Advice on legal lease issue

You had 3 mice over 2 months and have not really given the landlord a chance to figure out where it is coming from. I had a friend and it took 3-4 months for all to be caught and dealt with.

I rented for years and it sounds like your landlord is making a good faith effort to find/fix the issue.

I think he is being kind in letting you walk and just keep the security deposit. If i was the landlord i would hold you responsible for the full rent as that clause above yalks about persistent and no offense 3 times is not persistent. It is a pain that may take a bit to look for but ultimately it would have been solved.

Also you gave the guy 1 week to look for a tenant. That is impossible, either he would have to do a mid month rental or leave it empty for a month. First he would need to clean up and fix up, depending on condition and then find a renter.

In my opinion as both a renter, an owner and a landlord, you acted in compltely bad faith by running out and signing a lease and not even bothering to give any sort of notice until you found a place.

Had you not found a place for November, woudl you have stayed? Seems the only person you are looking out for is yourself, which is fine under most conditions, but not when you have a contract that you are trying to breach and then blaming the other party acting in good faith.

Fair enough - I appreciate your opinion. I guess my standard for getting things done is pretty high. I'd be fired from my job if i didn't get something big done "yesterday."

Get a cat.

I have to tell you if you can find any building in manhattan besides maybe the ultra luxury that meets your definition let me know.

Based on what you said the owner was responsive to your problem of the mice and was trying to help. Unless you want them to rip apart the apartment it takes time to figure out where they may be coming from.

Also remember at the end of the day most things favor the landlord unfortunately. In this case if you walked into court I would have to think you would lose even with that clause. Because they will ask him and ask you if anything was being done, the answer is yes.

Plus it is not like you had 15 constantly running around your apartment at all times. you had 2, they were attempting to figure it out, then #3 showed up and that became to many. So if i understand you had 1 at a time?

Did you even give the landlord a heads up that you were going to attempt to use the clause?

I have to say i am happy you are not a tenant in my apartment.

Landlord was so confident we would not have issues he told us to put the clause in the lease. I purposely wrote it very aggressively and he was fine with that. Next time I will write it insanely aggressively.

wait, so for over 6yrs there was no problem, then 3 mice show up over 2 months and you don't give him the benefit of the doubt and leave him hanging with no time to get a new tenant? geez - I think you are getting off rather easily with just the sec. deposit, which, let's face it, he can probably find reasons to keep the balance of anyway.

Where exactly do you live? Townhouse, hi rise, etc?

Of course he was fine with the language because he assumed he would have time to rectify the situation. Meaning that you actually found a landlord that cares enough to make things right.

Go and read all the articles about slumlords and see where your landlord falls.

I hope you have issues in your new place because it would be karma.

Had a tenant once who we had just fixed the stove, instead of calling and asking about a lingering smell a few hours after it was done, she decided there was a gas leak, went to a hotel and tried to stick us with a $200 bill, all done prior to a call or email. Finally split it just so we would not have to deal. There was absolutely nothing wrong, it was the lingering smell from testing to make sure the stove worked adn the contractor had left open the window to let the remaining smell out.

Point is why would you run away from this place when someone actually does things for you. My guess is you wanted out and this is your excuse. Now you are unhappy that wiht no notice the landlord wants to keep the security deposit as a termination fee.

We wrote the clause for a very specific reason - we did not want mice, period. It is a rather expensive apartment. As far as I'm concerned two months worrying about mice, finding things chewed, and tip-toeing around is two months of wasted rent. I've seen entire buildings go up in NYC in about 2 months; hard to imagine you cant seal an apartment properly. Interesting to hear your point of view however.

Where have you seen an apartment building go up in 2 months?

I do understand what you are saying, but out of curiosuity, did you offer to move all your furniture away from the wall and give them a clear view of every area they could be coming from? It really is not always so straightforward depending on how many rooms where they may be coming from.

Oh and none of us want mice, it is not just you. Unfortunately in they city, there is just no way to guarantee they will not come out.

based on a perponderance of the evidence, I have to side with the landlord

agreed, 3 mice in 2 months is not persistent, landlord wins

go look at the how long can you be charged for MCI thread for an idea of a bad landlord and living conditions. Guy actually posted link to pictures. Or read curbed ny today for a bad experience.

when i owned a coop, after the third mouse, i pinpointed the location. found a small hole in the sheetrock and sealed it. that was it. were you able to pinpoint where the mice were coming from?

on another note, my cat had a blast catching and playing with the mice for 1/2 the night before killing them and leaving them for us to find in the morning :0).

What a pussy. I hate guys like you. 3 mice over 2 months and you go through all the effort of moving and finding a new place. PUSSY. Go back to Greenwich

I have to say, I agree. I HATE RODENTS but they're a fact of life, probably everybody has to deal with them at one point. It sounds like the OP is a diva & is lucky if he/she is only out the deposit.

I think that clause is a great idea. I had my first mouse in September and have had two since, totaling 3 since september. I am so fed up. My land lord came and "sealed" things up. It was a horrible, he left my apartment a disaster, wrappers of and garbage on the floor, and his sunglasses in my apartment. Next I hired an outside person by myself to seal up to the apartment. Things were fine for a few weeks but we saw a mouse again last week. I called the managent company, and the landlord, and no one has called me back. I am so fed up.

I'm VERY pro-tenant, but in this case I have to side with the OP's landlord.

Also, mice are sneaky shape-shifters and can get in through much smaller openings than one might think ... for example, the little air-space under the entry door.

At least he didn't leave sunglasses in your apartment.

OP is probably the guy who complains on TripAdvisor that there were mosquitoes on the porch of his hotel in North Carolina during July.

i'll rent you my cat for $25/hr. she'll do the trick. i live in the west village and have had no mice problems since she moved in.

Another wow discussion.

I wish we could get more postal from small landlords about problems with their tenants.