Advantages and disadvantages of lease forms

Introduction

The landlord and the tenant must enter into one of the two legal contract before the landlord can rent a rental unit. Two kinds of agreement through which a property can be rented are: a periodic rental agreement or a lease.

Under a lease, it is stated for how long or the total number of months that the lease will be in effect - for example, 6 or 12 months. Even though the lease requires the rent to be paid monthly, the tenant is bound by the lease until it expires (for example, at the end of 6 or 12 months). This means that the tenant must pay the rent and perform all of the responsibility under the lease during the entire lease period.

Advantages of a lease

Here are some of the advantages to having a lease.

If you have rented a property on a lease, the landlord is liable not to increase your rent while the lease is in effect, until the lease specifically allows raising the rent. Furthermore the landlord cannot legally evict you while the lease in effect. In certain circumstances the landlord has to right to ask you to vacate the rented property for reasons such as your damaging the property or failing to pay rent.

A lease gives the tenant the security of a long-term agreement at a known cost. Even in cases where the lease allows rent increases, the lease should correctly state the extent to which the rent will be increased and how often the rent will be raised.

Under a leasing agreement, the lessee is not entering in to a long-term financial commitment. In a lease agreement which will have a set time frame, you are free to leave the property once the lease expires. It becomes advantageous to the lessee in situations where premises become unsuitable and it allows them to abandon the property on expiry of the lease, with no further commitment.

Real estate becomes a good investment to the landlord in times of inflation. Rising rents become a real asset rather than a danger to the owner.

Disadvantages of a lease

One of the main disadvantages of a lease is that it will be difficult to sever a lease if the tenant needs to move, especially if you cannot find another tenant to take over your lease. If you move before the lease ends, the landlord may have a claim against you for the rent for the rest of the lease term.

Before signing a lease, you may want to talk with an attorney, legal aid organization, housing clinic, or tenant-landlord program to make sure that you understand all of the lease's provisions, your obligations, and any risks that you may face.


James is an expert in writing about legal forms and documents that may help you when your in the search of the right legal document. He writes many articles about forms ranging from, power of attorney forms, landlord tenant forms, and almost any legal form that your searching for.