I wish I would have put that on the lease...

[Megan Phillips]

Hi All,

I'm reviewing my lease, and I'm wondering if there's any additions in people's leases that they consider must haves, or perhaps additions to leases after a bad tenant experiences? What is something you'd wish you'd put in your lease to prevent issues? Or simply additions that allow you to highlight some part of the lease, send to tenant as proof of "yeah, you signed and agreed not to do that."

[Jennifer T.]

"Tenant cannot park a vehicle on the front lawn."

You'd think that is just common sense, obvious, and would not need to be included in a lease.  You would be wrong, lol.  As was I (at the time).

I also started capitalizing and bolding the area in my lease that basically says, "Security deposit cannot be used as last month's rent."

It's always been in my leases, but have had multiple arguments with tenants (of course, always the bad ones) that no...really, really...they can't.  Apparently I'm "outrageous" because "all the other landlords" let people do that.