There is one good reason to rent out rooms in your home: the extra income you'll have. There are several good reasons to make them weekly room rentals, rather than charging by the month, as is more typical with apartment or house rentals. Let's look at why you should charge by the week.
To start with, it is a matter of psychology. The weekly payment makes the renter feel that he or she is renting a room in the same way as a hotel room is rented. This is important for easier evictions in case they are necessary.
WEEKLY
This is largely true, by the way, even if the law in your area treats room rentals the same as apartment rentals. The law is the law, but when asked to leave a renter is more likely to comply if he or she feels that the room is a short-term arrangement and not a "home." In the many years that I rented out rooms in my home I never had a renter run off to look up the regulations and laws when I asked he or she to move out.
In addition, there may very well be a difference in how the law treats weekly room rentals versus rooms rented by the month. After all, the local hotel doesn't have to provide a month's notice to get someone out of a room just because he has been there a week. But whatever the law is, put the psychology on your side.
The best reason to rent by the week is because most people who rent rooms get paid that way. Now, if they happen to be paid every two weeks, you might want to consider collecting on that schedule. The point here is to make it as easy as possible for a tenant to pay on time. Many who rent rooms are not very good at saving up for a big monthly payment, so don't make them do so. Charge according to how they are paid.
That is how I always charged, and it was part of my larger strategy to make it as easy as possible for renters to pay. That strategy meant including all utilities in the rent as well. If the bills went up I raised the rent, but I never had a single argument about who owed what for this or that or who was using too much electricity or water.
Finally, there is another psychological edge you get when making them weekly room rentals. It is that it feels like less money to renters. Even after I explained to renters that per week was really 5 per month - not the 0 they assumed - they still felt like it was less. It was easier to handle on a weekly basis in any case. With this and my other "make it easy" strategies, I actually had some renters stay for years.
Why Weekly Room Rentals? WEEKLY
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