Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in New Jersey

Re: Expired lease agreement

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Answer: As a general rule, all agreements related to real estate must be in writing. If you never made an agreement with him about what happened when the lease expired, the new jersey law would kick in that says it defaults to a month-to-month lease. Generally, a notice provision would start on the start date of the lease term. Meaning, if you were going to give 30 or 60 days notice, you would give it on or before the first of the month (since your lease expired on the 31st)to take affect the first of the next month or after two months. You gave 60 days notice but not an the anniversary date of the lease term (the beginning of the month). Since there is nothing in writing about sixty days notice, your notice should be good for thirty days notice on a month-to-month tenancy. Suppose you sent the notice on 2/1/09 to say you are leaving on 3/1/09. Since you gave it on 1/12/09 that is way before 2/1/09. Your problem is that you want to leave on 3/16/09 which is past the thirty days. YOu should really try to leave by 3/1/09 even if it means requesting a Use and Occupancy agreement to let the sellers of the house you are buying let you move in early for a prorated rent. If your landlord attempts to take the rent from 3/1/09 or any other period out of your security deposit (if you have one), you can sue him for double the amount that he held back from the security deposit over what he was entitled to. The likelihood is you'll all be wasting your money fighting something that comes down to "he said, she said" but remember, everything must be in writing related to real estate to be valid. If you leave by the 1st of March, you should be in good shape even if you have to take him to court to get some of your security deposit back. Good luck.