QUESTION
When a lease is signed do all pages have to be signed or initialed for the lease to be legallly binding?
Asked on Aug 24th, 2012 on Contracts - California
More details to this question:
My fiance and I signed a lease for an apartment for 1 year. Our landlords live in colorado and we are renting the apartment out of California. We signed the lease for last september 2011 until Ocotber 2012. We lost our copy of the lease and want to break it one month early. We were not sure about the penelty for breaking the lease becuae we are unable to find out copy. We asked the landlords to scan and email us a copy and they sent us a lease where our signatures were on the last page, but nor our signatures or initials were on pages 1-3 and I am almost certian they changed pages 1-3. They are insisitng that this is the original lease, but i specifically remeber initialng all pages and putting my full signature on the last page. Am I legally binded to this contract if my initials or signature are not even on the first three pages?
1 ANSWER
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The failure to initial each page does not make the lease invalid. Your memory raises a triable issue of fact about the eternity and contents of the documents. It would not just take any lawyer but a good lawyer to shepherd such a mater through to trial. You could try a business approach and just negotiate with your landlord.
Answered on Aug 24th, 2012 at 11:45 AM