In Florida law 83.595 part 2 - it states if a landlord retakes possession of the property they must make a "good faith" effort to relet the property.
What if they retake possession but do not make any effort to relet??? The lease was set to end September 31st and we left on July 20th.
The property manager listed the property on Craigslist then a week later it was gone and there has been no other ads anywhere (CL, newspaper, etc) since then. There are no For Rent signs and the house is overgrown by the yard which is clearly unkept. I believe she fired the management company since I no longer hear from them and she is sending me letters. It almost appears she herself has abandoned the property and is not demanded money from me for the remainder of the lease.
Why did I leave and break my lease??? Due to very frequent verbal harassment, almost a physical altercation and frequent calls to the cops and code enforcement by many of the neighbors on the street made for a very unpleasant and inconvenient living situation. Each time the city or cops came by all they did was say hello and leave because each complaint was UNFOUNDED. One of the cops even said "I don't know why we even keep coming out here because you all are clearly doing no wrong".
Answers & Comments
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A good faith effort doesn't specifically mean that the landlord has to spend time and money seeking a new tenant. Instead it means that it has to keep the property available for a new tenant, thus can not use it for another purpose until the end of the lease term. For example it would be improper for the landlord to move into the property where you lived because that would make the property unavailable to renters, or if they left the property vacant but told an inquiring renter that the property was unavailable. But leaving the property empty and not mowing the lawn is not breaking this law. Sorry.
A "good faith" or "reasonable" effort to relet the property is a very loose idea. You would have to somehow prove that she is purposefully keeping the rental empty just to continue collecting rent from you.
You have to understand: advertising can be expensive, and you screwed your landlord over by breaking the lease. Maybe she has to wait until she has money from you to afford to advertise the rental? None of the reasons you stated a valid reasons to break a lease. Inconvenient, certainly, but not legal reason to steal your landlord's income.
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