Tenants Now Renting Out One of the Bedrooms
My second floor tenants are renting out one of their three bedrooms. I found this out because a young lady rang my doorbell and asked if I was renting out “the room”. I stared at her and she said, oh it must be upstairs. Question: Do I ask my tenants about this? And should I…
My second floor tenants are renting out one of their three bedrooms. I found this out because a young lady rang my doorbell and asked if I was renting out “the room”.
I stared at her and she said, oh it must be upstairs.
Question: Do I ask my tenants about this? And should I do anything about rent?
They are now month to month, I only pay water/sewage and they are habitually late on rent and bounced 3 checks in 2.5 years.
Oh, I want to add that on my lease, I had the LL add clauses stating:
1. We can get a roommate for the 2nd bedroom at anytime.
2. Pets were allowed. (Cat)
3. Grilling was allowed. (Charcoal)
4. Drilling walls for internet/cable was allowed. (Had TW install new runs).
Etc… Yeah, my rent was high – hence LL wanting to play ball, and hence why I no longer rent!
Maybe you should discuss it with them. If you’re not comfortable with it, you can always give them a month’s notice, since they are on a month to month lease.
This is a bit tricky. Technically, every person on a lease is allowed to bring in their immediate family plus one roommate. Yet there is also another law which says basically anything more than two people per room is overcrowding.
However, I believe that if you own and live in a two family, you can basically do anything, including specifying on the lease that only lease holders are allowed to live in the apartment. I could be wrong about that though. I am not sure.
Step 1 is to check what your lease says about sublets and shares. As a LL with an apartment in my own 2-fam house, I want a say in vetting who lives in the house. I make all adults, whether a couple or a share, sign the lease and they are all jointly and severally liable for the rent and damage, and my lease bars sublets/shares without consent. It’s a different situation than a large bldg without a LL who lives on premises. So I do think it is reasonable to be concerned. If your lease gives you rights in this regard, you have more standing to say no if that is your wish. Best approach is not to escalate too much at first, but just talk to the tenants about what is going on. If your lease gives you power to consent, that doesn’t mean you should withhold it, but you do want to have your tenants know the right way to deal with this is by dealing with you. If your lease is silent, you still have a right to talk with them about it, and you can suggest that you think they ought to have talked with you first. Among other things, if this is to help them cover the rent, it would have given you an opportunity to decide whether you would rpefer the additional tenant or to lower the rent. You also should think about whether you want to add the new person to the lease or not. There are advantages and disadvantages to this. You should think about these issues for next lease. Meanwhile, it should be possible to have a good discussion with tenants without escalating this unnecessarily. It might be a perfectly fine situation.
it doesn’t sound like you’re too comfortable with the tenants and would like a little more information on who is exactly living in your building. I know I would not let people who I didn’t know, who haven’t passed a background check or credit check or criminal check for that matter move into the same building as me without at least some kind of meeting.
That seems like an appetite for disaster.
get them to sign a new lease. Make sure they understand they can’t sublet the apartments without your permission and without a credit check. You can go to onsite.com and they handle everything including charging the tenant.
Consider getting more responsible tenants. The easiest way is to raise their rent, if it is $500 more they will leave.
What is the big deal? They got a roommate to rent a bedroom they are not using. Seems like they’re doing the smart thing.
Six years ago my girlfriend and I lived on a 2bd/1bth floorthrough townhouse in Cobble Hill. At first we used the 2nd bedroom as a home office, but then later rented it out to help lower the bills.
I think it is pretty common in a shared apartment to find new roommates to fill the rooms with only the original renter’s name on the lease. I rented a bedroom in a share for years in Prospect Heights and the landlord – who approved – lived in the lower apartment. The person I shared with had his name on the lease and was the one who interacted with the landlords.
Why are your tenants month-to-month? It seems that part would get tricky if the original renters all move out and you find yourselves with all new tenants who are month-to-month.
I think NY state law allows tenants to have one roommate, plus any family members live there. Since you have plural tenants, I guess it’s a Q if they both are named on the lease. If they are, you may not have legal rights to object.
Maybe you should talk to the tenants and find out what’s up. If they’re month to month, you can always end their lease anytime. Maybe now is the right time for you to find some new tenants??
Think about the potential liability issues – and if its a violation of their lease. I wouldn’t allow it.