Wrong dates on rental agreement

bigtoebb

hI, i HAVE BEEN WITH MY CURRENT LANDLADY FOR NEARLY 3 YRS AND AM IN AN ASSURED SHORTHOLD TENANCY AGREEMENT. ME AND MY HUSBAND HAVE NOW DECIDED WE WOULD LIKE TO MOVE AND HAVE FOUND A PROPERTY WE LIKE. WHEN SIGNING THE AGREEMENT WE WERE TOLD THAT WE HAD TO GIVE ONE MONTHS NOTICE TO LEAVE AND THAT THE LANDLADY HAD TO GIVE US 2 MONTHS NOTICE.

IT IS ONLY NOW WE ARE LOOKING TO LEAVE THE PROPERTY THAT WE HAVE NOTICED A SMALL CLAUSE STATING THAT WE MUST GIVE NOTICE 1 MONTH PRIOR TO EXPIRY OF TENANCY,AND MUST BE ONE MONTH NOTICE IN WRITING ON THE RENT DUE DATE,TO VACATE THE PROPERTY.

AS I AM NOW CHECKING OVER MY CONTRACT I HAVE NOTICED THAT THE DATES ARE WRONG - IT STATES THAT TERM OR TENANCY IS 6 MONTHS,COMMENCING FROM 01/09/10 AND EXPIRING 01/03/10.

AS THE DATES ARE VERY WRONG DOES THIS MAKE MY CONTRACT VOID?????

G_M

First - please STOP SHOUTING. Thanks.

Is that the only contract you've ever signed? What is wrong with the dates? (apart from the expiry should really be 18/02/10).

If you are in Eng/Wales (?), and have never signed another contract, then:

1) the rent due date is irrelevant - it is the rental period that matters.
2) it appears your rental periods run from the 1st to the last of each month
3) you should give one months notice including a full rental period. Today is 30th Nov, so if you give notice today, you can leave at the end of December (but your notice must be RECEIVED today by the landlord, not sent). If you wait till tomorrow, you'll need to stay another full month (end of Jan).

DVardysShadow

bigtoebb wrote: »

hI, i HAVE BEEN WITH MY CURRENT LANDLADY

It looks like you are using the caps lock key instead of the shift key. Please don't post in block capitals - most people will just ignore you, because it is too horrid to read.

bigtoebb wrote: »

.... AS THE DATES ARE VERY WRONG DOES THIS MAKE MY CONTRACT VOID?????

What is wrong with the dates?

Generally an error with a contract will leave as much of the contract in place as would make sense.

jamie11

There is a small question here.
The term was stated as six months but the dates of the term are actually 6 months and one day. I know it's been discussed ad infinitum elswhere. I would opt for the written dates as the term, making the periodic tenancies run from the 2nd day of the month to the 1st day of the next month, does anybody disagree?

stuart69

I am the thread starters husband,the fact my wife used caps seems to have upset some people,well it was very late at night and typed under alot of stress so please have a little understanding she was not "shouting".

What is a large issue in the contract is the start and end dates of the 6 month tenancy.They make no sense whatsoever as the end date is set before the start date and even the year is wrong (2010 instead of 2011).

Now our landlady has been a horrible person to deal with at every level,she is rude,abrupt and ignorant and will do anything in her power to not have to spend a penny on the upkeep of the property.We are desperate to move and have found a house that is ideal.

The fact is the landlady was using a letting agency when we first signed a 6month contract and everything was above board,but she has now decided to dump the agency and came to see us with her own contract in hand.The thing is,the 6 month tenancy with the previous agency had expired and as such we were on a month by month contract , which suited us as it gave us freedom to vacate if needed.Well when we signed the contract with the landlandy on a private basis she said "you only need to give me one months notice to leave and i have to give you two months".

We took this as gospel and signed the contract,but now we have given her the one months notice she says we have to pay her up until march 2012 as it is a 6 month agreement?

March 2012 is nowere to be seen on the contract,not even 2011!! So what we are asking is,can we simply give the months notice and leave and if she fails to give the deposit or trys to get more rent from us could we use the confused contract as a defence?

