My Roommate Breaking Contract, what can I do? Options

[Jen]

My roommate has suddenly come home from a weekend vacation and says, she has to move out, my cats are giving her asthma.

Keep in mind, she has been here for 5 months without any problem until now.

We have a month to month lease with her, and asked her to give us 30 days upon her leaving. She says she's moving out today and can't give us 30 days.. aka she won't give us next months rent (which is coming up).

Upon moving in, she gave us a $125 deposit.

What can I do? Can I take her to court and collect for the rent she is supposed to be paying (prorated of course)?

Please let me know. Thank you.

On the other hand, I'm kind of glad she's leaving. I didn't like her one bit. =)

[ILuvMyCelica95]

What are the terms of the month to month tenancy agreement?

If it's month to month and she gives notice that she's leaving in February you can't ask her to pay the rent for January. If it was a long term lease and she was terminating early then there would be a penalty as provided in the lease.

As far as the security deposit goes there should be language in the agreement with regard to that. Sometimes language is provided in the agreement that states if the Tenant terminates mid-term or does not give x amount of days notice of terminating their tenancy the landlord can keep the security deposit. Most of the time the security deposit is either given back to the tenant at the termination of their lease or if the condition of the premises is not left as rented to the tenant damages can be deducted from the deposit. The remainder would go back to the Tenant.

There really isn't a way to answer this question about whether or not you should go to Court without seeing the terms of the agreement. I could hypothesize a lot of different situations because each agreement is different based on the Landlord's terms.

Either way I hope you get it sorted out.