Legal Question in Landlord & Tenant Law in Massachusetts

Re: tenant vs. tenant

It depends on what it says in the lease. If the lease says each person who signs it is "jointly and severally" liable for the total rent payment, the answer is you are both liable for the full amount, and the landlord can get it from either one of you or both. But its also unfair to you if she forces you to pay rent when you're not living there or receiving the benefit of the rent payments. You should try to appeal to her sense of fairness, and see if she'll find replacement tenant to get you off the hook (document this in writing, and also make sure the landlord goes along with it). You would be responsible for the rent between the time you left and the time she replaced you with another tenant, assuming she looked reasonably diligently and found a replacement.

If she refuses to look for a replacement, or drags her feet to spite you, she may be responsible for her "failure to mitigate" her damages; in other words, she has a legal duty to make reasonable efforts to find a suitable replacement. If this wound up in court, your liability might be cut off after a month or two, or whatever period of the time court deemed was reasonable period for her to find a replacement. She might be liable for the rest, b/c of her failure to mitigate damages.

You have leverage in that she lives there and has to deal with an unpaid landlord (if you don't continue paying your share). Use this, but gently, as incentive for her to look for and find someone else to move in and pay the other half of the rent. But if the landlord comes looking for your share in the meantime, technically you owe the money, either to him -- or to her, if she covers your share then sues you to get her $ back.