Apartment Lease Break Fees

It’s time for another installment of our series on apartment budgeting. Today we are tackling the top of apartment lease termination fees.

Lease Termination Fees Defined

What are lease termination fees? The fee is applied if a current resident decides to break their existing lease contract prior to the lease end date. I have seen the fee vary in amounts – some as low as one months rent and others as high and two and one half times the amount of the monthly rent.

Budget Strategy

The apartment lease termination fee is a line item that you can simply use history to forecast forward. If you collected three of these fees last year, it is fair to say that you might do the same in the coming year. Or, if you have more history to pull from then do so. If you have three to five years of history, go back and consider the number of fees you collected over that time and simply average it out.

Once you have determined the number you have collected, space them out over the course of the year. Feel free to pick your months at random as there is no absolute way to predict when someone might need to break their lease.

Charge and Beware

This is likely the second most contested apartment related fee standing close behind late fees. A quick search yielded more than a few Q&A sites that advised everything from – pay it to challenge it.

The fee is perfect legal and it is agreed to at the time of the lease signing so feel compelled to stand your ground.

Your lovin’ other income multifamily manic,

M