Personal and small jobs
Roommate agreement
The paper the people sharing a home write for each other. It sits beside the tenancy rather than replacing it: the landlord's agreement governs the property, and this one governs the household — who pays what share of rent and bills, how the deposit is split, whose room is whose, how guests and cleaning work, and what notice somebody gives before moving out. Its value is mostly in having had the conversation.
- In the catalogue
- Personal and small jobs
- Where it can live
- Any of the 184 governing laws
Who uses one
- People moving into a shared house or flat together.
- An existing household adding a new person to the arrangement.
- Friends sharing a home who would rather agree the awkward parts in advance.
What you are deciding
- Who pays what share of rent and bills
- How the deposit is split and returned
- Which room belongs to whom, and what is shared
- How shared costs are bought and settled
- Cleaning and chores
- Guests, overnight stays and noise
- How somebody gives notice and finds a replacement
- What happens to shared furniture at the end
Blanks you leave stay blank and wait in the room. Nothing is filled in from a guess.
The sections a draft usually has
- 1The people and the property
- 2Rent shares
- 3Bills and shared costs
- 4Deposit
- 5Rooms and shared spaces
- 6Cleaning and chores
- 7Guests and quiet hours
- 8Moving out and replacements
- 9Shared property
A general outline, not a required one. What turns up in a draft follows what you described. A contract is written in the order a contract is read.
What people call it
The names this kind of paper goes by. They are here because people search for them. They also filter the catalogue. They are not a wordlist the door matches. At the composer you describe the deal in your own words instead.
- roommate agreement
- flatmate agreement
- house share agreement
- housemate contract
- shared house rules
- cohabitation living agreement
Questions people ask
- Does a roommate agreement bind the landlord?
- No. It is between the occupiers. Obligations to the landlord come from the tenancy, and in many joint tenancies each tenant remains liable for the whole rent regardless of how it is split at home.
- What is joint and several liability?
- An arrangement where each tenant can be pursued for the whole rent, not just their share. It is common in shared tenancies and is worth knowing about before the shares are agreed.
- Can somebody leave part way through?
- The tenancy usually decides that, not the household agreement. Papers of this kind commonly set out how a replacement is found and what the leaver does about their share until then.
General answers about the document. Not advice about your situation. Not written about any one country.
Where it lives
A contract names the legal system it is governed by. That is a separate decision from which paper it is. You pick it at the door, from any of the 184 units in Governing law, including England and Wales, Delaware, California and New York.
You do not start from this page. Describe the deal in one sentence at the door. Read the draft back in plain language, in the order a contract is read.
Start it at the door →Related kinds