Are you moving to a new city to study or work and looking for affordable accommodation to live in? Don’t want to spend a high amount of money by going fancy? Looking for a simple living space available for rent?
If yes, then it’s recommended to find a place that you can share with someone else as more expenses incurred. This way, not only will you save money but also have a friend in the city of strangers.
But, the thing that you shouldn’t forget is to create a roommate rental agreement in order to avoid conflicts in the future. Therefore, it is better to gather as much information about this agreement as possible so that you don’t miss out on anything.
What Is a Roommate Agreement?
When two or more individuals decide to share a room or a home, they get into the roommate agreement. It used to mention all terms and conditions that all tenants have to follow without affecting the comfort and convenience of the other.
This agreement is the surety by all parties that they have mutually decided certain rules and regulations to live together. If anyone doesn’t follow them, the other party(s) have the option to take legal actions against them.
Tenants can either be friends, colleagues, family members, or strangers. There are no hard and fast rules to sign a roommate agreement.
Why Do I Need a Roommate Agreement?
In the rental agreement, parties have to abide by the specified rules and regulations in it. The reason behind the importance of this agreement is to avoid conflicts in the future. All parties are sure about their responsibilities and how to live with someone else away from their homes.
Some rules are usually included in the roommate agreement:
- A roommate cannot keep a boyfriend/girlfriend for more than one night in a week.
- Every roommate will contribute a certain amount to share expenses of cleaning and toilet supplies.
- Get permission before calling friends over
- Respect others’ routine and finish parties early
Who Will Be Benefited From a Roommate Agreement?
A roommate agreement is useful for a landlord who is willing to rent out a vacant room or portion of the home to someone looking for accommodation.
With the help of roommate agreements, all parties are ascertained about their responsibilities, expectations, and obligations. They don’t have to fight for their rights in the future.
What Are Included in a Roommate Agreement?
Here are the elements that need to be included in a roommate agreement:
Amount of Rent to Be Contributed
The first and foremost thing is to clarify the division of rent for each roommate. There is no issue that is evenly split but the living arrangements should not be overlooked at the same time.
Utility Responsibilities
It’s usually quite irritating to divide utilities since the division is not always the same. So, it’s better to specify the criterion before anything could happen.
Security Deposit By Each Roommate
The roommate agreement also requires parties to specify the amount of security deposit to be paid by each roommate. They can consider anything for this division like room size so that each roommate is sure about how much he/she has paid in terms of security deposit. This amount will be returned when they decide to leave the place.
Guest Policies
While a roommate agreement would already have overnight guest policies, it’s necessary to get into the depth of this matter and clarify everything in detail. Girlfriends or boyfriends cannot come at home often for an overnight stay; permission is required from each roommate.
Cleaning Responsibilities
Cleaning is always the most difficult task, especially when two people who are not used to living with each other and share a living space. Sometimes, either party makes the other responsibilities to carry the house chores, which eventually leads to conflicts.
Parties to the agreement can add more clauses or terms as per their requirements to rest assured about convenience and peace in the future. There are no limitations to adding the terms since the roommate agreement is flexible to accommodate all of them.
Wrapping Up
In summation, it can be said that a roommate agreement is the best way to avoid misunderstandings and other issues with the other person. It’s better to mention everything before deciding to live with a stranger.
However, CocoSign can help people in their creation. We just need to have a basic understanding of what all parties want and how they want things to work in the future.