DD and fiancé have a 2 bed apartment in a flagship university small city. He is in grad school there till December. Their lease goes to mid-June and they now have to decide their renewal. She says 10 and 12 months are being offered. I think she should inquire about 6 or 7 months and see what they say.
Barring that, if they have to pick from 10 or 12, their options are to either find someone to sublease or take the buyout option (pay for an extra 2 months at about $1000/mo).
Pro of subleasing they don’t have to pay anything extra. Con is the trouble of finding one and potentially being on the hook if they don’t pay/damage. Right now their apartment complex has 19 open apartments- it’s not a tight market apparently, but if they renewed at 12 months they would have the advantage of offering someone a 6 month lease at a 12 month price that encompasses an entire semester. Looking at the FB swap page, it’s hard to say how much luck people have because I don’t know how many arrangements are made over Messenger.
Pro of buyout is being done with any liability and requires little effort. Con is $2000 cost.
I’m thinking renew for 12 (because a 10 month ending in April makes it harder to sublease in a college town), try to find a subletter until mid-October at which point if they don’t have one they put in their 60 day notice for buy out.
Any other advice? Things I’m not thinking of?
I doubt any landlord is going to be ok with a 6/7 month lease. My kids have rented at 10 places, all 12 month leases. Some places were 10, but charged extra so it equaled 12 months. Only one was able to sublet over the summer, but she’s in Boston, and her program matches up summer subletters (the 3 year program starts the end of may so there are always new students). My daughter’s super fancy 3 bedroom 3 bathroom apartment (pool, gym, clubhouse, coffee house, walking distance to campus, downtown) will sit vacant this summer, more apartments than students. I think just go with the 12.
Is it possible to pick up someone else’s contract and sublease from them for Fall? My D was on a rotating co-op and was moving constantly, but she saved on rent because plenty of people had 12 month leases and were happy to give her a discount so they weren’t on the hook for the entire monthly rent.
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This was my thought too - to see if they could sublease from someone else and not renew their own lease.
(My D did also did this when she was on co-op).
He has asked on FB group about subleasing from someone else but I don’t think has had any luck finding one yet with their specifications*. Now they have to make their renewal decision by the 19th.
*2 bed, allow cat, $1000 or less, decent area. I think they are pretty lucky with what they have and it’s a good location for her work.
On the apartment’s website they offer leases from 4-12 months. 7 months is not much higher than 12 if the website is to be believed. I didn’t know if existing renters could ask for the same.
I have had 6 month leases, twice, in the Boston area.
Never hurts to ask for the shorter lease. It’s worked for our child. They will usually charge more for rent for the short lease though. At least that has been our experience.
Personally I would weigh the $2000 vs increased rent for short lease and decide from that. There’s a lot that can go wrong with a sublease and many apartments have strict guidelines and rules making sublet not attractive at all. That’s what happened to my nephew. The apartment rules for sublet were such that it didn’t make any sense at all to do it.
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