We’re signing the lease on an apartment later today. They’re asking for a $300 “nonrefundable administrative fee” and then a full month’s rent on top of that as our security deposit. This seems high to me - usually, I’ve only dropped a couple hundred bucks as the security deposit, especially if there are other irritating, vague “administrative” fees and deposits tacked on.
Do I have room to bargain the security deposit? We have a 5+ year renter’s history with not even one late payment, and both have great FICO scores, so I don’t think we’re “risky” renters to the point where we should have to fork over that much up front.
What do you think? Are realtors generally flexible with stuff like this?
wow, $300 NON REFUNDABLE? We don’t have security deposits here any more (thank heavens although it’s been a while since I rented0. I never had to pay one because I had good history - I can’t believe they can actually make you pay that! And do you never get it back, ever?
Won’t hurt to try, but no, they’re generally not very flexible. It depends a lot on the rental market in your area. If there is a high vacancy rate, it gives you more power; obviously a low rate gives the power to the owner.
I also agree with the flabbergasted response on the non-refundable fee. That’s outrageous!
You can try to negotiate, and explain that you feel a $300 non-refundable fee is unreasonable. I doubt they will negotiate with you on that unit – however, sometimes rental companies will have different locations and units with different fee structures. For example, when I explain a friend was getting a much better deal on an apartment with the same floor plan (about $200 less on a one bedroom) and, while they wouldn’t change the unit I was looking at, they found a two bedroom that was only $10 more than a friend was paying for his 1 bedroom.
Otherwise, I would recommend looking elsewhere. I doubt $300 non-refundable is standard for any housing market.
You can try and bargain but if it’s a landlord’s market, they may well just go on to the next people on the list.
A month’s rent as security is the norm here. That part wouldn’t surprise me - it’s that $300 that would have me walking. What kind of administering costs $300? Have they specified exactly what this fee will be used for? I’d find another place if someone tried to charge me that, and then I’d try to find out if it’s legal, and if not, I’d start calling the newspapers.
Or is the $300 a commission of some sort? When the market is hot here, it’s completely normal for the renter to have to pay a month’s rent as fee. There’s no negotiating about it. You pay or you find another apartment, and it’s fairly hard to find one that doesn’t charge a month’s rent as commission. When it’s a renter’s market, the owners of the property usually pay the agent’s fee.
Is the $300 non-refundable amount going to be taken off the first months rent? We often ask for a “non-refundable” application fee of $50 that is used to cover the credit and background checks of the tennants and to make certain they are serious about wanting the apartment. The $50 comes off the first months rent when they move in however.
Prior to doing this we’d have people claim they wanted the apartment and would ask us to hold it for them, so we turned down other prospective renters only to have the original folks dissapear or find another place. Now we don’t “hold” the apartment until we have applications and the $50.
Some of the landlords do have an application fee that is maybe $20-50 which does NOT get credited to the renters, but I’ve never seen a purely administrative fee being $300. (And that would never fly in Chicago - at least right now - because the rental market is pretty depressed. Of course conditions in your market may differ…).
Don’t know where in Chicago you are at, but if it’s actually within the city and not in the 'burbs, there are lots of unrented apartments due mostly to lots of new condo construction and low mortgage rates which have encouraged people to buy rather than rent. YOU should have the upper hand in this market.
The fee here in Boston is the realtor’s finder’s fee. They are never, in my experience, willing to negotiate on this. However, to me a $300 fee sounds cheap. All the fees I’ve paid to realtors over the years have always been a full month’s rent. Once I paid only 3/4 of a month’s rent ($800 fee for that apartment - I actually felt like I got a good deal. :rolleyes: ).
that fee goes directly into the realtor’s pocket and the landlord is not involved in the transaction.
If realtors in your area do not generally charge fees, or if that fee is higher than most, I would look elsewhere if possible. No sense in encouraging the gougers.
The security deposit is for the landlord, so the realtor probably has no room to bargain there. If you have direct access to the landlord before or during lease signing, by all means mention in a nice way that you’re interested in a price break on the security deposit, since the realtor took a $300 fee. I’m pessimistic, though, and think the landlord probably won’t give.
