<p>DD is a sophomore at NU and she wants to live in an off-campus apartment/house next year with 3 or 4 roommates. They checked out a few places and she's telling me the landlord wants us (parents) to sign the lease holding each of us accountable for the entire lease. Is this the norm? Does anyone know of strategies to avoid this or mitigate the parental exposure? Thanks.</p>
<p>The landlord for my son’s house just had each student sign the lease giving them the responsibility for their own room/share. Maybe your D should keep looking for a lease you are more comfortable with.</p>
<p>I live in a collegiate town and all landlords have parents co-sign. Students have no past credit nor the income to qualify to pay rents.</p>
<p>I had to sign for my son for this (sophomore) year in Bloomington, IN – otherwise no apartment. He’s signed a lease on a house for next year and I don’t know if I have to sign that one.</p>
<p>Dad: we had to sign just for our daughter’s share…not the whole house…</p>
<p>We did not have to sign anything for our daughter’s lease. She and her room mate each have separate leases and are responsible for just their own share of the rent, which I really like. Her best friend that lives in the same town but in a different apartment complex did have to have a parent signature on her lease. So I guess it varies by landlord.</p>
<p>We had to sign for DS. He was one of three on the lease. They collectively were responsible for the rent…meaning if someone left, the other two were responsible.</p>
<p>DD…who knows what her lease is! We were not asked or required to sign it. We questioned it but in her area of CA, this is the norm…no parent cosigners on the lease. Hope they read the fine print. It ends on June 20.</p>
<p>D1 goes to Cornell. We also got such lease initially - joint and severally responsible for rent. The other parent was fine with it, but I wasn’t. Everyone told me that it wasn’t negotiable. I told the landlord that I would guarantee the rent if we were only responsible for my daughter’s rent, if the other renter should leave then D1 would have the right to find another renter, if she should forfeit the right then the landlord would be responsible to find another renter, but he could only rent it to a a female student from Cornell. The landlord agreed to it. I believe everything is negotiable. Too many students leave because of poor academic performance, illness, family problem… It is very hard to sublet once school starts.</p>
<p>For S, we never signed any leases. He has a credit card & sufficient funds in the bank to pay his share of the entire year. For D, we had to sign for her share of the lease this year. We could have squacked, but she really didn’t want to make any waves. This may be her last year in student-related housing anyway. This & last year she was with university housing & none of this came up.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s unusual for parents to have to guarantee at least their student’s portion of the lease, but there is considerable variation about whether anyone has to co-sign for the ENTIRE lease.</p>
<p>Our D will be living with one of her best friends & two others. We don’t think there will be any issues as they are all VERY responsible and will be juniors/seniors next year.</p>
<p>I’ve never signed any leases for my kids. In order not to one place required x amount of money in the kid’s checking account (I think the equivalent of 6 months or so of rent) and a couple of other places just required a deposit of somewhere around an extra month of rent that was returned at the end. In one case the landlord wanted the cosign but my D asked what would be necessary to get the apt without the cosign and it amounted to that extra month or so that was returned later. The above was done on both ends of the country (California, DC).</p>
<p>In all cases where my kids have rented everyone on the lease, and that would have included cosigners, is responsible for the entire rent and damages for the apartment. It’s a good idea to not cosign if you can manage it. It might take asking the landlord what alternatives they offer besides the cosign. If they’re not flexible, look around at other places.</p>
<p>ucsc_ucla dad…I still find it ODD that we didn’t have to cosign DDs lease in CA. And neither did the rest of the parents of the kids in her house. We did NOT put six months rent into her bank account and she does not earn enough money to cover her costs. BUT I guess this works for her landlord…who apparently owns all the houses on her cul de sac and is a VERY good landlord (from what we know…kids are dying to get into these houses because they are convenient to the campus, and VERY well maintained). I guess we hit it lucky.</p>
