help with rental agreement

mom60
Sun, 03 Aug 2008 14:26:38 +0000

An update on the apartment in Berkeley-
I saw my friend last week and the girls finally have solved their problem. It isn’t ideal and it has been a pain but they are out of the lease and got back most of their money.
One of the girls siblings went to the apartment with the police. The apartment was vacant but it was in shambles. No cleaning or repair work had been done. After repeated attempts the landlord still would not answer calls to turn over the keys. He kept telling them they had told him Aug 15th as a move in date(the lease began June 1). As the girls were preparing a letter to send certified telling him they wanted out of the lease they get a call from the landlord saying he was releasing them from the lease because he did not want to rent to them. Two of the girls went up to Berkeley for a weekend to look for another apartment. They told the landlord they wanted to pick up a cashiers check for the refund. He did not answer the calls or emails they sent. They found another apartment in a complex with a management company. Wrote new checks (without having the refund yet- which was risky). A few days later they had a check in the mail from the first landlord - not a cashiers check but a personal check made out to all 4 of the girls. The bank would not cash the check for the two girls. They had to make arrangements for the other two girls to come up from 2 hours away. All four went to the bank which the check was drawn, all had to show ID and they now have their money back.They were lucky the funds were there. The landlord returned the last months rent and security deposit. He kept the first months rent. The girls now will have to take him to small claims court to get that back.