You may have missed that there is a new lease and the girl is not on it, and the landlord has been instructed not to allow her to sign it without another lessee present.
Yep. New people, new lease = new division of rent. If every one of the other roommates has agreed on a set formula, why should she get to hold out and dictate what she thinks is fair?
Check the lease, or ask the landlord, but I’m willing to bet you are specifically NOT allowed to sublet to anyone. In fact most leases I’ve signed even go so far as to state that someone not listed on the lease is not allowed to reside in the apartment/duplex/condo etc for more then three days with out written permission from management. If you want her out, call management and tell them that you won’t be signing the lease as long as someone will be subletting. Just mentioning that will most likely result in the landlord making some phone calles to some of the tenents and her and she’ll probably be gone. Also, if you ask her to leave and she doesn’t I believe you can have her picked up by the police and cited for tresspassing. If she wants to be on the new lease that’s fine, but I think everyone better come to some sort of a WRITTEN rent payment arrangement BEFORE the new lease is signed. Sometimes (I’ve seen it done in the past) the landlord will write each person their own lease, so no one can wiggle out of their payments. It makes collecting the money more difficult for the landlord if someone absconds, but some will do it to rent the place out.
IANYL, this isn’t legal advice, standard disclaimers apply, blah blah blah
Laws of rental property vary state by state, and even city by city, with that in mind, let me pose more questions:
While property wasn’t my best class, did you all agree to sign the lease together? Were any promises made to each other to sign this new lease? Are you sure TenantX (the girl cousin) isn’t a valid sub-lessee or assignee (not really a significant point, but it will help clear up some of these sub/non-issues brought up by other posters)? Was TenantX included in these discussions for the new lease? I have the suspicion that she was, and that she intially was needed for her to rent the room to lower your overall rent. However, more facts would clear that up. Was any consideration given? By consideration, I mean anything of value, even nominal, even a future promise.
As others have pointed out, your lease is between you (the roommates) and your landlord (the lessor). If she was never included in the discussion to use her as a roommate – meaning, she didn’t actively take part in the discussion between you, your roommatese, and herself – then, I don’t see a problem telling the landlord that you (you and your friends) are going to be the only roommates, and that the lease agreement will be between all of you, excluding TenantX.
However, since I do not know what type of agreement she has with her cousin, whether or not she is a sublessee, and the property laws of the state/city you all live in, she may or may not have a valid claim to extend her lease. She most likely doesn’t, and I’m too busy to do a search to see what the rights are of a former lessee. In most cases, once an agreement is done, it’s done. However, property always has special circumstances.
A lease agreement is a contract. Contracts for property, particularly leasing for a term of one year, require certain construction requirements for validity according to what is commony called a Statute of Frauds. Basically (long story short), all of the tenants and the lessor must agree to the lease agreement in writing. For example, all of you and lessor draw up an agreement outlining the terms and conditions of the lease, and once all agreed, the parties execute it. Conversely, if all the parties orally agree to a lease, but the lease is not evidenced in writing, then, without more (as in additional facts which I will point out below), the Statute of Frauds becomes a defense for a party to not executing the lease.
However, there are some exceptions. Long story short, one of the exceptions to the Statute of Frauds defense is that one of the parties has detrimental reliance (also known as promissory estoppel). Detrimental reliance is when a party acts in If you all, including TenantX, talked about all living together and there was consideration given (promises even), and she relied on those promises to her detriment, and you knew about that or it is reasonable for you to know that she would act on that promise, that she will be able to enforce that lease.
Assuming that she is not a valid lessee in some degree, and assuming that there was no promissory estoppel from your actions, and assuming there is nothing funky in the local law/ordinances, then it is the landlord who should be the one giving her notice to vacate. The kicking out of the former lessee is the landlord’s obligation.
The best advice I can give you is to talk to the local legal aid or tenant union/renting board/attorney. Bigger cities and college towns have offices set up for specifically this type of issues.
Tenant//landlord agreements vary from state to state (assuming you’re in the US).
