Hate your landlord? Help me sue mine.
Background: A house for lease was advertised as sitting on "3+ private acres," with lawn care included. I then signed a lease for "123 Oak Lane," with landscaping and lawn care included. During the term of the lease, however, my landlord (1) felled scores of trees on the 3 acres and left the piles of logs and the bulldozer sitting there for months; and (2) instructed the lawn mowers to mow only a small fraction of the property that hugs the house, leaving the remainder of the property to grow into a literal prairie. Despite numerous requests for an explanation, I have received none. My guess is that (a) he wants to develop the bulk of the land during the term of the lease and/or (b) he's a cheap bastard who doesn't feel like paying for all 3 acres to be landscaped.
Basic question: If I lease the real property known as 123 Oak Lane (with lawn care included in the rest), and legal records show that 123 Oak Lane does in fact consist of 3+ private acres, have I thereby leased the entirety of that land, and does the landlord therefore lack any legal right, during the term of the lease, to fell trees, leave bulldozers, refuse to mow, or develop the land for other purposes?
(9) Comments
Obviously you are not a lawyer, or you'd know that lawyers have ethical obligations that prohibit them from giving legal advice online.
Not to mention, it's a little insulting to expect people who worked their asses off for 3 years and are in debt up to their eyeballs for it to want to give free legal advice. You value our opinion, but clearly not enough to pay for it? Ugh.
Tuition at HLS is currently north of $39K per year. Now why would any smart person who went to HLS (which since you are clearly a noob around here, I should inform you is a TOP 100 school) spend all that money to learn about the law so they can give you free advice on your take home exam for Contracts? Tomorrow you'll probably ask us who will get the reversion after the life estate on 123 Oak Lane terminates. Not little Timmy because the trust violated the Rule Against Perpetuities. Seriously, get out of here.
Bar/Bri has private tutors available for bar preparation. ATL is not a question board for bar preparation questions.
And CLS's tuition was $42,024 last year.
To be slightly less of an ass than the above three commenters-- it sounds like you may well have a valid claim here, but the only advice I can give you is you should talk to a real lawyer about it. Contact your state or city bar association for a referral if you don't know anyone, or ask your friends for a reference.
take pictures, keep a log of dates of when they were taken, then shoot yourself in the head while playing in traffic.
the only way to know with certainty whether or not your landlord has these rights is to sue him and have a judge declare it so. lawyers can only speak in terms of probabilities, not certainties. based on the facts you have given, it is my sense that you would probably win. of course there may be other relevant facts that you have overlooked which could change things. nothing is black and white, that's why lawyers have jobs, and why you should hire one to pursue your case.
Good for you trying to get some basic info online before wasting your money and a lawyers time. I see your question as if you went to a health website and asked opinions as to if it was worth seeing a specialist about symptoms. That wouldn't be "free medical care." If a physician responded online by saying "... only a doctor could tell you, but you might have lice, so please consult, blah, blah..." that would be a credit to the medical profession. I can't imagine a doctor posting something as wooden-headed as "do you think I went to 4 years of medical school to give you free medical advice?" But, to say the least, all attorneys aren't as thoughtful about the legal profession, which is why attorneys are regarded as a bunch of tools by the public. Anyway, if your question is a real situation and not a law school hypothetical, I can tell you my personal thought: I wouldn't pursue litigation because I doubt the damages are quantifiable or large (even if you otherwise had a cause of action). However, if all you want is to just break the lease and the landlord won't agree to let you do so, you might ask a lawyer about helping you with that aspect. Good luck.
thanks, 7:14.
to most of the other posters -- actually, i have a jd from a top-3 law school (and so am intimately acquainted with law school debt, thanks), but (perhaps not surprisingly to those of you who attended a similar caliber law school) was not exactly taught the fine details of landlord-tenant law at said school. nor did i ever take the bar, having chosen to run far and fast from legal practice. as a result, i can tell you all about the lockean labor theory of property but began second-guessing my intuitions about my current landlord dispute -- which, yes, has its basis in reality (with identifying details altered and structured in a hypothetical fashion to permit ethical commentary by lawyers), not a law school exam or a barbri prep question. i have no intention of wasting my time or money suing my landlord, for many reasons, including those 7:14 notes. i just wanted, as leverage to get a modest rent reduction if it comes to that, or merely for my own edification, to be able to tell my landlord that the law doesn't support his position, if that's in fact at least arguably true. yes, i could do a westlaw search trying to find the answer to what i'm guessing is a pretty random fact pattern, but thought i could instead spend 2 minutes posting my question and might get a reasonable response or two from people who know far more about property law than i ever wish to. yes, this is a legal tabloid, but plenty of threads on the main page in the end amount to little more than pissing contests among posters about who has the correct interpretation of a legal situation, whether real or hypothetical, important or trivial. i merely hoped that others who have had bad landlord experiences (and I have spared you the details of mine) might empathize and weigh in, fwiw. note that i did not attempt to hijack an unrelated thread, but started a new one in this dead community section. i never suggested that anyone had any obligation to spend his or her two minutes responding instead of billing hours; if bashing landlords or entertaining somewhat unusual property fact patterns isn't your cup or tea (it otherwise wouldn't be mine, either), you needn't have read the post, much less taken the time to respond to it. geez -- some of you have a great deal of pent up anger and should consider seeing somebody about it.
--op
I hope you are not a practicing lawyer. Your predicament is exactly why we have transaction attorneys. I hope you learned a good leason. Clarify and prepare for contigencies in your dealings. HTH.