Landlord services agreements that set out the working relationship clearly

Standard terms often stay at a high level and may not deal with the practical questions that cause friction later, such as what authority you have to arrange repairs, how urgent decisions are handled, who approves spending, what reporting is expected, and when your appointment can end. A landlord services agreement gives those points a clearer contractual home. That is especially useful where your business offers a mix of letting, inspection, maintenance coordination or tenant-facing services rather than a single, simple management function.

Common issues include the exact services being provided, the landlord's instructions and authority limits, fee structure, reimbursement of expenses, communication and reporting expectations, privacy and record handling, use of third-party contractors, liability allocation, termination and what happens to records or keys when the relationship ends. Some businesses also need clauses dealing with rent collection processes or maintenance approvals. The drafting should be matched to the commercial arrangement, the documents already in use and the facts around how the work is performed, so the detail can vary significantly from one property business to another.

A landlord services agreement is usually framed around the direct service relationship with the landlord and the practical authority you are given to act. A broader property management agreement may go further into wider management frameworks, portfolio arrangements or more expansive operational settings. This service keeps the emphasis on the core document for the landlord-facing engagement itself. That makes it useful where you want a contract that clearly records your service offering, commercial terms and boundaries, rather than a broader advisory exercise about your whole business model.

A template may be enough for very simple arrangements, but many property businesses quickly run into issues where the template does not match how the work is actually done. For example, your agreement may need to address contractor coordination, inspection frequency, approval thresholds, tenant information handling or different fee models across properties. If those details are missing or inconsistent, the contract can create as many questions as it answers. Tailored drafting is often more useful where your service mix is broader than basic rent collection or administration.

We will usually need to know what services you provide, whether you act for residential or commercial properties, how you charge, what authority you have to incur costs, whether you engage trades or other contractors, and how you handle landlord and tenant information. Existing terms, proposal documents or onboarding materials can also be helpful because they often show where the commercial deal is already being described inconsistently. The practical working model can be just as important as the contract wording, so those operational details are important.

Just submit an enquiry via this page or click the 'get started' button on our website to submit an enquiry. After you've submitted an enquiry, one of our legal consultants will review your enquiry within 1 business day and get in touch to get a better idea of exactly what you are looking for.

Then your legal consultant will send through an email with a bit more information about the services you need, along with a fixed fee quote setting out costs, scope of the service and timing. Have a read through it, and if you're happy with the scope, you can accept and sign our engagement letter online - easy!

Once you've formally accepted, we'll connect you with a specialist lawyer and they will work with you to complete your project. They will contact you by email or phone if they need to get in touch.

Sprintlaw works on fixed-fee pricing wherever possible, so you can review the scope and cost before you decide whether to proceed. For the Landlord Services Agreement service, pricing starts from $900.00.

After you enquire, a legal consultant will confirm what is included, the expected timing and whether any extra work is needed before you engage us.

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Our legal team is made up of experienced lawyers, who are specialists in various areas of law and hold an Australian legal practising certificate. None of our Sprintlaw lawyers are New Zealand qualified lawyers and they do not currently hold a New Zealand practising certificate.

They provide legal services working remotely from Australia via our 'legal consultancy' model, through which (under section 6 and section 35 of the New Zealand Lawyers and Conveyancers Act 2006) our Australian legal team are permitted to provide legal services to New Zealand businesses provided they do not provide services in certain 'reserved' areas of law. You can read our FAQ page to learn a bit more about our 'legal consultancy' model.

Given the strong similarities between Australian and New Zealand law, and the areas of law in which we practice (being small business and startup law), we do not view the fact that our lawyers have not qualified in New Zealand as having any substantive impact on the quality of our service. We are committed to ensuring that we provide high quality, affordable legal services to all our New Zealand clients.

Our legal team have all trained at leading firms, but have left the traditional corporate law world to join us on our mission to create a new and better way of delivering legal services. They have specialist expertise in technology law, intellectual property law, contract drafting and review, corporate law and commercial law.