In Texas, for instance, if you pay rent, you are legally a tenant with full tenant rights, regradless if you signed a lease or not.
See Orgain v. Butler, 478 S.W,2d 610, 614 (Tex. Civ. App.–Austin 1972, no writ); Vinson v. Horton, 207 S.W.2d 432 (Tex. Civ. App.–Texarkana 1947, no writ).
Tapioca Dextrin:
Regarding what you mentioned about Texas tenant’s laws, doesn’t that only apply if a) the person accepting the rent has the authority (by being the owner or the owner’s agent) to rent the place and b) the person with such authority is directly paid by the tenant?
Not necessarily true. She’s not a squatter because she is paying rent. Squatters are those people who claim ownership of land via adverse possession, put simply. Depending on the jurisdiction, she may be considered to be a holdover tenant. She may also be a valid assignee of the lease. In present times, squatters and holdover tenants are not looked up too favorably by the courts and lawmakers, but they still have some rights. For instance, adverse possession is still the common law in a lot of areas.
This is where it gets pretty tricky. From your fact pattern TonyF, fellow posters are assuming that you all negotiated to be all parties to the lease agreement. If that is true, and she has some sort of detrimental reliance, she can enforce her right to the new lease. Likewise, the landlord can enforce the lease upon you all, and have you all work out the payment of the rent on your own, and breach you all for non-payment. Practically speaking, it is more trouble than it is worth, and depending on the rental market, if I were the lessor, I would just decide not to lease to any of you. However, I am off on a wild tangent from the facts at hand.
More to the point, if this is the case: that you all made promises to each other to enter into a lease and all made promises to the landlord to enter into the lease, then I suggest you find some local lawyer/tenant union to sort things out. With luck and reasonbleness of the parties, you all may be able to talk things out amongst yourselves first, before seeking third party guidance/intervention.
Not to speak for Tapioca, but I believe your questions are satisfied if the tenant in question is paying rent directly to the landlord in lieu of the original rentor (her cousin). This was not specified in the fact pattern, however. But, Tapioca does bring up an interesting point.
Well, that might be what she wants, but that doesn’t mean it’s what she should get. If my lease with my landlord ends, and he decides to rent to someone else, then i don’t get to keep my bedroom just because i feel like staying.
Damn fucking right he’s being fair. If it’s his name (and his friends) on the lease, they are the people who have effective control over the house. And it has nothing to do with whether or not it means more expense for the woman. Even if she agreed to pay the extra money, they shouldn’t have to have her there if they don’t want her. And, with the way she’s acted, i’d probably want her out of there anyway.
In many cases, yes they are. Just not in this one.
Be careful with letting her spend even a single night in the residence if you don’t have something worked out.
I heard of a situation in my area where a guy found he needed to give his non-rent-paying cousin (who’d been living with him for a month) two weeks notice when he kicked him out.
Honestly, she sounds like the kind of person you probably don’t want to be keeping in your life, but I might be misinterpreting the situation, and she might just be young and completely ignorant of how leases, the law and landlords really work.
If she’s actually a jerk, dear Lord, keep her off the new lease. You’ll regret it otherwise.
If she’s just a little naive and she’d be an asset, try to reason her into signing on terms that would be fair to all persons concerned.
As a personal aside, I’d hate to be splitting a lease as many ways as you’re splitting it. I suspect you’re jointly and severally liable for any rent deficiencies your roommates develop, which could really suck for you if the dwelling sustains partial abandonment or job loss. This would suck much more if the remaining employed tenants were incapable of meeting said deficiency.
Most states, if the lease is silent on rights at termination, require, in writing, that a notice be given to the tenant that he has to move out at the end of the lease period (other states differ, and put the onus on the renter, some states don’t have that requirement (but that’s probably very few), etc.). Notice is typically 30 days, sometimes 60. If no such notice is given, then the renter becomes a holdover tenant, typically, depending on the state. I’m willing to bet that a majority of the states default over to holdover tenancy when the lease agreement is silent on rights upon termination. The tenant becomes a month-to-month tenant until notice is given to vacate. However, such notice is typically withdrawn once the lessor accepts rent payment.
