My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: Arizona
I have been reading posts from various dates on this website for the last 3 days. I have seen that the conclusions of the posters have widely varied. If anyone could give me insight to my situation, I would appreciate it. Here it is:
I signed a lease, along with 3 other renters, that is valid from 6-01-09 to 5-31-10. On, approximately, 06-25-09 I moved out of the house to move into another residence. I continue to pay rent at both properties. I have paid utilities for June, July, August, and September for the property I moved out of (Let's define it as House A). I continued to pay utilities because the other 3 roommates from House A have been actively searching to "fill" my room. After 3 months of fruitless efforts, I have taken over the search. The search to get someone to sublet is my responsibility. I gave the 3 roommates the opportunity to select their choice of roommate in a reasonable amount of time. I told them that I would wait until 10-01-09 before I started to attempt to find "anyone" to fulfill the lease. I did this in order to give them a chance to have a preferred roommate as opposed to someone whom they have never met.
About 20 days ago, I told them that I would no longer be splitting the utilities with them. This, of course, led to outrage on their part. I would like to know if they have any legal standing to come after me for the amount of 1/4 the total utility bill.
The utilities are in the names of the 3 roommates. None are in my name. None are in my landlord's name. As far as I know there is nothing in the lease that pertains to this. Also as far as I know we did not sign a roommate rental agreement of any kind.
Thank you in advance for your time.

