Lease Acceleration Clause
in Your Lease
What it actually means, what New Jersey law says, what's specific to Newark - and exactly what to do. In plain English.
Quick Summary - What You Need to Know
- The rule comes from a court decision. In Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977), New Jersey's Supreme Court held "that a landlord does have an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages" when a residential tenant wrongfully leaves.
- The landlord carries the proof. It "shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises", and a landlord with other vacant apartments "must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock".
- Kridel's own lease "stipulated that failure to re-let or to recover the full rental would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent", and the opinion ends: "The judgment in Sommer v. Kridel is reversed".
- The New Jersey sections our record read contain no statute stating the duty, and the Newark Housing Code and Rent Control chapters it read set no rule on re-renting or on acceleration clauses.
- Reasonable diligence is judged case by case, and the court said "there is no standard formula" for measuring it. Read the current text of the opinion yourself before relying on it.
Understanding the Lease Acceleration Clause
An acceleration clause is the lease paragraph that turns the rest of your term into a single bill. Fall behind or move out early, and every month still to run is written up as payable now.
In New Jersey, the rule our record carries for a residential tenant who leaves early was written by a court. Sommer v. Kridel, decided by the state's Supreme Court in 1977, holds that a landlord has an obligation to make a reasonable effort to re-let an apartment a residential tenant wrongfully left.
It also puts the burden of proving reasonable diligence on the landlord rather than on you.
The New Jersey sections our record read contain no statute stating that duty, and our record of Newark's ordinances finds no rule on re-renting or on acceleration clauses. What follows is therefore a reading of one opinion: what it held, what it asks a landlord to prove, and what it leaves to the facts of each case.
What renters assume
A lease that says in plain words that the landlord's failure to re-rent will not reduce what you owe looks like the end of the argument. You signed it, and nothing in the paragraph is ambiguous.
What is actually true
Kridel's own lease carried wording of that kind. It "stipulated that failure to re-let or to recover the full rental would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent".
New Jersey's Supreme Court still held that a landlord has an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages, and reversed the judgment in the landlord's favour. Read the current text of Sommer v. Kridel yourself before relying on it.
Not one of the 17 rows in the comparison further down this page carries a figure; each is a short label. Newark's reads Mandatory, landlord proves.
Eleven of the 17 labels open with Mandatory: Austin, Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, Seattle, Phoenix, Nashville, Portland, Las Vegas, Washington and Newark. Of the other six, Miami and Philadelphia read No duty to re-rent, Atlanta reads Likely no duty, Denver and Columbus read No statute; case law, and Boston reads No statute; 93A limits.
Two labels name who has to prove the point, and they point at opposite parties. Los Angeles reads Mandatory, tenant proves; Newark's rests on Sommer v. Kridel, where the landlord proves it used reasonable diligence to re-let.
Like Denver and Columbus, Newark's answer comes from a court, yet its label opens with Mandatory.
Plain English Version
If you leave a New Jersey apartment before the lease ends, a landlord who wants rent for the months that follow has to have tried to re-let the place. Under Sommer v. Kridel that effort has to be reasonable, a landlord with other empty units has to treat yours as one of them, and the landlord is the one who must prove the effort.
A court looks at things like whether the apartment was shown or advertised. You can point to suitable tenants you put forward who were turned down, and reasonable diligence is judged case by case, with no standard formula.
Rent Acceleration Clause Example - What the Wording Looks Like in Newark, NJ
The sample clause below is real lease language - a court quoted it word for word, and then ruled on it. What the judge decided is at the bottom of this block.
Find the equivalent paragraph in your own lease and read the two side by side. The wording will differ; the moving parts rarely do.
