[kenbfilm]

I hate to be a pest but I am still confused about breaking a lease.

The Florida statute 83 in landlord tenant law states

From the Florida statute, Title VI, Chapter 83:

83.595 Choice of remedies upon breach by tenant.--

(1) If the tenant breaches the lease for the dwelling unit and the landlord has obtained a writ of possession, or the tenant has surrendered possession of the dwelling unit to the landlord, or the tenant has abandoned the dwelling unit, the landlord may:

(a) Treat the lease as terminated and retake possession for his or her own account, thereby terminating any further liability of the tenant; or

(b) Retake possession of the dwelling unit for the account of the tenant, holding the tenant liable for the difference between rental stipulated to be paid under the lease agreement and what, in good faith, the landlord is able to recover from a reletting; or

(c) Stand by and do nothing, holding the lessee liable for the rent as it comes due.

(2) If the landlord retakes possession of the dwelling unit for the account of the tenant, the landlord has a duty to exercise good faith in attempting to relet the premises, and any rentals received by the landlord as a result of the reletting shall be deducted from the balance of rent due from the tenant. For purposes of this section, "good faith in attempting to relet the premises" means that the landlord shall use at least the same efforts to relet the premises as were used in the initial rental or at least the same efforts as the landlord uses in attempting to lease other similar rental units but does not require the landlord to give a preference in leasing the premises over other vacant dwelling units that the landlord owns or has the responsibility to rent.


If I have a tenant who breached a lease and instead of rerenting right away I try
To sell my house can I still collect a portion of the balance of the lease for damages.

Why should I be forced to rent to collect on damages?

Any help would be appreciated.

Kbfilm

[ScottGem]

If you can show an active and good faith effort to sell, you probably satisify the law under paragraph (b).

However, the only time this comes to a head is if you have to go to court to recover damages. What might happen is the judge may deem that a sale would take much longer than a relet and split the difference. Lets say it took you 4 months to find a buyer and close, but the market was such that you could relet in 1 month. The judge could say that you did not fulfill the good faith requirement.