The tenant for my first property broke the lease and moved out because a commission house became available to them.
(The property is in QLD.)
The penalty for breaking the lease was only one week rent which was just $210.
My property manager accepted without asking me, and the property stayed vacant for about 2-3 weeks.
So it was not so bad.
But I thought tenants were obliged to pay rents till a new tenant move in under the lease agreement if they had to break the lease.
And obviously I was wrong.
Some landlords try to get 1 year, 2 years lease from tenants feeling secured, but is it really?
They don’t mind paying just a few hundred dollars to break the lease, I think.
It means that a lease agreement works for only tenants as we, landlords, can’t kick them out during the lease, but they are free to move out paying just one week rent penalty.
Is that correct?
What do you think?strictly speaking, tenants are obligated to pay up until the day they signed for. Or until replacement tennants are found.
However, at the same token, landlords are obligated to mitigate their losses ASAP after a tenant moves out and not rely on tenants paying a lease. The courts could argue that an average house could be re-tennanted within one or two weeks.
One week is reasonable to expect the tenants to pay, any more than that and you may need to proove that you had advertised and marketed the property but it was not effective. your PM probably did not want to go through the hassel of proving anything and so just accepted the one week rent!
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phone 0412 437 582Hi Maruco
A Tenant breaking a fixed lease is obliged to pay all expenses incurred which the landlord would not normally have to pay if the lease had not been broken. Usually this includes rent until a replacement tenant starts paying, ads, cleaning, lease document prep, re-let fee, prep of condition report, etc. If the tenant objects to the length of time taken to replace the tenant, then the landlord might have to prove the rent advertised was fair market rent and that all reasonable steps were taken to re-let. The landlord is not obliged to take a bad risk replacement tenant .
With your lease breaking tenant, I would take all the bond for a start, not settle for one week’s rent. In this case, if the PM doesn’t have a good excuse for settling for less than your entitlement, then the PM should do the relet for free and thereby cut some of their own entitlement. Doesn’t sound like they looked after your best interests.
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Doesn’t sound like they looked after your best interests.I think if you had a frank chat with the Principal of the Agency and push came to shove, I think you’ll find that their number one goal is to look after the agency’s interest first.
The hapless Owner (one of hundreds typically on their books) is not at the top of their list. Maybe about # 4 or 5, for sure. But priorities # 1,2,3 must be satisfied first. It appears to me, as usual, like your priority # 4 got gazumped by one of their higher priorities.
When confronted however, there will be alot of hand waving and shoulder shrugging, but typically they are so beaten about the ears by lawyers and PC correctness, that fact will seldom be told to you face to face.
Maruco, if you are wondering why the Lease agreement doesn’t protect the Landlord, you only need to read the RTA and meet some of the Tenant Advocacy people who carry alot of weight to realise your rights as property Owner are seldom put at the top of the list.
Once I recognised as Owner of residential property my interests were not # 1, everything became clear and stress free. Tactics and strategy therefore changed…job sorted.
Good luck with your struggle.
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