Roomate Breaking lease w/ multiple Tenants

[JABIII]

I'm looking for some advice on breaking a year long lease that starts in six months, September.

-It currently has three signatures on it, but is for a six bedroom house that usually has four tenant and sublets the other two.

-I'm looking to remove just my name from the lease, the other two signers still want the house, and intend to find tenants, but in their own time. I have offered to attempt to find a suitable replacement to assume my name on the lease.

-Given that the landlord wants four signatures on the lease, is it legal for him to add another tenant to the lease without me resigning? I'm concerned that if I present someone to assume my portion of the lease, he'll just try to add him or her onto the lease without removing me.

-Given the requirement to mitigate actual damages in VA, does giving my landlord six months notice BEFORE the start of a lease limit my possible liability to have to pay him lost rent in September and beyond? Or does that only apply if all of us were breaking the lease?

-How do the other tenants fit into this, do they have any responsibility to help mitigate damages?

And finally is there anything that holds the landlord and/or tenants responsible if an unhabitable level of dirtiness (the reason I'm breaking in the first part) prevents me from finding interested parties to assume my portion of the lease?

Any and all answers would be greatly appreciated.

JAB

 

[Michael Wechsler]

JAB - this is a good question. I am not familiar with the specific landlord tenant laws in VA but I'll do my best to answer your questions.

1) It's perfectly fine for all parties to agree to add a fourth name to the lease. In fact, it benefits all of you.

2) The landlord may still want you are on the lease because you are acting as a guarantor for your new tenant. What if the new tenant doesn't pay the rent? What if the landlord thinks he is a bigger risk but will accept him because of your guarantee that the rent will be paid?

With regard to "mitigation of damages" - the landlord can't require you to pay the rent if you provided a suitable alternative. It doesn't mean that the landlord must also release you completely from the obligation to pay if your attempt to mitigate damages fails.

3) You haven't even entered the premises. You cannot claim that the place is uninhabitable or not clean as per the lease requirements six months prior to the lease.

4) If all of you have cosigned the lease, you're all technically responsible for the entire lease, individually and jointly. I would wonder whether your roomates would want you to replace yourself with a roomate they don't know as well.

In short - if all goes well with the replacement for you, then there is nothing to worry about. You will not pay anything on this lease. Regarding a release, I'm not sure there is one and you would need to consult the landlord tenant laws of Virginia to see if there is such a protection. I'm unaware of one at this time. In addition, I also haven't seen the lease. Without more, these are my thoughts.

 

[cashtary]

Similiar case

Your above advice was very helpful and I wanted to see if you had any insight on my situation:

6 months ago I signed a 1-year lease with two other tenants. I will now need to break that lease, however we are in a condo with very strict move-in/out rules. There is no subletting, and in order to have a new person move in, a new lease between the three tenants needs to be signed.

This gets complicated because only a portion on the units are rentals, and to invalidate the current lease would mean losing the spot for condo rental (there is a wait list to rent the condos out).

Basically, I want to know how much legality Board rules have in affecting leases. Should I legally be able to fin another tenant to move in under the same lease, or to take over my portion? If i break the lease, can the board invalidate it and throw out the other tenants?

Thanks a lot for the wisdom and insight...

 

[jharris352]

Cash, Please repost your question to your own thread. Otherwise people will answer the original post instead of yours and it is already old.