad that you pay for, arrange to show the place to prospective tenants.  Whatever you can do to reduce the amount of additional work the landlord has to do to get a new tenant, the easier it will be for you to get out of your lease without any penalty.

  3. Photo of Maria D.
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    7/10/2006 Maria D. says:

    You can always break the lease - people break contracts all the time. You may want to offer to help find a replacement, that technique always seems to work and they can't pull an ass move and say that your move caused them to lose income on the apartment.

  4. Photo of jay h.
    7/10/2006 jay h. says:

    you can break the lease you just may not get your sec. deposit back.

  5. Photo of mei n.
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    7/10/2006 mei n. says:

    just like what the others said... it's pretty easy. i manage all our properties (my father's) and i'm usually pretty nice when it comes down to it. i just tell them that they need to find a new tenant and do the subletting with my approval of course. the money in terms of deposits and last month's rent will be transferred over to the subletter but you should be responsible for letting the subletter know of any damages you may have made while living there. the subletter usually gives you the money for deposit and last month's rent so everything from the owner just gets transfer to the new person.

  6. Photo of Alicia A.
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    7/10/2006 Alicia A. says:

    I'm so glad you posted this!  I'm thinking about breaking my lease also.  I'm about 99% sure that she has violated a term of the lease (99% sure we are paying utilities for an illegal apt).  Will I have any trouble?  Who should I call to lay the smack down, if necessary?

  7. Photo of B. n.
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    7/10/2006 B. n. says:

    Call the Rent Board and TEnants assn about the illegal utility charges.  You should probably document it with PG&E also, have them check your meter, turn off everything in your apartment and if your meter is still showing activity then you're paying for stuff that isn't in your unit - which is illegal if they haven't disclosed it to you.

  8. Photo of Gil S.
    7/10/2006 Gil "whoo hoo" S. says:

    If you sign a deal you are supposed to live up to the deal.   As with breaching any contract if you break a lease you're responsible for all of the landlord's financial losses.  That's lost rent, re-renting expenses, prorated broker's commissions, etc.  In an up market these expenses may be minimal, especially if you can help your landlord find a suitable new tenant.  The security deposit is not a limit on damages, it's just the money the landlord has availble before they have to sue you.  

    Your landlord's breaking a lease term doesn't mean you can move out scott free, no more than your breaking a lease term means the landlord can kick you out.  Most of these things create a cause of action for money damages, not for termination.

    That's a very small part of the theory.  In practice, it's whatever goes and whatever people do and agree to.  Landlords and tenants alike often don't bother with the law, they operate on rumor and wishful thinking, entitlement, leverage, and chutzpa.  Any landlord that is not living up to their responsibility or is defrauding or lying is probably going to do the same for your security deposit.  As a tenant you have an advantage because it's almost impossible to kick tenants out for nonpayment, and once you're gone you can disappear and it may not be worth the landlord's time to go after you for the money you owe.  You can usually work something out.

    If you're renting from a big apartment complex they probably have a collections process, and some kind of landlord-to-landlord registry of bad tenants, so they can screw up your credit.

    Be careful of subletting -- that turns you into a landlord, and if the subtenant defaults you're responsible for the lease payments anytway even though you don't live there.

  9. Photo of Alicia A.
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    7/10/2006 Alicia A. says:

    Gil -

    http://www.dca.ca.gov/...

    This says that she can kick me out with three days notice if I violate any term of the rental agreement...  Would I not be entitled to the same (e.g. move out with three day's notice if she violates the terms of the rental agreement)?

  10. Photo of Kristen N.
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    7/10/2006 Kristen N. says:

    Are you in SF?  If so, go talk to the SF Tenants Union (http://www.sftu.org).  They have drop-in counseling hours and are trained to help tenants with the whole range of housing issues.

    Good luck!

  11. Photo of Danielle v.
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    7/10/2006 Danielle "The I come into a room like a happening Tornado" v. says:

    Thanks everyone!!!

  12. Photo of Cathleya G.
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    7/10/2006 Cathleya G. says:

    Alicia -- while im no expert, I do know that California laws HEAVILY protect tenants over landlords, so I bet if you threatened to rat her out, she would probably be more than happy to let you break your lease penalty free.

