5 Must Have Apartment Lease Provisions
While landlord tenant laws vary from state to state, one thing is true for almost landlords: in disputes, judges often see the tenant as the “little guy” who needs protection.
Consider a lease dispute as an example. Due to the fact that the landlord is the one who drafted the lease, they will have to deal with the mistakes they made in and how they enforced portions of it.
If a landlord is going to make changes to a lease’s fine print, they could change the outcome of a lease dispute. Here are five (5) things that require their attention:
1. Contract? What Contract? – Show The Tenant’s Original Signature The landlord’s signature on the lease is not the one that matters. Unless the landlord can show the tenant’s signature on the lease, it is not a lease.
Be especially careful when using fax or email, or online services. If the signature gets lost, the same is true for the landlord’s legal options.
Make sure you can access a hard copy of the original signature. This mistake is easy to make when form leases are used, because the signature lines are often omitted, or not set for multiple or corporate signatures.
Consider a lease dispute as an example. Due to the fact that the landlord is the one who drafted the lease, they will have to deal with the mistakes they made in and how they enforced portions of it.
If a landlord is going to make changes to a lease’s fine print, they could change the outcome of a lease dispute. Here are five (5) things that require their attention:
1. Contract? What Contract? – Show The Tenant’s Original Signature The landlord’s signature on the lease is not the one that matters. Unless the landlord can show the tenant’s signature on the lease, it is not a lease.
Be especially careful when using fax or email, or online services. If the signature gets lost, the same is true for the landlord’s legal options.
Make sure you can access a hard copy of the original signature. This mistake is easy to make when form leases are used, because the signature lines are often omitted, or not set for multiple or corporate signatures.
2. But, You Said You’d Let It Slide – Only Written Modifications Are Acceptable Landlords do not always catch tenants breaking the rules. If the landlord sees a problem and does nothing, there can be legal consequences for this lack of enforcement of lease provisions. Such inactivity opens the door for the tenant saying that the lease is no longer binding. An important safeguard is that any modifications of the lease must be in writing, with signatures, to be valid.
Buried in fine print, the modification clause restricts verbal modifications. If the tenant gets the wrong impression that the landlord changed the lease, with the modification clause in place, chances are that they will not bring up that argument.
3. Try To Keep It Together! – Use An Integration Clause Often times a lease is more than one document. There are add-ons, like house rules, a no-smoking policy, pet addendum, or disclosure pages. Anintegration clause is a piece of fine print that serves as a legal paper clip, tying all those documents together. At the same time, the clause prohibits the tenant from slipping in other forms that they claim were a part of the lease agreement. Look for language that provides that the lease being signed – and all attached pages, make up the full and final agreement between the parties.
4. Cutting Your Losses – Include a Severability Clause
A severability clause states that if one provision of the lease is deemed illegal, the rest of it can stand. While this seems like legal mumbo jumbo, this clause can save the day in a situation where an inadvertent illegality is not central to the lease. Without it, the entire lease could be unenforceable.
5. Adding Up The Charges – Specify All Potential Charges In The Lease Many lease forms place the all-important remedies provision of the lease in fine print. By doing that, an impression can be created that these terms do not have to be modified for your property.
Do not assume that you can charge interest, or add attorney’s fees and the costs of a dispute to the claim against a tenant, without first checking your local laws for any restrictions. Those terms must be included in writing, but at the same time, they cannot contradict the law.
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