Sparksy
1 Apr 2022 #1
Hello,
I was hoping to get some advice on my current housing situation.
I rented a room in a flat more than a year ago. I liked the house, everything was good most of the time, except for the room being really cold (which I got used to I guess), so I renovated for another year after the first lease ended back in January. A couple of weeks after this, already for January's rent he started charging way more for the bills. The thing is, there is this term in my contract, RYCZALT in Polish, or a lump sum in English, meaning they are not 100% included but only partially. Since energy is more expensive now, and it is getting to a point that I paid around 300PLN extra for bills for these last two months (casually after renovating the contract, no word of this was mentioned until a couple of weeks after that). The house is not even warm, I have to wear a jumper all the time. But the guy has sent us the bills and everything, and though I understand nothing it says in them, it seems pretty legit I have to admit, and the other tenants (who are Polish) are paying them too.
For this reason and because I feel like the situation is not going to improve and next winter it will be even worse with the prices, I want to leave now, but my landlord will not terminate my contract, even giving him a couple of months notice. I am outrage for this, for I do not f
The thing is, I looked up in my contract, written in both English and Polish, and there is not any specific termination clause.
He is the owner of a small housing agency, and the only similar thing is this ''Agency service of transferring the agreement to another tenant: 2500PLN''. I find this abusive as it is more than two times the monthly fee. And since I came to realize that this guy is pretty iffy, I am sure he will just keep the deposit, knowing that I am a foreigner unfamiliar with legal procedures and I will not bother trying to claim this money back. So it would cost me not just 2500PLN, but almost 4000PLN.
There is also another clause that says:
''The tenant's failure to meet the deadline of the concluded agreement will result in a contractual penalty of three times the monthly rental fee. The contractual penalty shall be added to all financial obligations resulting from the concluded lease agreement, until the end of its term''. I have no idea if this means that I would have to pay a total of 3 months rent to leave, or if I would have to pay the penalty plus keep paying the contract until the end of its term.
I considered stop paying him for 2 months so he has to terminate it legally, as some friend advised, but there is another clause that says if I do this and he has to terminate the contract because of this, I will have to be paying the rent for the rest of the contract term + a penalty of 3 months rents. I am not sure if this is legally enforceable or not, but it is even worse than the 1st option.
I know I am stupid for signing such a bad contract without going through it, but now I would really need to find a way out of it that, possibly, doesn't involve losing 4000PLN or even more. I do not really care that much about the deposit, but the whole situation bugs me. He also did not mention about this 2500PLN fee when I told him I wanted to leave.
If I just leave, how worth it is for him to sue me and try to have me pay for the whole period? Is that something he could easily do and, if he decides to do it, would he 100% win the case and have me pay for the whole term + 3 months penalty (since I would just leave I guess he would try to activate the second clause I mentioned above)?
Many thanks beforehand for the advice,
I was hoping to get some advice on my current housing situation.
I rented a room in a flat more than a year ago. I liked the house, everything was good most of the time, except for the room being really cold (which I got used to I guess), so I renovated for another year after the first lease ended back in January. A couple of weeks after this, already for January's rent he started charging way more for the bills. The thing is, there is this term in my contract, RYCZALT in Polish, or a lump sum in English, meaning they are not 100% included but only partially. Since energy is more expensive now, and it is getting to a point that I paid around 300PLN extra for bills for these last two months (casually after renovating the contract, no word of this was mentioned until a couple of weeks after that). The house is not even warm, I have to wear a jumper all the time. But the guy has sent us the bills and everything, and though I understand nothing it says in them, it seems pretty legit I have to admit, and the other tenants (who are Polish) are paying them too.
For this reason and because I feel like the situation is not going to improve and next winter it will be even worse with the prices, I want to leave now, but my landlord will not terminate my contract, even giving him a couple of months notice. I am outrage for this, for I do not f
The thing is, I looked up in my contract, written in both English and Polish, and there is not any specific termination clause.
He is the owner of a small housing agency, and the only similar thing is this ''Agency service of transferring the agreement to another tenant: 2500PLN''. I find this abusive as it is more than two times the monthly fee. And since I came to realize that this guy is pretty iffy, I am sure he will just keep the deposit, knowing that I am a foreigner unfamiliar with legal procedures and I will not bother trying to claim this money back. So it would cost me not just 2500PLN, but almost 4000PLN.
There is also another clause that says:
''The tenant's failure to meet the deadline of the concluded agreement will result in a contractual penalty of three times the monthly rental fee. The contractual penalty shall be added to all financial obligations resulting from the concluded lease agreement, until the end of its term''. I have no idea if this means that I would have to pay a total of 3 months rent to leave, or if I would have to pay the penalty plus keep paying the contract until the end of its term.
I considered stop paying him for 2 months so he has to terminate it legally, as some friend advised, but there is another clause that says if I do this and he has to terminate the contract because of this, I will have to be paying the rent for the rest of the contract term + a penalty of 3 months rents. I am not sure if this is legally enforceable or not, but it is even worse than the 1st option.
I know I am stupid for signing such a bad contract without going through it, but now I would really need to find a way out of it that, possibly, doesn't involve losing 4000PLN or even more. I do not really care that much about the deposit, but the whole situation bugs me. He also did not mention about this 2500PLN fee when I told him I wanted to leave.
If I just leave, how worth it is for him to sue me and try to have me pay for the whole period? Is that something he could easily do and, if he decides to do it, would he 100% win the case and have me pay for the whole term + 3 months penalty (since I would just leave I guess he would try to activate the second clause I mentioned above)?
Many thanks beforehand for the advice,