  13. Photo of mei n.
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    7/10/2006 mei n. says:

    a lot of people make it out as if the landlord is the bag guy here. if your landlord has been good to you... why would you do something like rat them out? just talk to your landland. i'm sure their understanding. as a property manager... i'm willing to compromise with my tenants.

  14. Photo of Gil S.
    7/10/2006 Gil "whoo hoo" S. says:

    Alicia, the problem is you're using common sense and this is the law.  Landlords cannot kick tenants out in three days, more like a couple months if they're totally unresponsive and several more than that if they fight back with or without justification.  The website link discusses this in some detail so I won't repeat.  In any area of law it's a mistake to intuit that you have a symmetrial right break an agreement due to a perceived breach by the other side, because in most cases that's not true.  At that point it comes down to strategy anyway, not legal rights.

    There's a word for threatening to report someone else's lawbreaking in order to prevent them from asserting their legal rights against you -- extortion.  Also sometimes called blackmail.  Nasty game when you think about it, really.

    I don't mean to blow anything out of proportion.  If you want to go ahead and break a lease you can go ahead and break a lease.  Then you're in breach, which isn't like you likked a baby seal or something, it's just a broken contract.  The law, and/or the lease agreement, has a procedure for figuring out who owes what to whom in that event, and as everywhere in life there are practical realities and not just legal principles.  Whether you do it becuase you want to, need to, or aren't happy with the place usually doesn't matter, although you can sometimes blow a landlord's failings up into an excuse to leave or at least an offset to the money that you would owe the landlord.]

    Landlords are often petty, cheap, difficult, and shady, and so are tenants.  It's one of those races to the bottom, especially if you're not dealing with reputable people.

  15. Photo of Annie D.
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    7/10/2006 Annie D. says:

    check out  http://tenant.net/Othe...
    it will give you the actual laws. If you help them find a new tenant then there is not much they can do, as small claims court will only make you pay the lost revenue- if your landlord even goes that route.

  16. Photo of Pammy C.
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    7/10/2006 Pammy C. says:

    Alicia,
    Gil is right on most counts.  A lease is a contract and, legally, breaking it comes with the same consequences as breaking any other contract would.  The only point on which I disagree with Gil is how often LLs have to evict tenants.  There are some violations for which a LL can serve a three-day "cure or quit" notice (stop the violation or get out).  As a tenant, you do not have the same option.  The law requires you to give your LL 30 days notice of your intent to vacate (if you are on a month to month lease; if you are on a fixed lease, vacating before the duration of the lease is breaking the lease).

    To all who want to break your lease because the grass is greener...much of what people are saying (even though it sounds contradictory) is correct.  A lease is a contract; breaking it is a breach, giving your LL a cause of action against you for breach of contract.  That means your LL can sue you for the duration of rent remaining on your lease (e.g. 3 mos remaining x $1200 rent = $3600 damages).  However, your LL is legally required to mitigate damages, i.e. he can't let you move out, then just sit around and not look for another tenant  and then sue you for the unpaid rent.  So, if you find another tenant who has substantially the same credit as you (or whatever requirements your LL imposed on you when you moved in), your LL can't reject that person simply to pursue you for damages.  

    Hope this helps.  If you're in SF, Kristen's advice is probably the best on here - make your way to the San Francisco Tenants Union (where I volunteered for four years) and they can set you up.

    Good luck!

  17. 7/10/2006

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  18. Photo of Gil S.
    7/10/2006 Gil "whoo hoo" S. says:

    Sam, if you've got a way to evict a tenant in three days I think you can patent it.  3 months is about right.

