If you need to break a lease, be aware that you may have to pay rent until your landlord rents the place out to someone else or until the term of your lease is over. This is what a lease means, whether it is stated explicitly in the agreement or not. Many leases say that you have to pay a certain amount of money in order to get out of the lease. The amount charged to you cannot be charged as a penalty, but instead is meant to cover the landlord's cost of re-renting the place. This amount is called "liquidated damages'." A landlord cannot say that you will lose your damage deposit if you break your lease unless it is a reasonable estimate of what it will cost the landlord to re-rent the place.