$500 fine for 2 violations without warning [condo][MA]
On June 24th, my landlord received notice of two violations that happened in June. Basically, the parking garage in my building has both an inner gate and an outer garage door. The property management has me on video closing the garage door, but not the inner gate. The outer garage door is the one that has the key code.
Fast forward 1 month, i’m completely oblivious to all of this. I get a notice that my account has been charged $500, $250 for each time in June that I only closed the outer garage door not the inner gate.
I checked all the previous communications, and they never sent me the HOA rules. I know this is my mistake for not getting the HOA rules, but I did check the parking lease, the master deed, and the property management rules and they do not mention anything about closing the gate. Also, I have seen other tenants fully leave open the outer garage door. I know this doesn’t help my case legally, but still!!
I feel like this is completely unreasonable to charge me $250 for two violations and then only inform me one month after about both at the same time, no warnings and no notice about the first violation.
The issue is that my landlord already payed this fine, and they’re now expecting me to reimburse it. It is written in my lease that I need to reimburse the landlord for fines based on my violations. I am moving out in two weeks on August 31st anyways, do I need to pay this $500 fee? And am I unreasonable for not wanting to pay this?