Landlord illegal entry terminates lease??

[CTTenant]

Hello, maybe someone can help me decide what to do.... I really need advice.

My family lives in CT where we have a lease expiring on Sept 30, 2008. We gave notice in early July that we'd be moving in August but realized that we would still owe rent through Sept. We bent over backwards to allow the landlord to show the apt, with notice, at least 7 times, until one morning she just unlocked the door, entered at 8:45 am with my whole family sleeping, and proceeded to show the apartment with NO NOTICE whatsoever!

Needless to say I was extremely shocked and horrified to be woken up with the sound of banging on my BEDROOM door and shouts of my name. When I opened the door I saw one of my sons struggling to put on a pair of pants in the living room as two women who had just broken into our home stood by asking to view my bedroom... where my husband was still sleeping. I refused and walked them out despite the landlady's protests.

We moved out a week later as planned, paying August rent in full. We did a 'walk-through' where the landlady signed off that we would be due $2400 after water charges deducted in security deposit return and the apt was in good condition. At that time I thought we would still have to pay Sept rent, but I am still traumatized by the event and we have therefore not paid Sept rent ($1500) yet in anticipation of possibly suing for damages since we've discovered that she, in effect, broke the lease that day.

Any advice if I should move forward with pressing charges? Is it actually too late to do so? The landlord's husband is a lawyer. Thank you for any comments.

You owe the rent. Despite the fact that the LL violated state law in not giving prior "reasonable notice" (state requirement) of entry, you cannot immediately terminate the lease at that very second. You must send written notice to the LL that you intend to do so based on the entry violation. Further, some state laws hold that you must give the LL warning that you will terminate if the behavior happens again. (You'd have to look up your state law to see if you must issue this warning.)

Either way, unless you notified the LL in writing that you would immediatly terminate the lease because of the unannounced entry. you must pay the rent. The LL had no knowledge of your termination because of the entry unless you wrote such. You now owe the rent and any late fee stated in your lease.

It would do you little good to try to press criminal charges. The LL owns the house and the court would tell you it was a civil matter, not a criminal one. You could try to sue in civil court, but since it only happened once, it is very doubtful you would be awarded anything. Especially if you did not notify your LL in writing that this was unacceptable. Sorry.

Thanks for the reply Unreg, I appreciate the insight.

~~Sec. 47a-18a. Judicial relief if landlord unlawfully enters. If the landlord makes an entry prohibited by section 47a-16 or 47a-16a, or makes repeated demands for entry otherwise lawful but which have the effect of unreasonably harassing the tenant, the tenant may recover actual damages not less than an amount equal to one month's rent and reasonable attorney's fees. The tenant may also obtain injunctive relief to prevent the recurrence of the conduct or terminate the rental agreement.~~

Here in CT there only needs to be illegal entry once and the lease can be immediately terminated. I do have the event noted in writing, and she signed it, that the entry was unacceptable and illegal on August 14th. Again I already paid August rent in full last month.

I believe you are probably right, however, that I will need to continue to pay rent, the final September portion, until the effective date of the termination notice I might send. Hardly worth it now except on principle. I guess my more specific question, which I didn't spell out very well, was can the effective date be retroactive to the event. I imagine it can't be but I thought I'd see if anyone here knew for certain.

Looks like my probable recourse will be small claims court for damages if I decide to pursue this. I'm not sure it's worth it except to show here she can't just break into people's homes. The damages awarded would be equal to one month's rent and I would donate it to charity. I just don't want to see her benefit monetarily and continue to show no remorse. It's just difficult to swallow that pill seeing as how she acted criminally (according to CT Gen Statutes) and has refused several interested renters in the meantime. She told me they weren't people "you and I would have dinner with" whatever that's supposed to mean. I pretty much will eat dinner with anybody!

Thanks again, at least I got to vent a little bit,
CT

I'm not sure what she meant by that comment either. But as long as she is not discriminating against someone based on the 7 protected classes, she can turn people down as she sees fit. The denied party could file a civil suit against her if they wished. Perhaps she meant that they didn't meet her criteria for an acceptable tenant?!?!?

Judicial relief or injunctive relief must be granted by a court. You cannot just stop paying rent. Pay the rent for September. If you wish to challenge the entry and think they judge would grant relief, feel free to sue. I don't know how tenant-friendly your state is though. Don't be surprised if the judge won't give you relief for only one entry. In many states the judge wouldn't grant it unless there was more than one illegal entry or repeated entries that harassed you. Plan on the LL claiming that it was a misunderstanding, that notice was sent but you didn't receive it, that it was an honest mistake,... and so on.

In many states, the LL actually has no requirement for prior notice before he enters. (The 24 hours notice is only in some states.) Be glad there is a statute in place in your state requiring notice.

No, notice cannot be given retroactively. If you wished to immediately terminate, you had to do it at the time of the incident. You can't go back to an incident a month ago and say you wanted to terminate the lease then and were giving notice at that time. Give it now, and do so in writing (keeping a copy).

Here's what my husband and I decided to do. Since we are more interested in a small display of justice as opposed to the money itself, he is hand-delivering a check for rent Sep.1 - Sep.25 ($1250) with a notice that we are terminating Sep.26 (today) due to their lease default on Aug.14. With 5 days left on the original lease (we have been in our new house since Aug 22 so my son could start school on time), we will donate an amount equal ($250) to this sum to a charity which I know that the landlords support, in their name.

If they wish to take us to small claims court for the final 5 days rent ($250) which they may mistakenly believe is owed, then we will counter sue and take our chances.

There is a possibility they would also take it out of the $2400 security deposit they owe us (amount agreed to & signed upon walk-thru). We'll cross that road when we get to it, but it would be fairly petty of them considering the donation in their name and the criminal trespass.

At the least we would be hopefully getting a bit of our point across that they can not just break into someone's home. Thanks for the replies!

Sounds like a fair solution. The LL gets his 30 day notice and rent for the period. You get your point across. The charity gets a donation. A win-wn for everyone involved.

But in future, be aware that a lease doesn't terminate, even through the LL's violations, until you issue notice of such. The LL may well subtract the other 5 days of rent from the deposit and rightfully deduct it from your refund. You must issue a termination at the time of an incident. I doubt a judge will hold that the event was so traumatic that it took you over a month to terminate the lease because of it.