Lease interpretation help

[mjrocks98.livejournal.com]

Hi All, I am in a tenancy at will and the lease states the following: "The Tenants will occupy the premises as TENANTS AT WILL. The tenancy will terminate when either the Landlord or Tenants gives the other written notice at least one full month in advance."

To me this means 30 days is 30 days. So I informed them that I will be moving out on May 15th (mid-month) & gave them more than 30 days. Now the landlord sends me an email that says: " Note that because the tenancy begins on the first of every month the notice period must be 30 days from the 1st."

Shouldn't that have been spelled out in the lease I signed? I feel like he's trying to slip one in on me. They asked us to move in mid-month & previous tenants moved out mid-month so considering that I know they've been willing to do half a month rent in the past.

Comments

[feylike.livejournal.com]

that would seem to conflict with MGL 186 § 12 (http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartII/TitleI/Chapter186/Section12) unless there's an established interpretation of the use of "interval between the days of payment" to mean "specific calendar dates" as opposed to "number of days", which i'll grant is quite possible.

[nathanjw]

This isn't my interpretation of the laws, but what other respected sources (including the Mass. state office office of consumer affairs) claim the interpretation is - we're definitely into "ask a lawyer for a real answer" territory.

That said, the way I read the section you mention is that that defines *notice* to terminate the lease, but does not define the actual termination. So it is true that 30 days notice is sufficient, but that doesn't mean that the lease is terminated at the conclusion of those particular 30 days.