Moving out before hearing

[lisa44]

We will be moving out a few days before our court date for an eviction hearing (thank goodness--we finally found a place!). We do not have an attorney and we hope that we will not need to hire one. What do we do on our end to ensure the case is dismissed? We have been told to make sure there is a dismissal as any settlement could refelct poorly on us. Also, we did not pay rent for this month due to the proceedings--do we owe for the full month or just the amount for for the time we were actually living in the apartment? We are current on rent except for this month (holdover) and giving a 30 day notice to vacate doesn't make sense when there is an eviction hearing.

Any insight or advice is appreciated. Thank you for your help!

[TenantNet]

Chances are the LL sued you for both possession and outstanding rent. Depending on a number of factors, if you move out then there's still the issue of outstanding rent ... and potentially the rent for the remainder of the lease.

[lisa44]

Thank you for answering so quickly! There is no lease term--we were on a month to month lease and with the rental market in New York City as it is, we just could not come up with the funds to move in the 30 days after we received notice to vacate. So, we now have a court date for the eviction proceedings later in the month and, luckily, we found an apartment and some family members loaned us some money to cover the costs so we could move out (moving, security deposit, first months rent etc.)--we will now be moved out before the court date.

We don't deny that we owe rent--and yes, the holdover petition did come with a petition for rent for this month (attempted payment was refused). If, for example, one moves out on the 18th (and our court date is the 22nd)--do we owe rent for just the 1st-18th or for the entire month? I know that under normal circumstances we would need to give a 30 day notice, but since we were served eviction papers we thought (hoped) a pro-rata share would suffice. This move has been expensive enough and to pay an extra couple-thousand dollars in rent, when we won't be living there, will hit us hard on top of everything else.

Also, what do we do about the court date or to make sure the case is dismissed?