Legal advice. How much trouble am I in?

Here's a a little background info:


I renewed my lease at my apartment last December. Around March I dropped out of LSU and got a new job on the other side of town. My grandparents offered me one of their rent houses to live in which would be closer to my work and new school(I'm not a deadbeat. When I dropped out, I started a new school immediately). I called the management in April to ask what I could do to get out of the new lease that hadn't started yet. The guy on the phone told me that I had to find a sub-leaser. I asked him if I couldn't find a sub-leaser, was there some sort of penalty I could pay instead. He said,';Yes its $350.'; I said,';fine.'; Now I was at work on the day my grandparents went there to drop of the check and break the lease. The new manager tells them that this will not work. They want the money AND us to find a sub-leaser. This was July and I'm sure most of you know: EVERYONE who wants an apartment has already signed a lease or given up by March or April. This was July 31st. We had no way of getting out of it or finding someone this late in the game. My grandmother had the idea of why don't we let my sister have the apartment and keep it under my name. This worked fine for a while, minus the occasional hassle of me having to pretend I live there for things like work orders. My sister, being the responsible ';grown-up'; woman that she often claims to be, decided she couldn't afford the rent and had a tantrum and moved back in with Mom. Not caring about the consequences toward mine and my grandmother's names, who appear on the lease.


Fastforward to today:


I find out from my sister that I have to appear in court Tuesday morning for failure to pay rent. Plus I will have to explain o a judge this whole complicated, illegal sublease to family thing we did.Legal advice. How much trouble am I in?
Umm... you shouldn't be in any trouble but your landlord should be. Especially because the whole point f a liquidated damages clause ($350) is so that no other action is necessary. You should not have had to find a subleasee if you paid the damages.


However, since you stayed there, you are liable for any rent.Legal advice. How much trouble am I in?
You are not in a big trouble just pay all the months you owe and that's it, you have no need to explain nothing about the sister, that's irrelevant. The lease is on your name so you are responsible.





By the way, it would have been cheaper to ask a lawyer to read your lease agreement to find out if there was a legal way to break the lease. I haven't read your lease but usually or you pay the penalty OR you find a sub-leaser but NOT BOTH...I think you were cheated in that area but that's irrelevant now, anyway it's too late and you really need to pay the unpaid rent.





You might avoid court and extra charges if you call the manager as soon as possible to pay the rent.





As for your sister, she had no legal obligation to stay in the apartment if she didn't like the rent, she only owes you for the time she was living there, no more, no less.





EDIT





No, you are not breaking any criminal law by letting your own sister to live in there (assuming you are telling the true), so stop worrying about it. In the worst case scenario your lease would not be renewed if the manager find out but that's what you want anyway.


Besides most manager don't care who actually lives in the apartment as long as the rent is paid on time. Your only mistake was not to make sure the rent was being paid.
More information on the complaint would be helpful. But it sounds like its simply a breach of contract claim over the rent you haven't paid. As such, you're only likely to be liable for monetary damages and you don't need to worry about anything more serious that might come about from criminal action.





Worst case is probably you have to pay all the rent due under the lease. Best case, you pay the back rent and continue to pay until you find someone to sublease. The oral promise of $325 is worthless in terms of amending the contract.





Be honest with the judge about what you've done, they'll figure it out. Just say why you did it.