Q: Can an apt complex legally enforce requirements NOT detailed in the lease/a lease addendum? Is it time to get a lawyer?
I'm closing on a home; I've provided my 30 days notice as the lease stipulates. I've read my lease several times. I can't find any clauses which coincide with what I'm being told about: the inability to terminate my lease early; clauses that denote the complex will do nothing to aid in reletting my unit/I have to find a new tenant (me doing so violates my lease by the way); and a list of all fees due for move out. I asked for written copies of such verbal policies; the laws that say they can’t tell prospective tenants about my unit coming available/doing anything to get the unit re-leased until my original lease term ends (in 3 more months); and an outline of all of the fees that are supposed to be due and what date they want them paid on (I was told not to pay anything until a new tenant is found--this also violates my lease). They've acknowledged receipt of my notice, but won't provide written documentation for the added things they are telling me I'm bound by. It's odd and sketchy.
A:
In the absence of an agreement to the contrary, a lease for a specified term continues until the end of that term. For example, if you agreed to a lease for a term of one year with a commencement date of December 1, 2023, that lease does not end until November 30, 2024. The parties can agree (usually in the lease itself) to allow an early termination (typically for a fee). So, you are asking the wrong question. Unless your landlord HAS agreed to allow you to terminate your lease early, you cannot do so.
A landlord / apartment complex has no duty to help you find a new tenant or to accept a new tenant you find. If you breach the lease--for example, by vacating before the end of the lease term without paying rent--the landlord has a duty to mitigate its damages by trying to relet the premises. If it is successful, what you owe for rent through the end of the lease term may be reduced by what the new tenant pays for the remaining months of your lease term (after deducting any cost of reletting). For example, if you vacated now and did not pay rent for Sept-Nov, and the landlord was able to quickly get a new tenant into the premises Nov 1st at the exact same rent you agreed to pay, you would only have to pay rent for Sept & Oct under your lease. In that instance, if you find a new tenant that meets the landlord's qualification criterion, but the landlord refuses to accept that tenant, you would have a defense (failure to mitigate) based on how much that tenant would have paid through the end of your lease term if the landlord had rented the premises to that new tenant. Proving a failure to mitigate, and the amount of any mitigation of damages, is your burden as the party breaching the lease by leaving before the end of the lease term you agreed to.
As for "fees" supposedly due, unless your lease identifies those fees either in the lease itself or in some other written document incorporated into the lease (like a complex's rules), you have no obligation to pay any such "fees." However, if the "fees" are really a "cost" of reletting the premises (e.g. an advertisement, or leasing commission, etc.), those fees would be deducted from the new tenant's rent payment first to determine the amount of credit you will get for mitigation.
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