I hope this is the right place to post - this is on behalf of a friend of mine (X). She's living in a rented flat with her friend (Y) of more than a decade, who, to put it delicately, has...'issues' and has spent the last month basically bullying X over various different things, mainly about X's boyfriend who comes to stay occasionally. (Y's boyfriend lives at the flat too.) X now has a collection of rather vitriolic text messages to prove it, but hasn't engaged back, apart from trying to cool the situation down and over-apologising in the hope it'll make it better. It hasn't.
X is now at the point where she can't bear to live there any more and has found another room to move into, in the next week or so. Only problem being she's on the rental contract til October and obviously has to sort out someone to take her room on, which she's been attempting to do and so far has had plenty of interest. Only problem is, the letting agent told X that Y and boyfriend have to approve of any potential new housemate before they move in. And you guessed it, they're not playing ball. Not responding to messages about viewings/meetings, not being in the house when my friend is trying to bring people round to see it, that kind of thing. All the while being quite poisonous/toxic to my poor friend who is a lovely, gentle sort who doesn't deserve it at all.
So, my question. Is there some sort of get-out in these kind of situations? If my friend can prove the housemates are being obstructive? (I've told her to keep all the abusive texts as well as evidence of her trying to set up meetings/viewings for the flat, in case she needs to show it all to the agents.) Or is my friend basically stuck paying rent on both rooms til October?
Thanks so much in advance if anyone can help, my friend's at her wits end and I'm a bit worried for her...