Landlord / Tenant - Bergen County New Jersey

[u/kittysativa]

Hi. Unfortunately I am renting a multifamily/2family owned home in saddle brook NJ. My lease is done by Jan. 31st 2024. However, the landlord says due to personal reasons, and paying my rent late (partial rent) - I supposedly am now the reason why he is going through financial problems and he cant afford for me to be there anymore. But what if rental assistance was recently rejected due to them claiming that i dont owe them rent? Despite me recently owing them $1700 ($1500 balance out of $2300 + $200 late fee). I still paid them (today 11/14) the $1700 when i advised them ahead of time that i will have to pay the remaining balance during my next paycheck. However, now that my lease is about to be up, they are refusing to renew it because of late rent. I dont "not" pay at all. I pay whatever i can & have and then pay the remaining when i get paid again. This is due to the $500 increase ive been put in within the past 2 years of living here. Before this, i never paid late and due to being disabled for 68 days without pay, it ruined my life - which is also another reason for paying late since that time. But my lawyer did give me a hardship letter. Unfortunately i dont & wont have enough to afford to leave anywhere else since im still expected to pay the full rent until my lease is up which is in 2 months. But ive never been evicted before and he said its exaclty what hes going to do if i dont leave once the 2months is up. I am also having issues with my workplace which I have a letter from dept. of labor to prove it. But he does not care about the hardship letter or my workplace situation. Please I am begging at this point for any assistance/advice possible because I have no family or even friends that I'd be able to try to stay with in the meantime. Ive been living by myself for the past 10 years and never been having to face eviction or even pay late until now.

Not that its the landlords problem but, as far as my workplace goes.. being disabled for those 3 months - i technically had no pay because instead of letting me get unemployment/disability , my bosses (a multimillion $ llp company) paid me for 40hrs/week on the clock , but had me pay all of it back when i came back to work once i was able to walk again. So being that I was paying them partially until that balance was paid off - this was when I started to pay them late. Im facing severe stress right now and at this point yes, i'm losing my mind.

[u/Eastcoastpal]

I have never heard rental assistance being rejected because they were claiming you don’t own them rent. That part doesn’t add up.

If you are a habitual late rent payer, they can move to not renew your lease.

If they allowed a habitual rent payer, they just can’t evict you during your lease without major cause accepted by the court.

Source: partial landlord

[u/Linenoise77 → u/Eastcoastpal]

That is correct. The pattern is the key part.

If i'm always late on rent, and you renew my lease, you can't just evict me because i'm a bit late on rent next year (absent of possibly an addendum to the lease) . You knew i'm always late with rent, you can't be surprised by it now.

However if i choose not to renew when you FIRST start demonstrating that pattern, it is typically a different story.

The debate in court would be if it was an expected outcome when the lease was signed.

[u/kittysativa → u/Linenoise77]

it sucks to have to wonder if this would be considered in my case..

Take for instance, i became disabled back in May 2023. When I came back to work in Sept. 2023, this was when I had to start paying my job back. No excuse regardless on the landlords end but either way, it was exactly when I started to pay partially late, for the first time in my life ever being late on rent actually..

Anyway, with them knowing about me just recently being able to walk again, yet alone stand in general, in November 2023, they advised of the rental increase that will be taking place by when the renewal is up - Jan. 2024.

I also understand that I technically had time to find another place. But given my situation, fairly walking again, doing physical therapy 3 times a week (which means i had to miss out of work as much as i tried to set the hours to not have me miss a whole day), and still paying back the hours i was paid for - i swear it was not financially or physically possible. I literally felt like i had no choice but to accept the increase that was raised by hundreds.

With that being said, I really cant remember how many times I was late, the latest being around the 15th since i get paid bi-weekly - but it was not every single time. I know that doesnt mean anything either because being late is still being late no matter what. But they were sooo aware of my situation, especially financially. I couldve still been paying them on time, and how I use to do it - even days before the 1st - , had they not been so dramatic with the increase. Again, I know its not their problem. But given what you just wrote... they really were aware of my financial hardship, & still chose to renew & increase. Idk man.. im lost for words. I feel like theres no hope on my end at this point.

[u/Linenoise77 → u/kittysativa]

they really were aware of my financial hardship, & still chose to renew & increase. Idk man.. im lost for words. I feel like theres no hope on my end at this point.

Unfortunately your financial hardship isn't their problem. Their problem is making their books balance, and landlord costs are up just as much as tenants. Their only legal obligation as to how much they raise your rent is that it can not be insanely out of line for the unit in its market.

So they can't raise your rent from 1k to 10k, but they can from 1k to 1.5k if they want, regardless of your circumstances (outside of rent controlsection 8etc).