This is the lease paragraph as the court quoted it, stopped one sentence early. The sentence left out deals with late charges and interest running on an amount once it has been accelerated:
If any monthly installment under this agreement is not paid when due and remains unpaid after a date specified by a notice to Tenant, the entire principal rent amount owed for the full lease term shall at once become due and payable at the option of the Landlord and judgment may be had for all said amounts due. The foregoing provision shall not relieve the Landlord of its obligation to mitigate damages. In the event the rental premises is re-rented to another for full value prior to expiration of the lease term, Landlord shall file Notice of Partial Satisfaction of any judgment entered to the extent of the third party rental agreement.
[…]
Quoted from the published opinion in Summers v. Crestview Apartments, 2010 MT 164, 357 Mont. 123, 236 P.3d 586 (No. DA 09-0489). Judicial opinions are not subject to copyright; the lease language is reproduced in limited part for commentary under 17 U.S.C. § 107.
“principal rent amount owed for the full”
This is the balance the paragraph converts into one debt. In Sommer v. Kridel, New Jersey's Supreme Court held “that a landlord does have an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages” when a residential tenant wrongfully leaves. It overruled Joyce v. Bauman “to the extent that it is inconsistent with our decision today”. The total a lease names is where a claim starts, and Sommer attaches a duty to it.
“of the Landlord and judgment may”
Judgment is the point where New Jersey puts the weight on the landlord's side. Sommer says “the landlord shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises”. California runs the other way: under Cal. Civ. Code § 1951.2 the tenant carries the burden of proving what rental loss could reasonably have been avoided.
“relieve the Landlord of its obligation to”
This lease concedes the duty. The lease in Sommer said close to the reverse. Kridel's lease “stipulated that failure to re-let or to recover the full rental would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent”, and the opinion ends “The judgment in Sommer v. Kridel is reversed”. The court saw “no distinction between the leases involved in the instant appeals and those which might arise in other types of residential housing”.
“premises is re-rented to”
Whether the unit is re-rented, and how hard anyone tried, is the factual centre of a New Jersey dispute. Sommer names what a court looks at: whether the landlord “offered or showed the apartment to any prospective tenants, or advertised it in local newspapers”. A landlord with other empty units “must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock”, and the court added that “there is no standard formula” for measuring the effort.
The Montana Supreme Court struck this paragraph down, and its conclusion is one sentence: “Thus, we conclude that the accelerated rent provision is unconscionable and therefore unenforceable.” The tenants had moved out of their apartment on October 13, 2006, and Crestview answered with a Statement of Deductions from the Security Deposit charging rent through the end of the lease in June - $6,505.75 billed against a $2,170 deposit. Two reasons carried the court. Acceleration undermines the landlord's duty to mitigate and reduces the incentive to re-rent promptly, because a landlord already holding a judgment for the whole term has little reason to fill the unit. And Crestview drafted the lease while these tenants had no meaningful choice and no opportunity to negotiate any of it. The case was reversed and remanded, and two justices wrote separately - their objection being that the majority had gone as far as treating acceleration clauses as unenforceable in themselves. So read the holding narrowly, as the majority wrote it: this provision, in this residential lease, unconscionable and unenforceable. It is a Montana decision and it binds no other state's courts. What travels is the reasoning, and the reasoning is about mitigation - which is exactly the question the statute in your own city's decode answers.
One court, one lease, one state. That answer is not automatically yours, and your lease may be worded to land differently. Use this to know what to look for and what to ask - your state's tenant hotline or a local tenant attorney can answer it for your document.
New Jersey Law on Lease Acceleration Clause
- Landlords must try to re-let. The court wrote: "We now reverse and hold that a landlord does have an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages in such a situation". It overruled the older decision, Joyce v. Bauman, "to the extent that it is inconsistent with our decision today".
- The landlord carries the proof. The opinion says "the landlord shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises". A landlord with other vacant apartments "must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock".
- Reasonable diligence is judged case by case. The court's factors include whether the landlord "offered or showed the apartment to any prospective tenants, or advertised it in local newspapers". It also said "there is no standard formula" for measuring the effort.
