When to ask a tenant about a new Lease

Question

Thank you all in advance, I have a question about how soon I should ask my current tenant if they are going to want to sign a new lease?

Their current lease is up at the end of June. I live in a seasonal town and new posts are being made every day from people looking for rental units that are going to be moving up here in the summer.

Colleen F. · Answer

We are also fairly seasonal and most turnovers are May/June. I provide a form about 60 days prior to expiration by email saying we are happy with them as tenants and want offer them renewal with the lease terms/rate and response time. If they say yes I send a lease for signature asking that be done by x date. The initial email usually starts the conversation on any uncertainties about staying or lets me know if people are definitely going to move. I use 60 days because if you are not renewing in my state you have to give some groups (disabled) 60 days notice. I have gone 90 days but would not go further, people just don't know that far in advance. If I want to know sooner I will inquire verbally if they like the place and do they think they will be staying, this isn't a commitment but it helps me when I have for instance student renters who are graduating or going to internships.Also some of the moving up in summer may not be year round renters.

Steve Rozenberg · Answer

Our company policy is to send out renewal notices 90 days prior to their lease renewal date. Prior to that we send a 3 rd party company to do an assessment of the property so we can get a non biased perspective of how the home is being treated and all tenants are treated the same for any potential fair housing or discrimination issues

Josue Vargas · Answer

In most cases two months giving notice. But you should not have to ask the tenant what is their preference. You should have that in writing in your current lease. Is their responsibility to notify you if they don't want to renew/start new lease/or continue with the lease. If you don't have anything to cover the lease renewal, then I would ask them in writing right away and include something to that effect moving forward.

Nathan Gesner · Answer

My system is set up to send automatic renewal requests 60 days prior to termination. I want to lock them in within 30 days of expiration.

Thomas S. · Answer

60 to 90 days prior, this allows plenty of time to find a good replacement if they plan to move. Make sure you include in your notice that you will be applying your annual rent increase.

Robert Biggerstaff · Answer

I would ask them now and kind of phrase it in a sense of I’m just mad trying to make long-term plans can you give me an idea what you would like to do and if they mention they would like to you could even say hey knock $300 off one months rent if you go ahead and sign another year lease or something to that effect

Zach F. · Answer

We send out rental increases/renewals around 100 days prior to their lease expiring. We send this through Buildium and then have our system send a message similar to what is seen below. The challenge is that when we inherit new clients and new residents, they only need to give a 30 day notice on their decision. On our lease, we require that they give us 75 days notice on what they are going to decide. This gives us plenty of time to properly plan for what our next move is to reduce vacancy as much as possible.Dear (Resident) Time sure does fly by! As we're sure you know, your lease at (property address) will expire on(date). We greatly value you as a resident and would appreciate your continued residency. With that, we would like to extend a new 12-month lease to you; effective (insert the new lease beginning date), your new rent will be increased to (amount of new rent) and will be due to start (lease start date) until (lease end date). A new lease has been sent out to you to review. Should you choose to remain please sign and return to the email listed on the document. If you decide not to renew your Lease Agreement, please notify our office as soon as possible or by the legally required date of (date here).If you have any questions or concerns please do not hesitate to contact us.Kind regards,

Nathan Gesner · Answer

@Sean Rhodes I use Propertyware for managing rentals. I believe even some of the free software will do this for you. If not, you can always set a reminder in your calendar.

Sean Rhodes · Answer

@Nathan G. What system do you use for that?

David Gonzalez · Answer

I would let them know 60 to 90 days before it expires and give them a deadline to respond to the new terms. If the deadline passes and they haven’t responded I would market the property for a new tenant. Also next lease term I would have the lease expire at the start of the season so if your tenant leaves you can easily find a new tenant.