Quiet Enjoyment and the Code Inspector
July 30, 2007
You may have noticed a clause in your lease agreement which talks about your right to “quiet enjoyment.” What this means is that the landlord will act in such a manner that no one can come in and displace you from the rented premises during the time that you are paying the rent there.
But if the landlord does not have the place up to code, and you call the code inspector and the code inspector cites the landlord for several violations, the landlord will have to bring the place up to code. If the landlord does not bring the place up to code, the the code inspector could post a 24 hour notice to vacate upon the rented premises, and then have you and your things tossed out the next day. If this happens, this would be a breach of the “quiet enjoyment” clause of the lease agreement on the part of the landlord.
Once you can show that the landlord has breached the lease agreement, then this absolves you of the duty to pay further rent on the lease.
So calling the code inspector may be one way to get out of your lease, but you should be warned that it might happen sooner (24 hours) than you think. So be ready to go if you summon the code inspector out to your place.
You can read up on other ways to get out of your lease agreement read more here.
I need help actually. The place I live now is definitely not working for my husband and I and we want to get out of our lease. Here are the things that have happened since we moved in, April 2007. We were on our honeymoon the second week of July and got a notice under our door that we were to be evicted if we did not pay our rent. We gave our check to them on the 1st of July as usual, but put it in the drop box because it was a Sunday. My mother was watching our place for us and come to find out, rent checks and money orders had been stolen. Other tenants had said that the same situation has happened 3 times since December. The previous manager who signed our lease also called my mother and admitted that the checks were stolen. We get back and the leasing agent said there was no proof that they were stolen even though we had heard otherwise. We wanted to get out of our lease then because we felt that our safety was in danger. Our checking account number was out in the open so someone could easy use that to their advantage. We cancelled the check and closed the account, but didn’t feel it was fair to us to get an eviction notice instead of being told the checks were stolen. The leasing agent said that it was their policy to assume people don’t pay rent and send out eviction notices. The apartment complex did not make a police report about it nor did they contact corporate. My mother had made a police report and the police never contacted the apartment complex. My husband called the corporate office 3 times and talked to 3 different people and they said they were surprised by what he told them and that the information would be passed on to someone and they would contact us. Nothing happened. Here we are a month later and still no answer. The leasing agent told us that they had corrected the problem with the drop box for rent, but it is the same exact box. Instead, they sent out an advertisement with August’s rent bill stating that we can apply online to pay our rent online instead of writing a check. That’s their fix??? Give me a break. Information can be stolen just as easily as it can be from that box! Needless to say, nothing has been done yet and we are getting quite upset. Then just last night, we witnessed a car break-in. Now we feel even more unsafe than before. During the month of June and May, we witnessed several times, 5 or 6 gentlemen outside by a car and appeared to either be selling items or doing a drug deal because when my husband and I would drive by, they would shut the trunk and stare at us making sure we didn’t stop. Talk about unsafe!! If anyone can help us with this situation please do! We want out!!