In other states, if the property is used for agricultural purposes (I think Wisconsin is one such state), then if the lease is silent on such terms, the holdover tenancy is a year. The same goes for Section 8 (federally subsidized) housing.
You are correct, of course. I guess i was assuming, in my hypopthetical case, that i had been given the requisite notice.
Also, in the case of the OP, the person whose name is on the lease has agreed to terminate the arrangement and move out of the house. Presumably, the agreement between landlord and tenant regarding the end of the tenancy was all done properly. Thus, the woman in question knew that the tenancy was coming to an end, and she has no standing in the new landlord-tenant agreement. If i were the OP, i’ll tell her to get on her bike.
I’m no expert in this area, but it sounds to me like you should be extremely careful about what precedents you set. There are situations you can get in where, having allowed this person to live with you, you have allowed themselves to become established as tenants and you’re required to go through eviction procedures.
The answer about what you should do requires you to make a decision: do you want this person out, or do you simply want to find out how to force her to agree to new terms? The first option seems like it should be doable if you handle it correctly, but you might have to start handling it correctly ASAP. Give the landlord a heads up that there is a person (who isn’t on the lease) living there who thinks she’s going to be allowed to continue living there, but that you do not want that, and you expect the apartment to be vacant when you move in. This will give him the opportunity to post notices that might be legally required some period of time before actually booting her. One complication may arise if you have made a verbal agreement about her staying there. However, it sounds like you have not actually arrived at a verbal agreement if you gave her terms and she did not accept them. That may be an important point if you have to get down to legally evicting her: it might be tempting to concede that, yes, you had a verbal agreement because you had talked about her staying there. But if you couldn’t actually come up with terms that you both agreed on, you have no agreement, so don’t concede that you do.
If you want to allow her to stay, but are looking for ways of forcing her to accept new terms, I think there are probably ways, but in my opinion you’re kind of screwed. What’s to stop her from saying, “yeah, ok, whatever…new deal” and then simply paying you the old amount? You going to take her to court? If she turns out to be a pain in the ass, the fact that you let her “move in” with you means getting her out is much more complicated. Make a clean break and move into an empty apartment.
However, one thing that might work is to let her know about your “clean break” option: “Look, here are the new terms I’m offering you. If you want to be a pain in the ass about it, I can arrange to have you kicked out of here when the old lease ends. All I have to do is say ‘why is there a person living in my new apartment I just leased? This person is not on my lease.’” I’d still be a little wary of living with someone you had to threaten in this way, but it could work.
Agreed 100%. Imagine a scenario where I’m sleeping on my friend’s couch for a couple of months, and his lease comes to an end. Before he moves out, can I simply tell the new tenants that I’m staying, and that I get their couch? Hell no.
Of course, there are two sides to every story. Maybe if the girl in question had posted her side here, and you had read it first, then maybe you would have been more sympathetic. Based on the information in the original post, she might have posted the following query. Read through it, and tell me what advice you might give to someone in this situation.
There you are, exactly the same information just expressed slightly differently.
How would you advise her?
I would tell her to move out, since she is in a completely no-win situation.
I think the answers to your questions, so far as I’ve gathered from this thread are:
- Yes.
- Probably Yes
- Definitely no.
- Of course not. However they don’t have to allow you to sign their lease (since as far as I know you cannot be forced to enter a legally binding contract against your will, and their will is not to live with you under the circumstances you desire) in which case you’ll be on shaky legal ground staying in the apartment.
- Move out
- No way
I would advise her to move out. She has few rights in the situation described and has no wish to compromise. Obviously the situation will never be suitable.
The answers to the six questions are:
- Yes
- Yes
- No
- No
- They’re not “harrassing” you.
- Are you an idiot?
Actually, given that this is GQ and not the Pit, my answer to Q. 6 asked by this hypothetical girl would simply have been “no.”