Notice period when staying for 6 years in an apartment

Hi, We are staying in an apartment for past 6 years. We have maintained the apartment very well and have always paid rent on time, almost all the time without landlord asking for it. Landlord was very happy as he did not have to do any work in the apartment in 6 years. He has said in the past that he would give at least 1 year notice to vacate. But now he requested us to vacate in a month as he needed money for his family member. We were not sure whether it was a serious request or something happened. We started looking but we were too busy to seriously spend time on it. Also, it was too sudden for us. Later he increased the time by 15 more days. Then again 15 more days. We didn't know what is the actual time we were going to get. But we kept looking. However, we couldn't find anything. Then he became very serious in his attitude and started using tough words. We were already looking seriously. But we didn't want to cause problem to anyone. Therefore, we took 1 week off from work and continuously started looking by engaging multiple agents. Unfortunately it is not easy to find all the apartments, which are open for visit during weekdays. Now we think we have found one and we might be able to vacate within a week. It will 2 and 1/2 months by that time. But our landlord is acting very angry now and he is saying that he will take strict action. We are not sure what he can do considering he is a lawyer himself! Should we seek some legal help? Are we wrong to understand that we should be given proper notice period? Kindly note that we had proper agreement just for the first year. After that we did not have any paper work (rental agreement). We are just paying rent by doing bank transfer.