Hi everyone. I will try to keep this short but I want to make sure every details is in here to make it as factual as possible to see if we have a leg to stand on legally.
We live in a private rented property and have done for just over a year. We are good clean tenants and have never had any complaints. In January we renewed our tenancy. The landlord increased our rent. Not by masses, but by enough to make things tight, but we accepted it as we were happy here.
A week later we are told the house was going on the market and that the estate agents will be in touch to take photos and arrange viewings etc. This all happened very quickly, and the house was on the market in just over a week after renewing our tenancy.
I have cancer and have been undergoing treatment and multiple surgeries, which the EA and landlord are aware of. When we were told the house was going on the market, the email specifically says 'the landlord is happy for you to stay in situ until a sale has been agreed. If an exchange has not been made by then, your tenancy will roll onto a periodic.
Due to this, we, rightly or wrongly, started to look for somewhere to live straight away as we didn't want to live on a knife edge here not knowing when we'd have to move, and have people traipsing in whilst my health is vulnerable. So we thought we'd get out and find somewhere. Which we have now done.
We served our 2 months notice and it has been declined, saying as the house hasn't been sold yet, we are liable to pay the rent until the end of tenancy in June. I thought this was desperately unfair, as in the email (which has now been admitted was poorly worded by the EA) that the landlord is happy for us to stay in situ until the point of sale, which we read, as if that happened before the tenancy was up, they'd serve us notice of 2 months and we would leave. So it would be only fair we could do the same.
I feel like I have totally been mislead here, as not only has the rent increased, but they renewed our tenancy, asking for more money a month, knowing they were selling. But tied us into the contract so we had to carry on paying rent until they reach a sale. The viewings that have happened so far are families and and no investors. I have been incredibly fair with viewings. I have to shield for a week during my treatment and when viewings are being done, I go and sit in my car, DH does a quick clean and if they've opened doors and touched things he wipes them down, and I come back in.
I know we don't have to accept viewings, but if we don't, and we don't get a sale agreed, we'll have to pay rent here. As well as our new place which we move into this weekend.
I feel like we have been totally mislead. Had we have known the house was going on the market days after renewing our tenancy, we of course wouldn't have renewed.
Do we have any leg to stand on legally? We are still moving. The whole thing is causing us so much stress. But I'm trying to work out if we could get any legal advice to not pay the rent here too until June or to break the clause early. And the real kicker is the landlord has done the reference for us to move out, and is now saying we have to stay until June! We just feel like it's such a misrepresentation and have been totally mislead here. We signed the tenancy to live here peacefully, not waiting for a house to sell at any point and for us to deliberately not be told this until we have renewed the tenancy.
Please help! Thank you!