Date of moving out

ray giraffe

Hi this is actually about a problem I had last year, I'm curious as to what my rights were and how I should have solved it.

I was living in an apartment with 2 other people. One of these was a girl who was leasing the flat from the landlord. I was paying rent to this girl every month.

When I wanted to move out, I wrote a letter giving 28 days notice of moving out and popped it under the bedroom door of the girl I was paying rent to. The letter said that I was going to move out on September 6th.

Later that day she came to me raging that she was going on holiday for two weeks and wouldn't have time to find new tenants until she got back. I said to her that wasn't my problem.

It's a couple of weeks later - August 27th - and she comes and tells me that she has found a girl to move in when I leave BUT - will be moving in to my room on September 1st!! I say 'listen that's not what we agreed - I said I was moving out on September 6th' to which she says 'people are only looking to move in at the start of a month - i wouldn't be able to find anyone for September 6th. You can either move out on September 1st or stay till September 6th and pay rent till the end of September.'

I said to her - listen I gave you a letter with the date on it - she says with a smirk "what letter - I don't have any letter!".

I rang the landlord and he wanted nothing to do with it - he said it was between me and her. I thought to myself "how can I prove I have given her a letter?". In the end I figured that I had no choice but to move out on September 1st. I had to move all my stuff to my girlfriend's house for a week before moving it again to my new flat. I was so annoyed.

What should I have done?

D3PO

well if you were only renting a room it would only have been a courtesy to advise her of 28 days notice unless you signed something to the contrary.

wasnt an ideal situation and there no 100% right or wrong way to deal with it. Id have thought that unless there was an absolute reason you couldnt move 5 days earlier that you would have obliged anyway as that would be the nice thing to do regardless of notice and what not.

ray giraffe

D3PO wrote: »

well if you were only renting a room it would only have been a courtesy to advise her of 28 days notice unless you signed something to the contrary.

wasnt an ideal situation and there no 100% right or wrong way to deal with it. Id have thought that unless there was an absolute reason you couldnt move 5 days earlier that you would have obliged anyway as that would be the nice thing to do regardless of notice and what not.

Hi D3PO,

I did give her 28 days notice, which should be enough. It was very inconvenient for me to move out 5 days early because I basically had to move my stuff twice. It was also an imposition on my girlfriend who had to put me up for that period.

What if I hadn't had any place to go when she only gave me 4 days notice?

Ray

D3PO

ray giraffe wrote: »

What if I hadn't had any place to go when she only gave me 4 days notice?

Ray

well you would have been within your rights to stay put of course. Id suggest reading betwen the lines this could have caused some tension and possible some vindictiveness on the leaseholders part i.e witholding your deposit (although no grounds to do so) or the likes.