Hi, I’m looking at options to integrate my short-lets on AirBnB with longer term (3-6 month) lets. I’ve already found a Tennant who wants to rent my apartment for a 3 months fixed period and I was wondering if the OpenRent AST can be customised for this scenario.
I’d also use OpenRent to perform the credits check and secure the deposit… is that possible?
Many thanks,
Andrea
Hi Andrea,
Yes, you can order referencing on any potential tenants. All you need is their permission, their phone number and their email address. You can begin that here: OpenRent Standalone Referencing.
OpenRent is designed for landlords to let homes in the Private Rented Sector and assumes an Assured Shorthold Tenancy in England & Wales, and a Private Residential Tenancy in Scotland.
I don’t think that an AST is the appropriate agreement for short term lets.
One of the basic premises of an AST is that it is not possible to evict the tenant before six months, unless grounds for Section 8 exit, and even then it’s very unlikely you could complete the S8 process before six months: and certainly not at three months. Therefore, it’s not possible, legally and practically, to use an AST for a three, four or five month tenancy.
You could use it to offer a six month tenancy, but this would give the tenants rights that you would not normally want to give to short-term renters. E.g. if they decided not to leave, it would be very hard to repossess the property.
To answer your final question, we do secure tenancy deposits on behalf of landlords when they use our tenancy creation service, Rent Now. But Rent Now requires an AST.
Hope this has been helpful.
Sam
Hi Sam! Thank you so much for the useful insights!
If I understand correctly, I can use OpenRent only for the background checks service.
The “tenancy deposit” service is part of the Rent Now service, which requires an AST… which is not recommended in my case.
If an AST is not a viable option, which kind of agreement should I use for rentals from 3 to 6 months long?
Many thanks!
Andrea
Hi, no problem 
Yes, exactly.
I would imagine you would be best with a holiday let agreement, but I don’t know loads about this as it’s not something OpenRent specialises in. There will be versions you can find online. The important thing is that it specifies that the arrangement is:
Sam
Hi Sam,
One more question. The tenant is happy to sign a 6 month tenancy agreement as long as there’s a clause that allows her to stop the tenancy given a one month notice. Does it make it a valid AST that I can manage and set up via OpenRent? And therefore have the full service which includes the handling of the deposit etc etc…?
Many thanks,
Andrea
I’m not a legal expert, but I don’t think that clause would be enforceable. The whole point of a fixed term is that the tenancy can’t be unilaterally ended by the tenant during the fixed term. You could in theory include such a term in the AST, but it would lead to a confusing and contradictory tenancy given that ASTs are meant to last the fixed term without notice being served. You could always agree to end the tenancy early if you both wanted to. With mutual consent anything is possible. But it would be very weird to include a one-way right for the tenant to end the tenancy during the fixed term.
It sounds like you probably want a contractual period tenancy rather than having a six month fixed term?
Sam
I guess so. However there are basically no info or platforms who can handle this scenario. It’s either AST or nothing at all… Or at least this is my understanding… I’m literally hitting a wall and can’t figure out what to do.