San diego ,CALIFORNIA- my landlord is going through a foreclosure when my renting contract is only half way... what do I do?

First, the Forum Help forum (where this was originally posted) is for questions about using this site. I've moved this question to the, more appropriate, Real Estate Law forum. Please use more care in the futture about selecting a forum to post in.

If the landlord knows he will be foreclosed on, ask him if he will let you out of the lease and start looking for a new place. Or you can offer to buy the property from him. He may be willing to take a little bit of cash and assign the mortgage to you. In other words you may be able to get the house for just a little more than what he owes on it.

Once the foreclosure is final, your lease will be terminated. How much time you have to move will depend on the new owners and local courts.

I've seen this one before.

If you can communicate with the landlord, and trust what they tell you, I would ask directly what their intentions are about the foreclosure.

I would start putting the monthly rent into a savings account. Tell the landlord that you have done so to protect your interest while this process takes place. If he resolves the foreclosure, you can hand him all his back rent at once.

On the other hand, if he were to collect the rent, then loose the property, then the new owner could come looking for rent money you had already given to the previous landlord. This way, the rent is on hand, and can go to the proper party once the process has completed.

You could also offer the bank the option of staying while they try to find a buyer, at less than the regular rent amount. Often they will take something from someone who is already there, rather than get nothing until they find a new tenant.

Best of luck to you!

Of course a foreclosure can take months depending on the status of it, and the current owner can up till the last moment work out a deal with the lender. So until the mortgage company takes possessoin ( in states where they do not have to sell at auction) or at the day of the auction, the current owner still owns it, and if you do not pay him, they can actually evict you ( not sure they will but if you don't pay the rent do, they can)

And they may be needing or requiring your payments to help in stoping the foreclosure.
The bank does not own the property until they actually do the action of foreclosure ( or do the autction ) depending on how it is done in your state.

And of course the bank can not rent it to you until they actually take it.