    As you must know 3 day notice to pay/cure or quit does not get the tenant out in 3 days; it merely means that 3 business days after actual delivery of a valid notice the landlord establishes a claim (not a determination, a claim) that the tenancy is broken and that the tenant is therefore occupying the unit illegally.  From there the landlord has to file an unlawful detainer action and still has to go to court to prove the claim.  If the tenant is totally silent but stays in the unit, the landlord goes to the hearing, obtains a default judgment, enters the judgment, and then arranges for an eviction, all of which takes at least a month.  If the tenant fights it at all that adds a month minimum, several months at least if the tenant is crafty and tenacious (invalidating the pay-or-quit notice on technicalities to start the process from the beginning, claiming inaccurate calculation of rent, setting aside defaults, claiming breach or refusal to accept rent by the landlord, forging documents, claiming retaliatory eviction, and so on).  If it's a payment thing all the tenant has to do is to show up to court with a check for back rent and the judge is going to find hardship and reinstate the tenant on equitable grounds.  Ive seen tenants show up with a bad check.  The judge throws out or settles the unlawful detainer suit, the check bounces, and the landlord is back to square one except the judge is pissed next time, if the landlord's lucky enough to get the same judge.  If it's a claimed breach for anything but base rent it turns into a he said / she said thing and you can end up with a long drawn-out fight.

  19. Photo of Alicia A.
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    7/10/2006 Alicia A. says:

    Just for the record. I'm not saying that she's evil, just that there is shady activity that impacts me financially.  And she knows she's doing something wrong, that's why she denies me access to the fuse box, water heater, and meters.

    It's just a very frustrating situation because every time I talk to her about the problem, she either acts like she doesn't understand, makes excuses, or flat out refuses to talk to me.

  20. Photo of Mike W.
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    7/10/2006 Mike "UranusDeMilo" W. says:

    In San Francisco?  IT'S A PIECE OF CAKE!!!!!

    The lease on an apartment is not a an arrangement to protect the landlord from your moving out early.  It's an arrangement to keep the landlord from raising the rent.  This is how the property manager in my neighborhood put it to me about 5 years ago.

    With the current rental environment, landlords LOVE short term renters.  It allows them to re-adjust their rents every time somebody moves in and out.

    Just bring it up to your manager.  I'm sure there will be no problem, and if there is an issue, you'll probably be able to negotiate a penalty fee of some sorts.

  21. Photo of Cornelius S.
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    7/10/2006 Cornelius S. says:

    talk to the rent board.
    it's my understanding that the landlord can legally try to enforce the lease until he/she finds a replacement tenant. usually the landlord won't be a dick about it, especially if you have had a good relationship. then if you make it hard for the landlord it would be very costly and time consuming for him/her to try to sue you.

    i didn't have time to read all the previous posts, but i noticed that gil posted at length which is good news for you.

  22. Photo of anna s.
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    1/28/2008 anna s. says:

    I rented from a large community complex, that chose to be shifty.   I gave the landlord notice, and then posted ads proceeding to locate anyone to rent the unit.  Had serveral responses to the add.  In the meantime landlord rented the unit to a tenant for a date beyond that of the term of my lease, locking me in to pay the lease and preventing me from transferring.  But here is the kicker.  So we are in a battle over this as the landlord turned away two tenants, and did not check credit history.   Turns out that she lied to her company about my move out date, and to me about the move in date.  Typically the company would not hold a unit for more than 10 days.  So the company believing my move out date was later counted 10 days from the faulty date provided by the landlord, even though I signed documents for the earlier date.  They also threatened me with legal action if I did not surrender the unit on this date, this was in acceptance that this, and not the typical 30 day date would be the dte the unit would be made available.  

    The crux is, you can break your lease.  People get sick, lose their jobs, etc.   In this rental market where the landlord will be able to charg the next tenant more it should not be a problem.  If the reverse were true you may be on the hook for the difference in rent between what you were obligated to pay and that of the new tenant.   Communicate with your landlord, and document, document, document.  Do absolutely everything in writing, particularly if you are dealing iwht a large firm.

  23. Photo of Joo X.
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    1/28/2008 Joo X. says:

    I broke a lease in college after getting approval from the landlord.  She end up taking legal action against everyone on the lease.  Get everything in writing!

  24. 1/28/2008

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  25. Photo of Magdelyn P.
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    1/28/2008 Magdelyn "you've been designated for termination." P. says:

    Breaking the lease means you are walking away.  The landlord can charge you rent, even after you left.  But he must make a reasonable effort to rent the place, and thereby mitigate your damages.

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