We have a garage in a block of garages that we bought with our house.

Its not being used and someone has mentioned that they would like to rent it off us to keep their sports car in it.

Having never done it before Im not sure of the pro’s or cons’ or even likely pitfalls.

Do any of you have experience with this ?

Cheers

I do. Pretty easy as rentals go, not really any legal issues compared to residential. Take a deposit and get them to set up a direct debit monthly in advance for the rent. That’s about it. Just check it’s empty before giving the deposit back at the end. Don’t forget to check market rate before agreeing a deal. Its about £55 a month here but up to maybe £120 in the posh areas with limited parking. Also keep a spare key in case they lose it.

Thanks for that, what about insurance etc if say the roof gets blown off the garage or damages the car etc?

As long as it is in reasonable condition then there really isn’t anything to go wrong. Roof blowing off is very unlikely unless it is already damaged/rotten. Anything else is really the tenants responsibility.

Cool thanks for the info!!

Isn’t the whole point of insurance to cover you in the event of something unlikely happening?

Isn’t the whole point of insurance to cover you in the event of something unlikely happening?

Its a scale isn’t it? You can’t get insurance for likely events and there is no point for insuring against the very unlikely. Its gets much greyer in the middle. I tend to lean towards self insuring as pretty much every penny I’ve spent on insurance over the years has been ‘wasted’. In this case I suppose you could get a quote but I suspect it’ll be around half the rental income and may well be invalid if the garage is in a poor state of repair which is the only thing that’ll result in a claim.

I think I’d want to get something in writing covering things like notice clauses (ie, you can tell him to sod off with 28 days’ notice) and expectations as to how it’s kept / left. If the door hinge breaks due to him coming and going every day, who’s going to foot the expense?

Back when it was still standing I rented mine out to a so-called mate once, and when I needed it back he vacated it but left all his shit behind. Old bald tyres and knackered wheels and the like. PITA.

Midlands based, no parking issues in our street but I rent a good size garage (14m x 3.5m)and off road parking for £20 a week.

No contract, gentlemans agreement for damage and I often help when there are jobs need doing. It works very well for me as even at a grand a year, I couldn’t afford to move to a house with a garage this size.