Need support for cancellation of Apartment Lease
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Need support for cancellation of Apartment Lease
I have signed a lease for 6 months but there is a big problem with a bad odor, the air conditioning is plugged. After see the filter compartment, it looks like there are o maintenance for years.
Asked on February 27, 2017 under Real Estate Law, Texas
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 7 years ago | Contributor
Have you given the landlord written notice of the problem? That's the first prerequisite: the law requires written notice to the landlord of a problem or condition like this. Then you have to give the landlord a reasonable amount of time, after they received the notice, to correct the condition, which could easily be 2 - 3 weeks for them to get a maintenance person in.
After that, if after written notice and a reasonable opportunity to correct it, the landlord does not fix the issue, IF the issue is so bad (i.e. the odor so bad) that a reasonable person would consider it makes the apartment/home uninhabitable, then you could terminate the lease. But if it's somewaht unpleasant but not so bad as to make the unit uninhabitable, you still could not legall break the lease. Only problems significantly impairing habitability allow terminatino of a lease.
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