Rent to Own a House

Yes, it's done. Margaret wanted to get rid of the house her mother had left to her, but she didn't feel right selling it. Besides, the home had some cosmetic and structural issues that needed to be addressed, and she didn't think it would sell for enough on the open market to pay for itself. But she didn't want the responsibility of leasing the home either.

Her solution? Selling it as a rent to own house to a distant cousin. This provided Margaret with a stable and consistent income, and relieved her of any responsibilities for fixing the home, though she did offer to help pay for some of the improvements.

The problem? She used a lease contract, instead of doing the research for a rent to own house contract. This meant that she left herself open to a different type of liability. In this case, the cousin who had been purchasing the house decided that they did not want to buy the house. In addition, they wanted to continue living there for a while and wanted Margaret to make the necessary improvements to it – the ones they'd verbally agreed to make.

The outcome: after the cousin threatened Margaret with a lawsuit, and she spoke to a lawyer and found that they would win, Margaret was forced to make the improvements to the home herself. These improvements did not significantly improve resale value of the house, and when they moved out Margaret was left with the same problem. She wound up selling the house at a loss.

This is far from the only thing that can happen if you don't do a rent to own contract properly. But there are good tax, finance, and liability reasons to sell a house in this way, besides the emotional reasons. The solution: download a good rent to own home contract. The forms here are legally valid, are applicable to many different situations, and won't cost you an arm and a leg like a lawyer or real estate agent would.