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Hello all,
When I moved to Louisiana, I noticed in my one-year lease a funny out clause in it for the landlord:
"Termination. This agreement and the tenancy hereby granted may be terminated by the Lessor at any time by giving to the Lessee not less than one full month's prior written notification."
This seemed like something I was used to seeing in a month to month lease so I had it amended to be more equitable before I signed:
"Termination. This agreement and the tenancy hereby granted may be terminated by the Lessor or Lessee at any time by giving to the Lessee/Lessor not less than one full month's prior written notification."
The changes were made in pen and initialed by all parties and this also made me feel more comfortable given that I found the landlord a bit shady. It turns out he was shady after all so I exercised the termination clause, gave one month written notice and moved out. I did a final inspection walk-through with the landlord and he signed that I left the apartment clean and with no damage that would require fixing. Then as I'm walking out he says he won't return my deposit because I broke the lease. I informed him that I abided by the terms of the lease and showed him a copy of the amended lease which he just dismissed. Is there any reason why I would not prevail against him in small claims court if I send him a letter demanding the return of my security deposit and he still does not comply?
From all that you have described you should prevail in small claims court. But I would first..
1. Verify what your states requirements are if any regarding the time line and documentation required for the return of your deposit. In many states if the landlord does not comply with that the looses any rights to the deposit.
2. Once the time line has passed, start with a demand letter, registered mail return reciept, demanding the return of the deposit, quoting what the law requires and the language in your lease that allowed you to terminate the lease with 30 days notice.
Threaten to sue for that, court costs and additional damages if the deposit is not returned.
The terms of the lease state that the security deposit will be returned within two weeks. That said, the state requires it be returned within a month or an itemized explanation for why any portion of it is not returned - I believe he will likely fail to send anything at all because his estimation of his cleverness exceeds reality. I was thinking I would go ahead and send the initial demand this week, then send a follow-up at the two week mark and then, at the one month mark, send a final letter. I would like to establish that I will have given him several opportunities to honor the terms of our contract.
Okay, I have given him my new address but not in an official letter (I hadn't yet found it when I issued my notice of intent to vacate) and I don't want him to be able say he didn't have a forwarding address.
Although you both had the right under the revision to terminate with 30 days, double check to make sure the timing (date of notice) is within any minimum requirement for the notice. A leases may contain a provision that notice (although only 30 days) must be given prior to the next periodic rental period. So, a notice given March 2 will not terminate the lease until until 30 days past the next rent date (lets assume April 1) making the actual end date April 30, not April 1. Just do a double check to make sure.
Do you have any wording after that states no penalties would incur if proper notice was given to break the lease early? If you have another section of the lease that talks about terminating the lease early and any penalties, that might apply.
In other words, you have the sentence above that you amended and all parties signed.
Then you have a section outlining the penalties of what happens when you break the lease early with or without notice.
There are no other clauses /provisions pertaining to termination / early termination - this is the only one in the lease. If he had a standard lease for the state it might very well have something along those lines but it's not a standard lease which is why I was suspicious from the start. This leads me to another question - does anybody know the law in Louisiana for default terms if a lease is found to be void?
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