Tips on creating a sub tenant contract

May 5, 2016 10:52 AM

Hello, I will be renting one of the bedrooms in my apartment to a sub tenant. The owner has approved me to rent out the second bedroom. Does anyone have a good template that I can use? I basically want it to state the rental period and rent amount. This is my question. I understand what a sub tenant agreement is, so please, no snarky remarks. Thanks

I rented a 2 bedroom and thought I would use the second room as an office. I have switched jobs and am no longer working from home and want to rent the second bedroom. The owner does not want me to add a second person to the lease but to have them be a sub tenant. I would like to do whatever I can to protect myself and am therefore looking to have the tenant sign a contract with me. I do not know what I should include in the sub tenant agreement.

posted by TRUELOTUS to Law & Government (4 answers total)

I did a search for "new jersey sublease agreement" and found this template.
posted by aniola at 11:04 AM on May 5, 2016

Ask your landlord to recommend a lawyer (preferably, a couple of lawyers, so you can get one who isn't your landlord's lawyer). There is too high a possibility of bad things if you screw this up by using some boilerplate thing that doesn't address the specifics of your local laws on tenancy.
posted by Etrigan at 11:05 AM on May 5, 2016

I did the same as aniola. It's worked out well for me. I did add a stipulation that states that the lease may be broken at any time if this or that occurs because of a horrible bipolar/kleptomaniac roommate situation I had.
posted by Marinara at 1:35 PM on May 5, 2016

You need to check the legal regulations in your area. For example, what Marinara says about the lease being able to be 'broken at any time' may not be legal in some areas. Where I live, even month to month leases have a 60-day notice period. People may well be persuaded to leave sooner if something isn't working out, but if the person has established formal tenancy, they do have rights no matter who the landlord is or how annoying they might be. When I was in university, students were specifically coached about this and told that if the lease has any clauses which are not legal, they cannot be enforced even if you are dumb enough to sign it :-)
posted by JoannaC at 8:23 PM on May 5, 2016