<p>We DID cosign for DS, in what I would consider to be substandard student housing. BUT it was VERY convenient to his campus.</p>
<p>In our case, we would rather cosign rather than be responsible for other roommate(s), at the end of day we were paying for her rent while she’s in school anyway.</p>
<p>We were not asked to sign either D’s lease in Texas or S’s lease in Louisiana.</p>
<p>However, the structure of the two leases was very different. S’s situation was one where his landlord was a lawyer who required each of the four boys to sign his own lease representing his “share” of the apartment. D’s lease was a single lease but signed by all 3 roommates. </p>
<p>Given the challenges of roommates who left unexpectedly, S’s scenario was by FAR better to protect him. With S’s lease, if any of the roommates bailed, it was entirely on the kid leaving to pay up or find a replacement. </p>
<p>If one of D’s roommates bailed, the other 2 were on the hook. (And it happened to her, TWICE in three years). </p>
<p>I’m guessing your D may have little to no leverage in requesting the type of lease she gets from a specific property landlord. However, it the choice is available, I’d highly recommend she ask for a lease like my son had. It was really stressful for D (and us) as she navigated through this.</p>
<p>We have not had to sign either of my son’s leases (one sophomore year, different one junior year), but we would have been willing to co-sign on his portion only of the rent if the landlord had asked and the language was clear in the lease as to what we were signing.</p>
<p>Our daughter’s school was landlord’s market, and most people told me that every lease was the same in collegetown - signed by students, but jointly responsible. We gave the landlord something extra (parental guarantee), in exchange we had each roommate be responsible for her own lease. Most parents feel college kids should handle this on their own, but unless a parent shows them how to read a contract and how to negotiate (give and take) there is no way they could figure it out.</p>
<p>We did not have to sign our son’s lease. Each of the boys signed it. As far as I know there were no background or financial checks done either. Very trusting, I guess. But in son’s case, if one of the 5 guys doesn’t pay, the other 4 are still responsible for coming up with the entire rent for the house.</p>
<p>Most students live off campus at D1’s school, so they have a dedicated off campus housing office. I was able to vet out the landlord through the school. They couldn’t make any recommendations, but when I asked, “Is X a good landlord? Is it a good building?” The office was able to say yes or no. I found them to be very helpful and they thought it was the right thing for parents to be involved. They actually suggested for me to have a side agreement with the roommate’s parents in case they were jointly responsible for the lease.</p>
<p>Dad by NU do you mean Northeastern? What part of the country are we talking about. My son is a senior at Northeastern, lives in a Boston studio. I had to consign the lease. We went through a realtor and had to pay the rent times four in January for a move in the following September. Relator fee, first, last, deposit. That’s generally how it works for the better apartments in Boston.<br>
Not sure about signing for the entire lease. I sure wouldn’t want to do that. If one of the other kids flakes you are on the hook for them? Nope. If that is the case I would encourage D to find a place where the lease is for each person and you are cosigning for her only.
But if we are talking about Boston the market is tight and nothing would surprise me.
Yes, there is also a housing office with information on off campus housing.</p>
<p>My nephew is a junior at Northwestern living in off campus housing. My sister and BIL did not have to sign the lease. My nephew did have to sign the lease very early in 2009 to reserve the apartment AND they had to take agree to start paying rent in June (although no one planned to live there until the fall semester). </p>
<p>I might also mention something that caught my sister/BIL off guard. If your student gets any type of financial aid/scholarship, check to see if any of it is tied to ON CAMPUS housing. When my nephew moved out, Northwestern revoked the part of the financial aid package they said was applied to housing. Sister and BIL just assumed that portion would move over to tuition, but it did not. SO they lost a few thousand dollars in financial aid and are paying for this apartment. Might not even affect you - just something to be aware of!</p>
<p>Cornell does not have enough on campus housing for everyone, so if you are on FA and it covers housing then you would get reimbursed. They include housing in sorority/fraternity also. Each school has its own policy.</p>