Mitigating Losses in PA (apartment, lease agreement, tenant, liable)

[Ginging322]

I was in a year-long lease and after a few months I lost all of my sources of income. I wrote the LL a letter giving them 2 months notice that I would be breaking the lease early and leaving them with 2 full months rent (so they would only be missing 2 months rent). I moved out on 4/28 and left my keys. I got a court summons today that was dated 5/4 because they want the other 2 months' rent. Over the past 2 months I have googled apartment listings and craigslist like crazy, but they never posted anything about it being up for rent again. When I go to court is this a valid point to help my case?

[PacificFlights]

I thought in PA, the courts recently ruled that a landlord does not have a duty to mitigate. So long as they don;t attemot to collect anything in advance or act in any way to acknolege and accept the early termination, they can let it sit even if someone is begging to move in. You will owe the rent as normal and all other terms of the lease still applies.

[STT Resident]

Originally Posted by PacificFlights

I thought in PA, the courts recently ruled that a landlord does not have a duty to mitigate. So long as they don;t attemot to collect anything in advance or act in any way to acknolege and accept the early termination, they can let it sit even if someone is begging to move in. You will owe the rent as normal and all other terms of the lease still applies.

I don't believe this is a new law in PA but one which has been in existence forever. It seems that under PA law, unless there is a specific clause in the lease which says that the landlord will make every effort to mitigate his losses (and this can and is upheld by the courts) the tenant otherwise is liable for the payment of rent for the remainder of the lease and the LL can basically sit on the place if he chooses. The only other exception is if there's a buyout clause for early termination.

Another good reason for tenants to understand their rights under their state landlord tenant laws and read lease agreements very carefully before signing them.