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Are all AST the same - do you add clauses?

Started by george white, December 29, 2020, 06:42:41 PM

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george white

Hi, we are prepping our house for rental and I was wondering if AST's are written to a standard and whether you use your own, pay for one or use a service to draw one up.
The property will be a 2 bedroom house in the greater london area.

I am also wondering what types of clauses you would list as part of the contract to protect yourself further if this was possible and legal.

I'm looking at using the service provided by openrent but it says that some landlords can use there own - so wondering what the difference is.

Also to cover my basis, I've seen a couple of guides on renting your home, though do you have any recommend guides for a first timer I can look into? Sorry if i've missed it on the forum side.

Cheers
George

Hippogriff

I write my own.

There is a Government-supplied model Tenancy Agreement... go look for that and have a read. You might decide it's acceptable to you.

KTC

The government model agreement is almost certainly going to be better than anything even a fairly experienced landlord can ever draft. You do not sound like you are experienced in landlord and tenant, and contract law etc. Don't DIY it. Also resist the temptation to modify a model agreement obtained from a reliable source.

Hippogriff

It's been a few years since I took a look at the model agreement. At the time I assessed it as quite large, unnecessarily so, I thought - I remember it being quite repetitive in places and not terribly clear in its writing. If I recall correctly I think the download was almost 50 pages (although that did come with copious explanatory notes, I believe) whereas my agreements are 13 pages, with a recent GDPR section, and they are specific to my properties... i.e. the ones that don't have gas don't mention anything about the boiler, the ones that don't have a garden don't mention Tenant responsibilities about the garden, the ones that don't have windows don't mention anything about the cleaning of windows... that kind of thing. For me they have matured over the years into a set of documents I know intimately and feel comfortable discussing with Tenants as and when necessary. For a new Landlord I would recommend the model agreement can't be a bad starting point. The OP gives no impression this is the start of something big here, so I don't think they need to go to the effort of extreme customisation... there's always a chance they'll move back in when their current fling, or job or whatever, ends.

george white

Hi thanks for the replies. I'll have a look at that, I currently don't have word on my PC due to a rebuild, but i'll have it installed tomorrow at some point.

In the meantime I've see your blog for an AST written by Stones Solicitors LLP as your recommendation?  So guessing that could also be a start, at a fiver seems good enough value for me if written by solicitors and updated as you mentioned.
We have the gas safety, electrical cert & EPC. So all good on that front.
I'll look into the additional blogs and hopefully i'll get the jest of the main requirements and ensuring all is above board. Obviously i don't want to make any mistakes particularly as I've heard horror stories on the radio regarding tenants not paying the rent for months and landlords not being able to evict for legit reasons.

Cheers.