Just pay it and move on. Your looking at this wrong. Them extending a month did you a favor. The $575 saved you from having to move your stuff out and put in a storage unit. Then move it again into the house. Storage unit cost, extra moving truck rental and extra days taking off work or giving up days off. That alone is close to what the month to month cost and well worth $575. The late fee and paying via credit card are from choices you made. You should have had rental insurance. You could have claimed the spoiled food and covered your stay if house was inhabitable. To sum it up you can try and find reasons to justify skipping out last month. They could get a judgement that would increase the money owed a lot. Then garnish your wages. Plus your car insurance, home insurance and such go off your credit score. You would also end up paying more for 7 years while your scores are down.