To sublet or not to sublet....

Hey Partners and Boothies,

As summer internships approach, my Boothie and I have been going back and forth on subletting our current Chicago space while we head to Houston. We can either sublet to an MBA student from another school, a random craigslister, or just have it remain empty while we are gone.

Right off the bat, you'd probably ask yourselves, why would anyone want to waste money on an empty apartment for 3 months while paying for a temporary rental in another city? Let me know if I am the only one who thinks about this but---how weird is it to have a complete stranger using all of your furniture and contents?? Im not sure if its my selective OCD coming into play here, but when I leave my apartment I know exactly where everything is and if I come back and things are tweaked slightly it just leaves me feeling off. 

For that reason, my husband was very understanding and we decided to eat the cost of leaving the space vacant. Then I realized by doing that I was pretty much throwing money down the garbage disposal and that is CRAZY- especially since I'm the type of girl that won't online shop unless I get free shipping. #sorrynotsorry 

Now that we have decided to sublet our place, we want to make sure the quality of our apartment and its contents are protected! I searched online to try to find a contract agreement that is relevant for our specific style and couldn't find the perfect fit. 

Then I found this website called LawDepot where you answer a questionnaire and it will create a legal document specific for your needs. In addition, you have the ability to edit/add clauses. To top it all off its FREE for a trial week- which is amazing because you literally only need it for a hot minute or two. 

If you don't want to deal with the questionnaire, I have linked a document version of what we used. Make sure to edit with you and you subtenants info! 

This document includes a damage deposit, cleaning fee, prorated rent, prorated utilities and protection in case your subtenant cancels on you last minute! Also- important- make sure to provide your subtenant with a copy of your master lease. 

Hope this is useful to some of you! 

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer and this document is not perfect by any means but hopefully it will protect the sublandlord as much as possible! If, by chance, you find an error in the document please let me know so that I can make changes for everyone.