- A lease clause saying otherwise did not avoid the duty. Kridel's own lease "stipulated that failure to re-let or to recover the full rental would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent", and the opinion ends: "The judgment in Sommer v. Kridel is reversed". In the companion case, Riverview Realty Co. v. Perosio, the court remanded "for proceedings in accordance with this opinion". It saw "no distinction between the leases involved in the instant appeals and those which might arise in other types of residential housing".
Sources include Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977) - statutes change; verify the current text for your situation.
New Jersey's rule for a residential tenant who wrongfully leaves comes from a decision of its Supreme Court. Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977) held "that a landlord does have an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages in such a situation", the situation being a residential tenant who wrongfully leaves.
It overruled the older decision, Joyce v. Bauman, "to the extent that it is inconsistent with our decision today".
The New Jersey statutes our record read are Title 46, chapter 8, and in Title 2A, chapter 18 from § 2A:18-51 on, with chapters 39 and 42. The duty comes from Sommer, and those sections contain no statute stating it.
The opinion is specific about who proves what. The landlord "shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises".
A landlord with other vacant apartments "must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock".
Reasonable diligence is judged case by case. Among the court's factors is whether the landlord "offered or showed the apartment to any prospective tenants, or advertised it in local newspapers", and it said "there is no standard formula" for measuring the effort.
A tenant may answer the landlord's evidence "by showing that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected".
The case also involved a lease that said the opposite. Kridel's lease "stipulated that failure to re-let or to recover the full rental would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent", and the opinion ends: "The judgment in Sommer v. Kridel is reversed".
In the companion case, Riverview Realty Co. v. Perosio, the court remanded "for proceedings in accordance with this opinion".
The court saw "no distinction between the leases involved in the instant appeals and those which might arise in other types of residential housing". Our New Jersey record carries that result and no sentence on lease waivers as such, and it does not reach acceleration clauses by name.
Texas voids a waiver of the duty in Tex. Prop. Code § 91.006 and New York does the same in N.Y. Real Prop. Law § 227-e; our New Jersey record holds no counterpart section.
Read the current text of Sommer yourself before relying on any sentence quoted here.
New Jersey Tenant Protections
A New Jersey landlord whose residential tenant wrongfully leaves has an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages. That rule comes from the state's Supreme Court in Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977), which overruled Joyce v. Bauman to the extent it was inconsistent.
The landlord carries the burden of proving that it used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises, and a landlord with other vacant apartments must treat the tenant's apartment as one of its vacant stock.
In judging that effort, a court considers among other factors whether the landlord offered or showed the apartment to prospective tenants, or advertised it in local newspapers, and there is no standard formula. The tenant may answer the landlord's evidence by showing suitable tenants the tenant put forward who were rejected.
Kridel's own lease said a failure to re-let would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent, and the court still reversed the judgment in the landlord's favour.
It saw no distinction between those leases and ones arising in other types of residential housing. The New Jersey statute sections our record read contain no statute stating the duty, and our record of Newark's Housing Code and Rent Control chapters finds no rule on re-renting or on acceleration clauses.
Read the current text of the opinion yourself before relying on it.
What's Specific to Newark
Figures are the state rule, or the stronger city ordinance where one exists. Verify the current law for your own situation before relying on it.
For this question Newark's own code is not where the answer sits, as far as our record reaches. Our record read the city's Housing Code and Rent Control chapters on ecode360, with legislation through July 15, 2026, and found no rule on re-renting or on acceleration clauses in them.
That finding answers this question alone; it is not a reading of what those chapters do on rent increases or anything else.
That leaves a Newark renter with two documents to read side by side: the lease, and Sommer v. Kridel. Sommer is a decision of New Jersey's Supreme Court, which is why it reaches a Newark tenancy at all.
It was not decided about a Newark apartment, and the court framed it broadly, seeing "no distinction" between the leases before it and those in other types of residential housing.
In a dispute over a Newark lease after you leave, Sommer sets the order of proof: the landlord "shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises". Our New Jersey record carries no sentence on whether a lease can change that order.
