Leave of Absence: What to Do with Your Lease in NYC

First, Three Facts to Find

If you live in housing run by your school, stop here and ask the housing office. School housing has its own rules for a leave, and this guide is about private leases.

• The date your lease ends.
• Whether you are the only tenant on the lease or share it with roommates.
• Whether you plan to return to this apartment, to New York but not this apartment, or do not know yet.

Option 1: Keep the Lease and Keep Paying

Count the rent payments between the day you leave and the day you return or the lease ends, whichever is first. A spring leave from January to May is five payments. $1,850 times 5 is $9,250.

This makes sense if you are staying in the apartment during your leave, or the gap is a month or two. If the room will be empty, look at the next option.

Option 2: Sublet Until You Are Back

A sublet keeps the lease in your name while someone else lives there for a set time. It fits a leave with a return date. In buildings with four or more apartments, New York Real Property Law 226-b gives you the right to ask. The request goes by certified mail, the landlord has 30 days to answer, and consent may not be unreasonably withheld.

If you sublet at $1,700 for the five months, that covers $8,500 of the $9,250. You pay the other $750 and you remain responsible for the lease.

One caution if your apartment is rent-stabilized. The Attorney General’s tenants’ guide says the tenant must keep the apartment as a primary residence and intend to return when the sublet ends. A sublet with no plan to come back can put the lease at risk.

Get your landlord’s written approval before anyone moves in. An email that says yes is good. A text or a verbal okay is hard to prove later.

• How to Sublet in NYC
• Subletting a Rent-Stabilized Apartment

Option 3: Assign the Lease

An assignment hands your whole lease to a new tenant, who takes your place for the rest of the term. People also call it a lease takeover. It fits if you are not coming back.

The landlord has more say here. Under the same statute you need the landlord’s written consent, and it can be refused without a reason. If consent is unreasonably withheld, though, you can ask to be released from the lease on 30 days’ notice. So ask in writing either way, and keep the reply.

• Leaving Before Your Lease Ends
• Sublet vs. Lease Takeover vs. Short-Term Rental

Option 4: End the Lease Early

You can simply ask. Some landlords will agree to end a lease early, sometimes for a fee or once a new tenant is found. Your lease may spell out what leaving early costs.

Get the agreement in writing with the end date, anything you owe, and what happens to your security deposit. Walking away without an agreement can leave you owing rent.

If You Share the Lease

When several of you are on one lease, your roommates are affected by every option. Talk to them first. They may know someone who wants the room, which can turn a hard problem into a short conversation with the landlord.

Any new person still needs the landlord’s written approval, whether they come in as a subtenant or onto the lease.

When you choose a subtenant, ask only about the stay: dates, ability to pay, references, pets, smoking and schedule. In New York City it is illegal to choose or refuse someone because of race, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, citizenship status, disability, family status, marital status, age, lawful source of income or another protected trait.

• Subletting with Roommates

Which to Pick

• Back in one semester, same apartment: sublet.
• Back, but the lease ends before you return: sublet to the end of the lease, then do not renew.
• Not coming back: ask about an assignment or an early end.
• Not sure: sublet for now. It keeps the apartment and the decision open.