Breaking leases early
Hello! My tenant has a lease agreement in place that doesn't end until March next year. However, they want to break their lease early to move into a bigger unit elsewhere. Any idea what the rules around breaking this lease agreement would be? They want to just give me a month's notice and then move in December (which is a terrible time to look for new tenants). I took a look at my lease agreement and it seems to have rules around how a landlord can break the lease and how tenants can break a periodic lease, but not how they can break a fixed term lease. On the BC Tenancy website, it seems to read that tenants can't break a fixed term lease unless the landlord and tenant both agree to do so on paper. I do have a liquidated damages clause on my tenancy agreement though that says that breaking a lease before the fixed term will cost the tenant two month's rent. Does that mean that the tenants can leave as long as they pay the two month's rent?
I'm a little vague on this so I would appreciate any insight you might have on the local BC tenancy laws.
Thanks in advance!