Anything special in the lease option contract?

I have been asked many times if we have anything special in our lease option contract.

Here are two answers: "Normal" and "Since bad tenant".

Normal - the lease option agreement is essentially a rental contract with the terms of a possible future purchase laid out. As a rental contract it needs to spell out the conditions for tenancy, including initial deposit amount, monthly rent amount, duration of the agreement, behaviour expectations, and terms eg. who pays for utilities, etc. The possible future purchase indicates the date and future strike price at which we will sell to the tenant/buyer - if the tenant/buyer opts to purchase. They do not have to, but will forfeit accumulated rental credits if they do not.

Since bad tenant - we thought we were doing the right thing by clearly delineating all of the cost elements of the relationship eg. initial payment, monthly base rent, monthly rent premium. When we ended up at the Landlord and Tenant Board, the LTB member was not at all interested in any of the numbers except for the agreed monthly rent. This meant that the only way to get compensation for the rent premiums (and an amount of the initial deposit still owed) was to go to Small Claims Court. Such things are beyond the jurisdiction of the LTB. We would have been better to bundle as much as we could into the stated rent.

--Bob Hudson AKA "Lease to Own" Bob