Internet included in lease?

Question

Hello landlords,

I reside in an owner-occupied duplex and am considering including internet as one of the amenities. What should I include in the lease if I decide to do so (things like not being liable for any illegal web activities, download limitations etc)?

Thank you.

Bruce Woodruff · Answer

I wouldn't do it. There's no upside for you IMO. It's not much of an amenity.

Glen Wiley · Answer

I wouldn't do it unless your market is highly competitive and it is necessary for getting applicants.

I have my tenants handle their own utilities for a couple of reasons:

1. I don't want to be the middle man when there are problems with service delivery - let them deal with the service provider directly. Any of my time spent on this is time I could be doing anything else.

2. I don't want to be involved in a tenant's abuse of the service.

3. Billing problems are between the tenant and the service provider, I don't want to be liable for extra charges or billing mistakes.

Nathan Gesner · Answer

What's the point? Do you need help attracting renters? Are your renters asking for this?

I wouldn't do it. Shared internet can be hacked. They could use it for bad things. The tenant may complain about the quality of service or be banging on your door any time there's an outage.

LeeAnn Owens · Answer

Hi Tiffany, I don’t think it would be worth it to provide the internet. Look at comparable rentals in your area, are they providing internet? A lot of people will probably want to have their own network for security reasons anyway.

Alecia Loveless · Answer

@Tiffany Tan I have a duplex and provide internet to the other side. However I only have one tenant living there and he doesn’t use much bandwidth and neither do we on our side. If the current tenant were to move out I wouldn’t continue to provide internet to new tenants that would use more bandwidth.

John Underwood · Answer

Create a guest network that they can be used.

Add some disclaimers to your lease for internet use.

Mose Gebremeskel · Answer

I wouldn't do it. There could be more problems than benefits.

Melanie P. · Answer

Because if it's not in the lease and they stop paying the rent you can take it away from them by simply changing the passcode. You have no liability if the router needs reset and you're in Europe for another two weeks - you don't have to interrupt your vacation to get a vendor to go into your home and fix/diagnose, or get to the secure part of a building where you store that equipment.

If they do anything wrong on the Internet and you're contacted you simply say you shared your wifi password with your tenant John Q. Tenant and give up all his info. There's no benefit to putting anything in the lease about it.

Tiffany Tan · Answer

Why not?

Internet included in lease?

Most Popular Reply