Wrong Pro Rata Rent Calculation by Real Estate Agent

saajan_12

Legally monthly rents are not subdivisble so there's no legally 'correct' way to calculate. If you stayed for the month of Feb then you're paying more per day than if you stayed for the month of Jan, so clearly its never going to come out 'clean'. 

So its really a matter for whatever you and the tenant agree, ie mutually agree to terminate x date in return for y payment. Personally I'd calculate a daily rate based on the month that it falls in, so if its a 31 day period 26 Dec -> 25 Jan then the daily rate is rent/31. That way it doesn't matter if you're adding or subtracting from a full month. Whereas you get illogical results if you take the annual rent or even the average daily rent for their stay. I think the most illogical thing is to mix calculations. 

However ultimately whatever you and the tenant agrees is fine. What the agent thinks is largely irrelevant, you can just instruct him to charge £xyz. 

justice4521

saajan_12 said:

Legally monthly rents are not subdivisble so there's no legally 'correct' way to calculate. If you stayed for the month of Feb then you're paying more per day than if you stayed for the month of Jan, so clearly its never going to come out 'clean'. 

So its really a matter for whatever you and the tenant agree, ie mutually agree to terminate x date in return for y payment. Personally I'd calculate a daily rate based on the month that it falls in, so if its a 31 day period 26 Dec -> 25 Jan then the daily rate is rent/31. That way it doesn't matter if you're adding or subtracting from a full month. Whereas you get illogical results if you take the annual rent or even the average daily rent for their stay. I think the most illogical thing is to mix calculations. 

However ultimately whatever you and the tenant agrees is fine. What the agent thinks is largely irrelevant, you can just instruct him to charge £xyz. 

Most helpful response so far, thank you.

In line with this, I think (monthly rent / 30 * 6) would probably be both contractually correct and would be a fair pro-rata allocation.

You are right in saying that the bizarre mathematical results from earlier are because the agent is using the monthly approximation and an exact daily calculation together.