State Specific Question About: MISSOURI (MO)

My landlord, who's a friend of mine, is wanting to still charge me rent until my lease is complete at the end of the year. I am buying a house and she is putting her rental up for sale at the same time. (She's also my real estate agent.) Can she legally still charge me all the those months rent if I'm not there and she's putting the house up for sale?

I don't know anything about MO, but in general, there are restrictions as to how much of the uncompleted lease must be paid by the tenant.

The promise embodied in the lease notwithstanding, it is a principle of contract law that the party injured by a breach of the lease cannot recover unless he/she makes all reasonable attempts to mitigate their loss. That means that the landlord must try to find a replacement tenant to pay rent in your place. Pursuant to this principle, most judges will order rent to be paid by the ex-tenant for only a limited period, often a maximum of two months, based on belief that the landlord could fill the vacancy within that time, if he tries.

In this case it is possible that the landlord will find that his prospects to find a replacement tenant are diminished by the fact that he wanted to sell at the end of the lease. He could argue that he is entitled to rent until the end of the lease OR he can find a replacement tenant, whichever comes first, with unpredictable success. If the landlord decides to put the house on the market before the end of the lease term, it could be argued that he is not doing everything to mitigate his loss.

Hello,

Usually when speaking about a Residential lease, the courts will mandate the LL is required to mitigate their damages. even though the LL is the non-breaching party

In your case if your "friend" is not going to re-rent the unit but offer it for sale instead, that's their choice but at the same time your "friend" is not acting in good faith to re-rent, thus they forfeit the right to collect future rent under the contract

I find it fascinating that it is always the LL that is the bad guy.

LL and Tenant both agreed, signed a lease.(Friends in the beginning)

Then something changes in tenants world and they don't understand why LL wants them to honor the original agreement.

I agree LL should try to mitigate damages to tenant but that doesn't release tenant from obligation of lease.

These situations are messy only because one party doesn't want to hold up their end. Common problem because few people's word today is good!

Greg, et al,

Your perception of the meaning of the promise embodied in a lease is flawed. Principles of how to deal with contracts broken and fulfilled have been worked out over centuries, to arrive at standards which are fair to both parties.

Your assumption that the lease clause binds the parties to actually perform the promises is sophomoric. There are principles that govern situations like this one, and they are so simplistic as to require actual performance except in cases where the actual performance is of the essence.

What happens when one party does not perform to the letter of an agreement? It is not true that he is responsible for continuing to fulfill the contract. Once broken, the contract is no longer in force.

So what happens when one party defaults on the contract to the detriment of the other party? A few years of being a landlord ought to have taught you a bit about how laws work. The defaulting party is responsible for DAMAGES due to the default, not specific performance of the broken contract, unless no other remedy would adequately compensate the injured party.

The measure of damages for a breach of contract is the financial value of the detriment to the performing party caused by the default. Additionally, there is a basic principle of law that no party can recover damages if he has not done everything that he reasonable can to mitigate the damages. Thats part of the responsibility from entering into a contract.

Pleading that the tenant owes the promise of the contract after the contract is broken, is childish. Landlord agreed (by entering into a contract) as to how the damages for default are to be measured. And how the damages are to be measured has been worked out in the Common Law for centuries, to principles that are fair to both parties.