A North Carolina room rental agreement (or “roommate agreement”) is a contract for a tenant to share a dwelling with one or more co-tenants. A roommate agreement lays out rules for the people sharing space.
As co-tenants, roommates are on the same lease with equal responsibilities to the landlord. If one co-tenant doesn’t follow the lease rules, the other co-tenants also are liable.
Before signing a roommate agreement, it’s critical to understand what it means, and for whom. This goes both for roommates and also for the landlord. There are three basic ways the law looks at roommate situations: co-tenancy, subtenancy, and at-will or guest tenancy.
The roommate agreement on this page is a co-tenancy. This means all roommates must sign the original lease with the landlord’s approval. Other types of roommate arrangement are discussed here, but are not recommended.
Co-tenancy: All roommates are on the same lease. They pay rent to the same landlord, and share equal responsibility for keeping all terms of the lease. Co-tenants generally don’t have the power to evict one another. They may have to go to the landlord if there’s misconduct.
Subtenancy: The original tenant is the roommate’s landlord. This usually means receiving rent from the subtenant. It also means the legal responsibility to fix the subtenant’s rental issues. The original tenant can in most cases evict the subtenant if there’s misconduct.
Subleasing is almost never allowed without the landlord’s permission. It is grounds for termination and eviction in almost all leases.
At-Will Tenancy / Guest Tenancy: The original tenant and roommate have an informal arrangement, with or without the landlord’s consent. The roommate legally is a guest for up to the first two weeks in North Carolina, meaning both the landlord and original tenant often demand the roommate leave at any time. After that, the landlord must initiate an eviction process.
Landlords often can limit the length of time a guest is allowed to stay without being on the lease. They also can evict if the original tenant violates agreed guest rules. Carefully check the lease and locally applicable laws.
Roommates, as co-tenants, are “jointly and severally liable” for the terms of the original lease. This means that each co-tenant is fully responsible for keeping all the lease terms.
The landlord can therefore pursue full recovery from ANY of the co-tenants when there’s a violation. For example, if one roommate leaves town with their portion of the rent unpaid, the landlord can demand full payment from the other roommates.
If the roommate has not signed the original lease and the landlord has not consented to the roommate agreement, then the original tenant will be liable for any and all violations committed by the roommate.
The lease always takes priority over a roommate agreement in the event of any dispute. This often limits how much a roommate agreement can legally be enforced.
House rules about things like food sharing, chores, quiet hours, and so on generally are not enforceable in a court of law. Co-tenants with a disagreement not related to the lease may consider a binding and neutral third-party service like a mediator or arbitrator.
