lease dispute, church

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Question

Country: United States of America
State: Washington

We are a church and have been renting space in a shopping center. We signed a 3 year lease 9 years ago and after the 3 years began renting month by month. we have NO signed anything for the past 6 years. we were contacted by the new leasing agent 4 months ago and was told that if we did not have a signed lease as of the first of January 2006 we were to vacate the premises. We began to vacate and have tried to contact her about this for the past 2 weeks and she did not return our calls. when we finally got hold of her today, she said that we were giving improper notice and that we will be penalized for this. when we moved in 9 years ago there was no carpet and the walls were full of holes and we carpeted and patched and painted. She also said that since we have given such short notice that there won't be time for her to walk through and make sure that we are leaving the premises in the same condition as when we moved in. we need help in dealing with this new leasing agent please can you help us?

Answer

If need be, based on what you say here, you could probably file suit against them (or at least threaten to do so) in small claims court or in regular court; filing in small claims court is easier and requires no attorney...you could try to collect all of the costs and damages that you suffered due to their behavior... their behavior sounds very unreasonable and most courts would agree with you we feel--