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My friends and I entered a year-long lease agreement where we each paid $600 per month to stay in an apartment. The original contract we signed stated we were to move out on May 26. However, as that date approached, we realized it would be significantly easier if we could move out on the 31st.

Because of this, we asked the landlord if we could stay the extra five days. He said yes and didn't mention any additional cost.

A few weeks after we moved out, the landlord sent us a bill for the five extra days we stayed, calculated by taking the monthly fee and multiplying it by 5/31. We had thought we would be able to stay the extra five days for free.

Is this allowed? Was he required to tell us that we would have to pay more money if we stayed the five extra days? Or should we have seen this coming?

We live in the US.

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    Does the lease you signed describe holdovers? Its a common enough contingency to be in form leases.
    – user662852
    Jul 15, 2016 at 23:05
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    He could have charged you 5/30, or 5/28, or just an entire month's more rent. He had no obligation to let you stay at all, let alone for free. You got a damn good deal. Stop complaining and pay him!
    – user4657
    Jul 16, 2016 at 5:52

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You should have seen this coming.

This might vary a bit from place to place, however it would generally be accepted that if you are in a rented place, you have to pay rent. Most jurisdictions would have some law which requires pro-rata'd payment for the time you actually stay, there would not be any requiring the landlord let you stay free.

An uninvested third party might ask "Why would a landlord provide you with 5 days free rent".

Another way to look at it is that one of the elements of a contract is consideration (think payment) - Thus in contracting to stay in his place longer you should expect to provide consideration - and pro-rata'd rent would be typical.

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    Actually, the OP was lucky - the landlord was probably entitled to a full months rent
    – Dale M ♦
    Jul 16, 2016 at 19:17
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    @DaleM Agreed. Since no new terms were negotiated, it's reasonable to expect the original terms to continue to apply.
    – David Schwartz
    Jul 17, 2016 at 8:41

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