I’m sorry; in silliness, I used the wrong phrase. We’ve only worked directly with the landlord, who I was mistakenly calling a “realtor.”
Moreso, this was not an advertised apartment - this is a sublease that we found on Craigslist through the currrent tenant. I think that gives us even MORE leverage, as the landlord didn’t even have to advertise the apartment.
So the current expectation on their part is one full month’s rent from us (as security deposit) and then a $300 “administrative fee.”
Actually, in Ontario the law states that a security deposit of one month’s rent can be levied, and when the lease is over it must be returned along with 6% interest (I’m not so sure on the percentage, but I believe it’s correct).
Considering that he didn’t have to advertise or pay a single red cent to get this rented, you have some leverage, IF you are willing to walk. He’ll have to get cracking right away on finding a new renter, that means paying for advertising and having to show the damn thing a few more times.
The Admin fee is the part I’m scratching my head about, it’s awfully high, and I would, like missbunny suggests, find out exactly what you’re paying for and tell them to stick it if you don’t like the answer. Realtor fees are a different animal altogether, outside agency advertising and showing the apartment, it’s worth some money, they gotta eat too.
One month’s rent is fairly standard on security deposits, and is less of a problem because you should be able to get it back when you leave.
Under no circumstances would I ever pay $300 to apply for an apartment, ESPECIALLY a sublease. You would be well advised to check out all the technicalities of this sublease, because my gut feeling is that you’re setting yourself up to get screwed.
IMHO, I’d say get a lawyer, have him look at the lease and sublease agreements, refuse to pay the $300, or walk.
Turning down the deal seems a much better option, given the timeframe you’re working with.
I’ve paid deposits up to $200 or $250 non-refundable (mostly with pet deposits tacked on) plus one month’s rent security deposit plus the application fee plus a credit check fee.
My current landlord is looking for one month security, one month + pet rider ($150 each pet!) for the other half of our duplex. Our deposit was one month security, $150 non-refundable for three pets and we got to move in early if we agreed to live with stained carpet. We’re not liable for any future damage to the carpets, so we jumped on that deal.
Thankfully, all of this fuss was for nothing. This was all a big miscommunication on behalf of the brain-damaged, inarticulate, frequently incoherent landlord. The $300 “administrative fee” was the security deposit; by dropping the whole charade of calling it a security deposit and just acknowledging that they’re going to keep it when you move out, they save you the headache of trying to actually clean up the place after you vacate.
I’ve never heard of a realtor for an apartment. For home buying, yes. But not for an apartment. Is that standard in certain markets? What does a realtor do that you can’t do for yourself? What, especially, costs that much?
It’s pretty common around here, but a lot of the apartments here are in two to six family owner-occupied buildings, not building large enough to have a management office. I’m not sure how much of advantage it is for the owner to list an apartment with a real estate gent, but it doesn’t need to be much, because it doesn’t cost the owner anything. The advantage to the buyer of using the real estate agency is to get access to those listings. When I rented an apartment (about 18 years ago), there was no way that I would have known the apartments I looked at were available if I hadn’t gone to a real estate agency. The ads were placed in the newspaper by the real estate agency, not the owner, and there weren’t any " For Rent" signs in the window. The real estate agency’s fee was one month’s rent.
It is standard in the Boston metro area to rent an apartment through a realtor. There are apartments advertised directly by the landlord, but the vast majority of landlords just use a realtor.
What does a realtor do that you can’t do for yourself? Most apartments are not advertised anywhere. They’re just listed with a realtor. So the realtors hold the listings for about 90% of the apartments in the area, which you’ll never get to see without going to a realtor.
What costs that much? Nothing, really. It’s just that they hold all the power due to the way the apartment market has shaken out here in the past few decades. And since many apartments turn over every year, due to the huge student population, this is a hugely lucrative business for realtors.
With the rise in popularity of Craig’s List and other online sources, this may change. Plus the rental market has softened a bit lately, so someday it may again be a renters market, and fees may shrink, or start to be paid by the landlord instead of the renter. My current apartment we saw listed on the neighborhood’s listserv, so no fee for us this time around. Yay.