One more point is that she was not even going to use a deposit protection scheme until i informed her it was law,she said she would forward the details of the scheme onto us but has failed to do so.

DVardysShadow

jamie11 wrote: »

There is a small question here.
The term was stated as six months but the dates of the term are actually 6 months and one day. I know it's been discussed ad infinitum elswhere. I would opt for the written dates as the term, making the periodic tenancies run from the 2nd day of the month to the 1st day of the next month, does anybody disagree?

It depends which date is wrong. If the start date is wrong according to when the OP took up the tenancy, you are probably right. But the OP would need evidence that the start date is wrong.

If the start date is right, then the end date would be wrong, so OP needs to give notice to finish one day earlier [and give that notice one day earlier too].

In this instance, it would be safer for OP to act as though the end date were one day earlier as this would mean that if they made a mistake, they would only have left a day early - whereas the other way about, they might actually leave a day late and incur another month's rent.

jamie11

01/09/10 AND EXPIRING 01/03/10.

I didn't even notice that, must get the eye's tested.

stuart69

jamie11 wrote: »

I didn't even notice that, must get the eye's tested.

It seems no one noticed the dates! The thing is i feel she confused the entire process and gave us a false sense of freedom by verbally stating the one month notice without explaining in spoken terms the finer points of the contract.The one month before date of end of tenancy was on the rear of the contact under special clauses but we did not even see it.I understand we should have checked every single detail but she was rushing us along and was very agitated as she had just had a dispute with the letting agency.

I am going to visit my local CAB office this morning and let them take a look at the contract and explain the whole story and see if they can advise us further.

DVardysShadow

stuart69 wrote: »

I am the thread starters husband,the fact my wife used caps seems to have upset some people,well it was very late at night and typed under alot of stress so please have a little understanding she was not "shouting".

Most people don't reply to all caps posts. I only replied because her post count was 1. It is not a question of nobody being understanding - it is a question of being roundly ignored and nobody explaining why.

stuart69

DVardysShadow wrote: »

Most people don't reply to all caps posts. I only replied because her post count was 1. It is not a question of nobody being understanding - it is a question of being roundly ignored and nobody explaining why.

Ok fair enough i feel we can put the caps lock debate to bed now..

DVardysShadow

stuart69 wrote: »

... What is a large issue in the contract is the start and end dates of the 6 month tenancy.They make no sense whatsoever as the end date is set before the start date and even the year is wrong (2010 instead of 2011).

Now our landlady has been a horrible person to deal with at every level,she is rude,abrupt and ignorant and will do anything in her power to not have to spend a penny on the upkeep of the property.We are desperate to move and have found a house that is ideal.

The fact is the landlady was using a letting agency when we first signed a 6month contract and everything was above board,but she has now decided to dump the agency and came to see us with her own contract in hand.The thing is,the 6 month tenancy with the previous agency had expired and as such we were on a month by month contract , which suited us as it gave us freedom to vacate if needed.Well when we signed the contract with the landlandy on a private basis she said "you only need to give me one months notice to leave and i have to give you two months".

We took this as gospel and signed the contract,but now we have given her the one months notice she says we have to pay her up until march 2012 as it is a 6 month agreement?

March 2012 is nowere to be seen on the contract,not even 2011!! So what we are asking is,can we simply give the months notice and leave and if she fails to give the deposit or trys to get more rent from us could we use the confused contract as a defence?

One more point is that she was not even going to use a deposit protection scheme until i informed her it was law,she said she would forward the details of the scheme onto us but has failed to do so.

At the time you signed the new agreement, the intent was that it should run to March 2012. So if it went to court, that is the date which would probably be upheld. Unless you could sustain an argument that the agreement was dated wrongly and known to be so to cover the landlady for her lack of a contract due to dropping the Agent.

Ultimately, getting out of contracts on technicalities is never a good place to be - particularly technicalities which are discovered when one party looks at the small print to find a way to wriggle out - because if clauses are defective, it is the original intent which counts