One or two year lease?

i feel more secure with a two year lease for planning purposes. Your lucky the LL agrees most will only do one year.

one year.

or at least if you're going for a two year, negotiate no increase for the second year...

I love the one size fits all advice, people like aboutready. It depends on your situation, if you are a single in your 20s with no kids, presumably like aboutready, maybe the 1 year makes sense for you. If you've got kids, if your school district is important, if you have a tough job where taking off for work to move / pack, etc. is inconvenient, go for the longer period. Rents have dropped. Are rents going down again in a year? I have no idea.

FWIW, we signed a two year lease last August thinking it was great to lock in the same rent, but that turned out to be a bad move. Luckily our landlord renegotiated our rent for the second year (just bc they wer nice beleive it or now). Otherwise we would have been stuck paying at least 10-15% more than market. We did a 2 year lease so that we would not have to think about moving 8 months after we just made a big move b/c we have kids, so I understand that point. If you do it, I would certainly ask for no incresae in the 2nd year.

I think it also matters who you are renting from. If it is a huge building, they are not going to kick you out after year 1 as long as you agree to sign another lease (I would guess rents do not go up much more than 3% unless you are getting a great deal now). If it is a unit owned by an individual, you may have to worry about them wanting it back or selling it and kicking you out after a year (so a 2 yr lease gives you more comfort in that regard). Good luck.

What about a 1 year lease with month to month afterward?

All, advice very much appreciated. Are moving towards a two-year contract, but will digest over the weekend!

put in an early termination clause after the 1st year.

dysterd, i have a kid. i've lived in the same place for five years, five one-year leases. each time i did better than signing the two-year lease. i would have been paying 10% more this year if i had signed a two-year lease. unless you're renting from a landlord with very few units, the odds of your landlord saying get lost are extremely small after a year. and i mean extremely small in this market. with the same landlord, in this market, any increase in rental price is unlikely.

so, my advice would pertain to most renters. and if you read the OP, the only concern mentioned is cost, not children, not schools, not work considerations, etc. i was responding to the OP, not everyone who is up for rent renewal.

What, a 2-year lease and an increase in your rent? Where is this taj mahal? I'm seeing landlords offering two months free on a two-year lease.

A two-year lease is a huge advantage for the landlord, you should be getting something nice in exchange for that IMHO.

...Or maybe you're paying $12,000 a month in rent, that's how they do things up there, and I just don't operate in such circles.

{Manhattan real estate agent.}

If the 1 and 2 year are at the same price, do the 2 year. Unless you are a gypsie or something

aboutready: If I understand you right, you said you did better with a 1-year lease over each of the last 5 years? Does that include 2006? Rent increases were brutal that year, so it seems like a 2-year in 2005 (if everyone had perfect foresight) would have been a much better deal than having to re-sign with the increase in 2006.

no, i don't think so, but my lease was renewed very early 2006, march or late february, so that's probably why. it really helps to have winterish lease renewals. you're right, summer 2006 killed. so did summer 2007. but i'm fairly certain i did better each year with one-year leases.

btw, someone mentioned getting 2 months free and not having it tacked on to the end of the rental term. if i had a lease starting august 1st or september 1st i'd love to have the two months tacked onto the end of the lease, making the next renewal start october or november 1st instead.

oh, that totally makes sense. God, 6 months one way or the other can really make a difference. (e.g., Jan 2006 vs July 2006)