No Bull

I am pleased to say, I found a super-nice couple, with decent credit who speak in complete sentences to rent my home in Pinson. Mr. Noble, moving from out of state, is a statistician he has gotten a position with the local employer to do number crunching.

All was going swimmingly, with me writing Mr. Noble's lease Friday morning in between dealing with Harold's plumbing drama. Then, Mr. Noble called me. He read the lease and was uncomfortable with a few things in there. Essentially the lease was not "fair" for the tenant.

His biggest issue is the part where I say if the tenant moves out prior to their lease being up, they are still responsible for the rent. Somehow this seemed like an odd concept. To his credit, he told me this in a very polite, respectful way--even if I thought it was amazing he would question this at all.

Here is the scenario he threw at me: what if six months from now he gives me a 30 day notice to vacate. He wants to pack up and leave and not pay me a dime for my trouble. In fact, he said this was the first lease he had ever seen in his entire life where a landlord would hold him to fulfilling the terms of the lease. So, I needed to change my lease, because he was "confused" as to why I would have this clause in there.

So, let me get this straight: if one leases a car and they decide five months into a three year lease, they don't want the car, the dealership will just take the car back without penalizing the person? The dealership will cheerfully just accept the car and everyone will part friends? I used this analogy with Mr. Noble as I gently explained that yes, he was responsible for the lease. That is why we have a lease, and not a month-to-month agreement.

"Well then, don't you think if I move, I should only have to pay $50 a month, not the entire rent?" No, I didn't. "Ok, how about $100 instead?" he asked weakly. Nope.

Truthfully, I did not want to loose this guy. He needed a home immediately. He looked good on paper. He was impressive every time I spoke with him. I am guessing he probably won't rent for more than a year, given he is just moving to Birmingham. But maybe housing prices will be up a bit more by then and I will look at selling it. But, I didn't tell him this. I just told him I would not put my business in jeopardy by deleting this clause.

His other issue was he wanted me to delete the part where I say violating the basics of the lease (taking care of the home, subletting, meth labs, etc.) were grounds for eviction. He said, "What if I let the grass grow an extra week? I don't want to find out I am out on the street for something like that."

"Look," I said. "I live in Arizona. I am not going to fly out every week to see if you mowed your lawn. Say, I did fly out every week for this purpose, I would then need to hire a lawyer, pay the court fees and stand in front of a judge and ask him to put you out on the street? It seems more likely one of the neighbors will just contact me if your lawn gets high and I will call you and ask you to mow it." He seemed to understand that, but wasn't excited I wouldn't delete this clause either.

I suggested that he and I would both act like reasonable people. I would uphold my end of the bargain and I would expect him to do the same. Next June we could revisit this, and if he proved to be half as good a tenant as I expect him to be, I might consider rewriting a clause or two. But, probably not.