dear message board--it would be great if someone could respond!!!
Last semester my boyfriend and I decided we would move off campus and pay our rent with the refund check that we would recieve from our college--through our loans. We found a place that seemed to be "ok"---renting our own room and then sharing common rooms with the others in the house so we moved in. We signed a lease agreement for the semester and paid upfront and in FULL. (We both had our own lease). We decided at the end of the semester that we would rent the rooms week-to-week because we would stay at school to work. We agreed on a week-toweek rent with our landlord and asked him if we could leave our stuff there over a two week period so we could go home for christmas. He was going to charge us for storage but then decided not to since my bf always shoveled and did things without charge. When we got back the second week in January we found out from our financial office of our college that our refund checks would be smaller than estimated. We then realized we could not afford to re-new our lease agreement there and had to find some place cheaper. (Which to me wasnt a bad idea I was the only female now left in the house and had many uncomfortable encounters with barely clothed men and the bathroom)...We found a place on the 12th of January and looked at it on the 15th and decided to take it on the 16th. We were suppose to renew our lease on the 18th. We moved out on the 16th and our landlord was very angry making the process almost unbareable (screaming calling names, slamming doors, even called my mom names and harrassed my bf at his work place). Now the problem--my bf so far is being summoned to court bc our ex landlord claimes he owes him over 1700.00 bc of damages (we have pictures there were no damages) bc of cleaning due to insufficient notice of moving...and storage for those two weeks we agreed he wouldnt charge us for...and for the rent of jan 18th to may 20th. The strange thing is I havent gotten sued in small claimes yet...probably will get my letter in the next week. My question is ...
IS THIS FAIR? We never formally agreed to anything with that lease---like price (which now we see he so happened to raise). He asked us in passing if we were coming back---he said "yeah" bc we thought he mean to school---we werent dropping out so we said "yeah". Can he sue for this?? He also never gave us our security back.
Isn't there something anywhere that gives someone in an oral agreement a way out before the action is suppose to take place?? I mean things happen in life---like a smaller check from college!!!
Plz respond!! Thanks--Scared College Student in NY