Can I Break My Lease Because of PTSD

Those who have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) suffer from symptoms that prevent normal functioning from day to day.

If you signed a rental agreement and discovered that your PTSD makes it too difficult to remain in the rental property, can you legally end the lease early?

Perhaps – but the answer is not a simple one.

Determining whether your PTSD may qualify you for early lease termination is a challenging and complex process – DoNotPay provides a quick, simple way to handle the details for you.

What Is PTSD?

This mental condition is triggered by witnessing or experiencing some terrifying event. Symptoms can include:

• Flashbacks
• Extreme anxiety
• Uncontrolled thoughts about the event
• Nightmares

They can greatly impair work and social situations, as well as relationships. It is important to minimize any triggers that can set off symptoms of your PTSD, which includes triggers from where you reside. Is having PTSD, however, enough of a reason to legally break your lease?

Does the Federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) Protect Renters With Disabilities?

It protects in two key ways:

• Prohibiting discrimination based on disability
• Forces landlords to comply with tenant requests for reasonable accommodations.

The FHA defines a qualifying disability as a mental or physical impairment that significantly limits one or more major life activities. This includes caring for yourself, learning, speaking, walking, etc.

PTSD can interfere with some of these major activities, but this alone is insufficient to break a lease.

What Else Is Required?

Accommodation by Landlord

If your PTSD is triggered by the sound of heavy traffic outside your rental, for example, you could specify this as a reason for your inability to live within the rental property. The landlord must then try to supply you with reasonable accommodations. Perhaps a rental unit with better soundproofing or a better location away from the freeway might be offered as a suitable solution.

If such a solution is not available or would place an unfair financial burden upon the landlord, then you may have grounds for ending the lease prematurely.

Proof of Disability

PTSD is not always a visible and obvious condition. As such, you do not have to show or explain it to your landlord, but you may be required to show proof of your condition from a third party.

How Do I Request an End to My Lease Due to PTSD?

You must communicate clearly with your landlord regarding your request:

1. No special form is needed
2. Submit your request in written form
3. Describe how you must break your lease because PTSD has made the property unlivable for you
4. Keep a log of verbal communications with your landlord
5. Hold on to letters, emails, and other written forms of landlord contact

To find out more information about specific statutes when it comes to breaking your lease due to PTSD in your state, refer to this table:

Is There an Easier Way to End Your Lease Due to PTSD?

Attempting to terminate your lease agreement prematurely legally can be tricky and time-consuming, not to mention the penalties you may have to pay and the negative impact on your credit score if you fail to make any payments.

A handy alternative is DoNotPay. Our product can simplify the entire process, and we are confident you will find it:

Quick - This will be faster than waiting for your landlord to respond to your notice.

Successful - We can help deal with potential extra fees.

Easy - Easier than handling every step yourself when you need to prioritize finding a more suitable place to live.

Use DoNotPay to Help You Break Your Rental Lease

Here's how you can get started in 3 easy steps:

1. Search Break My Lease on DoNotPay.

2. Prepare a signed copy of your lease that you can use as a reference and enter the state the lease was signed in.

3. Let us guide you through the 4 potential options.

• If you're a uniformed servicemember breaking a lease to fulfill your service obligations, we'll send your landlord an SCRA Protection Letter.
• If you're breaking your lease for a reason protected by your state's tenant laws, we'll write your landlord a letter detailing your protections for breaking the lease under the relevant law.
• If your reasons for breaking your lease aren't protected by federal or state law, but you'd like to try to convince your landlord to let you break the lease through mutual agreement, we'll draft a hardship letter making your case to your landlord.
• If there are no remaining options for breaking the lease with protection, but your state requires landlords to mitigate damages to tenants who break their leases, we'll notify your landlord of that obligation and minimize the remaining rent you have to pay.

DoNotPay can hand you an easy, automated way to help with a comprehensive list of problems. We offer many additional products to help simplify your life, including (but not limited to):

• Breach of contract
• Reducing property taxes
• Power of attorney
• Change your mailing address
• How to cancel

Our products can help give you simplified, automatic ways to deal with the difficulties of early lease termination. They can certainly help with other tedious and annoying tasks we encounter in life. Let us help!