Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Virginia
Adding to a lease after the lease has been signed
I made a clerical error and bounced a check to my landlord. He wants to add a clause to our lease staing that if I do not pay him the rent by the 5th day of the month that I am ''immediately evicted''. He now has all the money he is entitled to as of this date and we did write into our lease late fees etc. Can he do this after the lease has been in effect?
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Adding to a lease after the lease has been signed
Generally speaking, a party to a lease cannot make a unilateral change to the lease contract while it is in force. One question is does the existing lease provide for such a change in terms if you bounce a rent check ? A second question would be whether the lease is up for renewal and the landlord is trying to put the new clause in the renewal.
Assuming the answer to both of these questions to be no, and there is a written lease, the landlord cannot legally change its terms mid-stream. Watch out when the lease term is up however, because the landlord who has shown himself to be hard, will probably not renew or put some pretty tough terms in the new lease.
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