[Carl Harvin]

Dear, friends
I just rented a room to a fellow student in college. I am not sure about the proper way to insure that I can rent out to someone on my contract and how to report my income from the tenant for filing at the end of the year. Can anyone assist me with this. Also, I am renting out to is a para legal who withheld this information from me until we argued about something. What information is out there for me to learn about eviction notice, public notary, and other legal matters with landlord/tenant agreements.

Carl

[Fr_Chuck]

Who owns the house/apartment your are living in?

If you are renting do you have permission to sub lease to anyone else

If they are renting from you without a written lease or rental agreement then the rental laws specific to your state/ and including any city rules and/or laws

Also if you are both students I have seen some universities that have rules where they interfere into rental agreemetents when both parties are students. Not that I believe they should have those rights but I have heard stories from some of my kids friends.

Next reporting the income, depends on how much, if it is not enough to have to report quarterly, then merely anunally on when you file your taxes, if you earn enough and actually file taxes.

If you do include this as rental income ( there is specific forms to file this income under when you file you taxes, you also get to deduct all sort of other expenses. If your rental includes utilities, a protion of the money you pay for them would be deductable, If you are paying rent on the apartment then a percentage of the rent. And so on.
In all honestly most people who share an apartment ( which is what you are doing if you are renting also) don't reprot anything, since it is merely paying part of the rent you already pay and is not truly income.

And I have no idea what a notory has to do with this except if you wish to have a signture on a paper witnessed,

Best idea, buy some beer and pizza , make up and watch a foot ball game

[LisaB4657]

Go to http://realestate.findlaw.com/landlord and read up on all of your responsibilities as a landlord. Then go to http://realestate.findlaw.com/tenant and read about all of your tenant's rights. Once you've read all of the general information you can get specific information for your state by clicking on the Resources link.

[AtlantaTaxExpert]

Carl Harvin:

Fr Chuck's comments are accurate. The form to report the rental income is Schedule E. However, if the deductions exceed the income, then report nothing, because in the case of a roommate, you cannot report a loss on a rental property.