RPA Tenant Rights Blog » Landlord Problems, Legal Questions » Deceptive wording in notice letter

Deceptive wording in notice letter

By Zipcat

Hi – our story.

We moved over from the UK and asked s for a 6 month lease. We have been contacted a month before we leave and told that we need to give 60 days notice, so will basically be paying for an extra 5 weeks.
The bad news: 
– We were sent a reminder letter and on the second page it said "Please remember that if you plan to move, a written 60 day notice to vacate is required".
– In the contract it says:
9. OPTION TO RENEW/RENT INCREASE: Upon expiration of this Lease, and at Management’s sole option, this Lease will automatically renew on a month-tomonth basis at a monthly rent, which shall be $100.00 higher at the current market rent. The resulting month-to-month Lease will be under the same rules and regulations of the expiring Lease. Resident must provide Management a 60 day advance written notice of Residents’ intent to vacate. If Management, at its sole option, chooses not to renew this lease, Resident agrees to vacate on the expiration date of Lease.  A Lease term of greater than one month may be required for
In my defense:
– We expressly stated in emails initially that we only wanted a 6 month lease, so in a sense we provided them a more than a 60 day advacne wrtten notice of our intent to vacate.
– Their language in the reminder letter is DELIBERATELY deceptive and focusses on the expiration of the lease, with NO mention in the reminder letter about the automatic renewal:

"Your current lease expires on 7/31/2013" and "..we invite you to renew your lease and continue to make Pillar at Santan your home"

In the context of their devious letter and shaky contract, I really feel as though we are being screwed here.

So, questions:

1 – Do I have any sort of leg to stand on?

2 – Can I pursue any kind of legal action?

Thanks very much

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YARPP

Edited on: Thursday, July 4th, 2013 12:40 am
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