I have huge issues with this case.

We see it all the times that courts realize that people are idiots and that they expect things that they don’t put into their deeds, contracts, and legal writings and the courts go out of their way to cover the asses of the common folk. In wills the courts do it all the time, in contracts, we see it all the time with respect to implied contracts and Illusory consideration. Time and time again, the courts go out of their way to protect idiots who make contracts and legal obligations when they don’t know what they’re doing. And in this situation, the courts stand up and say, “you should know better?” Please. There is a reasonable expectation that if I sign my lease to begin on the 1st and I show up on the 1st, then that is totally the fault of the landlord for being a crappy landlord and for not fulfilling his end of the bargain.

Contract law, not property law, should totally come into play here and the landlord has broken his end of the contract. His consideration was to have this apartment/property open and empty and clean for me to enter into, for which I will give him a promise of payment on a regular basis. The meeting of the minds is that when I sign saying that I’m moving in on the first is that the apartment will be ready for me starting at that point. Not that I need to sue the party living there and not the landlord. There was not promise or contract or bargain made between me and the old tenants.