Rental property questions

[Guest Kelly O]

Hi

 

Just wanted to see if anyone could throw any light on our rental questions.

 

We are currently renting and more than half way through a 12 month lease. Ideally we would like to continue renting for another year and stay at the same property but just wanted to know if the Landlord wants us to vacate at the end of the 12 months how much notice would he need to give us? Also if he does want us to stay but decides to increase the rent is there a limit on how much he can do this by?

 

Thanks -if anybody can help us out from their experiences we would be very grateful. We just do not want to be scurrying around looking for rental properties as we have done that once and wanted to stay put if we could!

[Guest Kelly O]

Sorry bumped it back onto the screen as I didn't get any suggestions and it slid off from view! Maybe the next shift of PIA will be able to help!!

[Guest the4hopes]

We rent through an agent and our lease is due to end 23 March, we have just had a letter asking us if we want to sign for another year. The rent will go up 10 dollars a week.

[Guest nikki & john]

Hi

 

In regard to the notice at the end of the lease, it's deemed to be good practice and courtesy to give the tenant as much notice as possible, preferably a minimum of 4 weeks especially if you are giving them notice to leave, but unfortunately doesn't always happen for a variety of reasons. There is no actual official length of period for giving notice but OCBA recommend a minimum of 4 weeks.

 

At the end of a lease term the Landlord can choose to increase the rent by however much they please, whether or not you choose to pay it or whether or not they would actually get this on the open market is another matter altogether. During a lease term they can only increase the rent in line with market value but at the end of a lease term they can up it to whatever they want and its your choice whether or not to accept this.

 

It might be worth approaching the agent/landlord to ask whether you can get a lease extension early, they won't look at it themselves until about 8-12 weeks before the end of the lease and thats when they will contact the landlord to ask whether they want to keep you, for how long and at this point they will recommend whether they feel a rent increase is appropriate, but that doesn't mean that you can't ask them before that. If they and the Landlord is happy with you they might be willing to give you the extension you want now.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Nikki

[Guest Kelly O]

Thank you so much for that. You had some really useful advice which I will follow up. Taking the time to give advice like that is very much appreciated. This site is so helpful and people like you who offer their advice and share their experiences is just fantastic. I wish I had discovered it before we'd left England. Still... I'm learning all the time.

 

Cheers. Kelly