"Landlord" charging $50 each time tenant brings guest over - help!

[perry335654]

That sounds like it is being run like a hotel/motel instead of an apartment whereby there aren't leases. I believe in motel you can stay the longest of 2 weeks then have to check out and then come back the next day to gain access.

[convextech]

Originally Posted by amnesiatic

Posting this to help a friend out. He is visiting Miami Beach temporarily on a visa and will be leaving early June. I stopped by to visit for a few minutes yesterday and she arrived about a minute later, was upset that she wasn't informed he was bringing a guest over, and took him aside to tell him that she would remove $50 from his deposit. Additionally, when I came to drop him off later on that day, she wanted to charge an additional $50 for that second time too.

I'm born and raised in Miami Beach and this sounds highly illegal.

1. She lives in the same apartment and has her own bedroom.
2. We don't think she has a renting permit.
3.. She is renting out the extra 2 rooms in her unit as well as the living room - each for $700.
4. It is likely that she does not even own the unit, so she is effectively subletting the apartment she is renting and living in.
5. These are all short-term rentals for tourists/visitors, so everything is paid under the carpet, so to say. My friend just paid the rent for this month and there is no documentation of it OR the deposit. That was his screw-up.

The idea of charging $50 to let a guest sleep over is outlandish, let alone just for a 5 minute visit AND a second time for another visit in one day! So for the remainder of his stay, he'd like to find another place that won't be so strict about visitors.

The ideal solution would be that she returns the FULL deposit to him and he leaves halfway through the month and gets half of the month's rent returned to him. We don't want to get her in trouble or ruin her life, just maybe give her a gentle "heads-up" that we know she could get in trouble if the city finds out, so please meet us halfway to get out of this uncomfortable situation.

Question to you guys is: how illegal is this? Is this something we can use to leverage out an agreement?

It's her house, she can pretty much do what she wants. If I was renting out a room, I wouldn't want visitors either.