All You Need To Know About The Rent Agreement

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All You Need To Know About The Rent Agreement

16/12/2024

Let's start with some statistics.

The population in Dubai is around 3.48 million people. And 80 percent of them live in rented apartments or villas. In other words, a demand for rental properties in Dubai is really high.

In seven cases out of ten, when one purchases a property, one invests in this property. In other words, this one intends to rent it out and enjoy passive income.

Thus, understanding the essence of rent agreement and its content as well as knowing who can help you with it is a must.

What is a Rental Agreement?

Perhaps, there is no other term in rental business that has so many names as a rental agreement has. Well, just look at the list below:

Rental (rent or lease) agreement;
Tenancy agreement;
Rental contract;
Tenancy contract;
Lease.

However, the common term in Dubai is a tenancy contract. To clarify, this particular term is used in Dubai rental legislation and in the documentation.

So, what is a tenancy contract?

To put it simply, it is a written agreement between the parties (the landlord and the tenant) that recognizes, specifies, and governs their tenancy relationships. In this agreement one party (the landlord) allows another party (the tenant) to use the specified property for getting specified benefits during a defined period.

Hence, the most important thing that you need to know is that a rental agreement is a legally binding document for any tenancy relationships. That is to say, both parties must act in strict accordance with the terms and conditions specified in the lease. Any deviation from these specified terms and conditions of one party is regarded as a contract breach. In this case, another party has a right to prosecute the first one and make them fulfill their obligations.

What is Usually Contained in a Rental Agreement?

To start with, the Dubai Government developed and introduced a two-page unified tenancy contract form to standardize documentation. So, since 16 July 2017, this unified tenancy contract form is mandatory. This is very convenient as it includes both Arabic and non-Arabic (typically, English) texts. Therefore, you don't need to translate it to proceed further.

Sometimes, you may meet such term as the EJARI contract form, and this also goes for the unified rental agreement.

So, what items does a lease contain? Well, it has five sections:

The first section contains information about the parties, property, and most essential terms of their rental agreement:

Owner name;
Landlord name, email, and phone number;
Tenant name, email, and phone number;
Building name and location;
Property size, type, and number (including DEWA number);
Contract period and value;
Annual rent, security deposit amount, and mode of payment.

The second section is about mandatory Terms and Conditions of the contract. The most important terms and conditions are as follows:

Prohibition to sublease without landlord written approval;
Tenant responsibilities regarding rent payment and utility payments;
Tenant responsibilities regarding using property and its facilities and amenities;
Landlord maintenance responsibilities;
Landlord obligation to register the contract on EJARY. The third section, named as Know your rights, contains a list of legislative acts that governs rental relationships and a Rental Dispute Center website address, where you can resolve any rental dispute.

The fourth section, named as Attachments for EJARI registration, is simply a reminder of what documents to prepare for attesting the contract with EJARI

At least, in the fifth section parties may specify additional terms not mentioned earlier but essential for the parties.

How Can a Lawyer Help with a Rental Agreement?

On one hand, as you need to deal with a unified tenancy contract, where most items are already given, you may think there is no need for lawyer assistance with a lease. However, do not underestimate the role of legal support in drafting a lease.

Typically, it is a rental dispute lawyer who is involved in the process. To clarify, this is a professional who is not only highly familiar with the law but who are highly familiar with all rental dispute cases that may potentially arise.

But do you know that one-third of these disputes deal with issues that are not covered by mandatory items in the unified lease? Thus, you can prevent many of them by clarifying these terms in your lease as additional terms. Moreover, you can successfully resolve to your benefit disputes that concern additional terms only when you fix them in your contract.

And this is where a lawyer can help you a lot with your rental agreement. In other words, he will advise what additional terms you need to include in the lease. Moreover, he assures these conditions don't contradict the local law. Indeed, this is utterly important as conditions that conflict with the law will never be considered in case of disputes.

For example, a common additional lease condition is dividing maintenance responsibilities between the parties.

At BSO, our layers always carefully draft a lease, taking into account Dubai rental dispute practice and legislation. As a result, this contract clearly determines the rights and obligations of both parties while having their interests well-balanced. Contact us to benefit from our dedicated property management services.