Unenforceable Terms in the Lease Disclosure

Description

We all add stipulations in a lease that we know in advance can’t be monitored, tracked or enforced. Occasionally we take over someone else’s lease and find stipulations that are not trackable, measurable or enforceable. Examples might include: no pets over 10 pounds or no indoor pets, no smoking, set temperature at 70° during cold weather, tenant agrees to change the furnace filter every month, guests can only stay three days and tenant agrees to water the shrubbery. These types of stipulations are impossible to monitor, measure and enforce and disclosing this to the owner lowers the risk of the manager being sued for professional liability or malpractice when they leave these items in the lease and the manager has no way to track them.

Note: If you use the Crown lease, you don’t need this package because we don’t put untrackable and unenforceable language of this nature in the lease.

Here’s the problem. 

Owners naturally believe if it’s In the lease, it’s enforceable and will hold it against their manager if not enforced. Owners think you’re the expert and they are paying you to get it right and draft leases that are enforceable. It is incumbent on YOU to get it right and make it legal and enforceable or YOU are going to be blamed if it hits the fan.

To protect yourself you must remove (or at least lower) this liability from your company by either removing this kind of language from the lease or disclosing the reality of the lack of tracking and enforcing it to your owner . You may want to make this a housekeeping document to be signed by the owner when you take on a new property. You could use this language in an owner newsletter or annual report and disclosure. One way or another you should send it out (maybe more than once a year) to remind owners that these kinds of stipulations, although added in most leases, cannot be tracked, monitored, or enforced . This is one more CYA document to protect your company from the many liabilities of this business; especially liability from an angry owner expecting lease terms to be enforced.

This product includes the disclosure language to the owner and a training document for the manager and their staff regarding how and when to implement this document.