My guy has leased a house for a few years and the owner just sold it to a house flipper. The current lease goes for a few more months. The old owner sent him a notice to vacate in early May (45 days) with an offer of a months rent. My guy never formally responded. After talking to the house flipper yesterday, the sale has closed and he says the old owner told him the lease expired early May and did not provide it during closing. My guy is actively looking for a new place, but wont be out til the end of May at the earliest. We need to pay May rent and the old owner never gave a notice of the new person to pay. I do have his address off the deed (which I looked up) and I have spoken with him.
What should my play on the rent here be?
The reason that the old owner thought he could do all this is that the lease form they have signed every year didn't have the year updated. So, the current lease has a stated term of Aug 2019 - Aug 2020 and was executed by both parties in Nov. 2020. I got emailed and texts where the landlord italks about signing a lease for the next "year", I don't think I will have any issue showing mutual mistake if I have to.
No early termination clause in the lease, it's a custom form.
[I am an TX attorney, but I don't deal with this stuff very much]