Chicago sublease agreement

[Tim Matthews]

Hello, all.

If I have a tenant in Chicago who wants to sublease (not sublet) to someone else, should that sub-leasing setup be made with a standard lease agreement, such as the Chicago Association of Realtors lease agreement, perhaps with additional wording indicating that it is a sublease? Or is there another Chicago-specific agreement specific for subleasing?

[Mark Ainley]

Morning @Tim Matthews, Let me frame this a little different because this process gets mucky starting with the first questions you have here.  You are bringing additional parties into the relationship and that just brings higher risk for failed communication.  We try to avoid this by working out win/win scenarios with current tenants needing to break their lease.  Can the current tenant locate a qualified(you approve) tenant for the same or more rent and turn the place over to this new tenant in move in condition at which point you can release them from the current lease.  They win cause they are off the hook and you win because you get a new qualified tenant for another 12 months removing 33% of the parties involved.

We will offer a Chicago tenant the opportunity to hire us to locate and underwrite for a new tenant or they can find someone and we charge a small underwriting fee.  We know in Chicago you have to allow subleasing but we also know if a solution can be created for the tenant to be off the hook once they fulfill specific terms agreed to that they would prefer that option first and foremost and most likely be amendable to favorable terms you might have as the Landlord.  

19 years later we have been able to avoid subleasing for the most part due to the higher risk of messing something up.