Sublet to Tenant with No Social Security

[Craig Moreau]

Hey BP,

I ran into a scenario where a tenant is moving out of his unit from now until the end of August. It is a three bedroom apartment so there will still be two other tenants in the unit paying the rent they agreed to. The sublessor wants to sublet to an international student through the end of the lease (6 months). The catch is that this subtenant moving in does not have a social security number and will not have his social for about 4 weeks. Obviously given the circumstances and the time sensitive nature of the situation we aren't able to run a background check on this subtenant moving in. Since the sublessor is moving, and still responsible for the rent of the unit, I had planned to add an addendum to the lease with a provision that the subtenant's tenancy is subject to a background check once he has a social security number. 

To limit the liability on myself is it fair to also add into that addendum that this subtenant must pay the 6 months of rent up front? Those 6 months of rent would be forfeited if the background check does not pass. The problem here is that the subtenant is only responsible for 1/3 of the monthly rent in the unit. They pay $3100 total per month so the sublessor is responsible for $1,033.33. If we added this to the addendum would the other tenants already living in the unit have to pay as well since they pay with one check? I just want to try and limit the liability for myself so that if the background check doesn't come back approved than we still get paid. Would we need to include in the addendum that the other two tenants only need to pay their portion ($2,066) through the end of the lease since the subtenant paid theirs up front upon moving in?

Has anyone else run into a situation similar to this? If so how did you handle it? 

I appreciate the feedback!

-Craig

[Ray Harrell]

Let the sublessor pay the tenant and the tenant pay you if you have a trust issue. Would you require any other tenant to pay 6 months of rent up front? Remember, housing discrimination laws apply to all residents, regardless of citizenship status. The sublessor is not technically obligated to you, but to the person he is subleasing from. Hold your tenant to the original terms of the lease. Let the sublessor pay the tenant, and let the tenant keep paying you.

I think you are mistakenly treating this as a re-lease.