A Newark building with several empty units is where the vacant-stock sentence earns its keep. Under Sommer a landlord with other vacant apartments "must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock".
If your unit sat unlisted while others on the same roll were shown, that is a fact worth writing down.
The evidence the court named is local by nature. Whether the landlord "offered or showed the apartment to any prospective tenants, or advertised it in local newspapers" is something a Newark renter can often see for themselves, in listings, signs and messages. Save what you find, with the date you found it.
Your side of the evidence is local too. Sommer lets a tenant answer the landlord's case "by showing that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected". A friend, a coworker or an applicant you referred, and the reply you got, belong in the same file.
Ordinances change, and the copy our record read carries legislation only through the date above. Before relying on any of this, check the Newark code as it reads on the day you need it, and read the current text of Sommer as well.
A Newark tenant lawyer or legal services office can weigh your lease wording against the opinion before you agree to any figure.
That lines up with Sommer v. Kridel, which holds that a landlord has an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages when a residential tenant wrongfully leaves.
Useful in New Jersey. Under Sommer a tenant may answer the landlord's evidence by showing that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected.
Kridel's own lease said failure to re-let would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent, and the court still reversed the judgment in the landlord's favour. Read the current text of Sommer before relying on it.
Our New Jersey record does not reach acceleration clauses by name. It carries the duty to make a reasonable effort to re-let, with the burden of proving reasonable diligence on the landlord.
Sources
The law this guide relies on, and where to read it. Statutes change, so confirm the current text before you act on it.
- Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977), read on courtlistener.com.
Red Flags to Watch Out For
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A total with nothing about the unit
Under Sommer v. Kridel the landlord carries the burden of proving reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let, so ask in writing what was done with the apartment and when.
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A lease line saying re-letting changes nothing
Kridel's lease stipulated that failure to re-let would not discharge the tenant's liability for rent, and the judgment in the landlord's favour was still reversed.
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Your unit held back while others were shown
A landlord with other vacant apartments must treat the apartment in question as if it was one of his vacant stock, in the words of Sommer.
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Suitable applicants you found, turned away
Sommer lets a tenant answer the landlord's evidence by showing that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected. Keep the names, dates and replies.
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A letter citing a statute as the rule
The New Jersey sections our record read contain no statute stating the duty to re-let; it comes from Sommer. Ask which section is meant and read it yourself.
Your Rights as a Newark Tenant
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A reasonable effort to re-let
Sommer v. Kridel holds that a landlord does have an obligation to make a reasonable effort to mitigate damages when a residential tenant wrongfully leaves.
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The landlord proves its diligence
The landlord shall be required to carry the burden of proving that he used reasonable diligence in attempting to re-let the premises, under Sommer.
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Your replacement tenants count
A tenant may answer the landlord's evidence by showing that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected.
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Not limited to one kind of residential housing
The court saw no distinction between the leases in Sommer and those which might arise in other types of residential housing.
What To Do - Step by Step
Write down every date
The day you told the landlord you were going, the day you returned the keys, and the last day of the term. Every later argument about empty months is measured from them.
Offer replacement tenants in writing
Name anyone suitable who would take the unit and send it by email or letter. Sommer lets a tenant show that he proffered suitable tenants who were rejected.
Save what you see of the re-letting
Screenshot listings and note signs or showings, with dates. The court asks whether the landlord offered or showed the apartment, or advertised it in local newspapers.
Ask which other units stood empty
A landlord with other vacant apartments must treat yours as one of its vacant stock. A written question now is easier than reconstructing the building's vacancies later.
Check the Newark code as it reads today
Our record of Newark's Housing Code and Rent Control chapters, with legislation through July 15, 2026, finds no rule on re-renting or acceleration clauses. Later ordinances are not covered.
Read Sommer and get local advice
Read the current text of Sommer v. Kridel, 74 N.J. 446 (1977) yourself, then take the lease, the dates and your evidence to a Newark tenant lawyer or legal services office.