Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Lease Negotiations

Lease Negotiations

In the coming months, many leases will expire. Market conditions are such that renters no longer need to accept the terms landlords dictate (renew the old lease with a $100-200 increase). Rather, renters have more power to negotiate a new lease, demanding lower rents. In case you haven't heard, we're in a recession...

If the 132 tenants share some information, we'll be more able to negotiate lower rents for ourselves. My apartment will be renegotiating our lease soon. If anyone wants any information about how it went, please hit me up. I am willing to share information, but would rather do it in person or personal email rather than posting it.

In order to negotiate the best deal possible, we'd like to share information with our fellow tenants:

1. How much rent people who recently moved into apartments are paying (include # of bedrooms).
2. How many apartments are up for renewal/renegotiation in the next few months.
3. How many people plan on staying/leaving in the next few month.

If you recently moved into the building (or know who else has), please get in touch. I'd like to exchange a couple emails or talk to people for three minutes to see what's up. Please email me: hipsterlawyer at gmail

If you are thinking about moving out or will renegotiate your lease in the next few months, please get in touch. It's super helpful to know how many vacancies the landlords are expecting; the more vacancies, the better our bargaining power because they don't want to risk an apartment laying vacant for a month.

Please send me an email (if you want to remain anonymous, I won't email you back). You can also post to the comments section of the blog anonymously. No need to post your apartment number, but please let us know how many bedrooms you have. In a week or two, I hope to have a better ideal of where the building is at. When I do, I'll be sure and post some (anonymous) statistics.

Thanks...

Please email me: hipsterlawyer@gmail