Free Oregon Roommate Agreement
Oregon is the only state in this set with a statutory instrument for the person who is not a tenant. ORS 90.275 creates a written temporary occupancy agreement signed by the landlord, the tenant and the occupant — and it must say in terms that the occupant has no tenancy rights.
A roommate agreement is a contract between the roommates. The landlord is not a party to it and it does not change the lease. Oregon is different from every other state in this family because it provides a statutory route for the roommate who is not going on the lease: ORS 90.275‘s temporary occupancy agreement. It is signed by all three parties — landlord, tenant and occupant — and it is deliberately thin on rights, which is the point. Understanding what it does and does not give you is the first decision an Oregon roommate group has to make.
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What a temporary occupant gets, and what they do not
The section requires the written agreement to recite several things expressly. The occupant has no tenancy rights. The tenant may terminate the occupancy at will, while the landlord may terminate only for a material violation of the agreement. And there is no right to cure a violation. Termination needs no written notice at all under subsection (8), and an occupant who stays on after the tenancy ends, or after the tenant revokes permission, is “treated as a squatter” under subsection (10) — which ORS 90.110(5) places outside the residential act altogether. Note: the risk does not sit only with the occupant. Subsection (9) allows the landlord to terminate the tenant’s own tenancy if the occupant does not leave promptly, so a tenant who invites someone in under this section is putting their own home behind the arrangement. Subsection (11)(c) prevents a tenancy consisting solely of temporary occupancy.
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Oregon roommate agreement at a glance
Temporary occupancy agreement
Landlord, tenant AND occupant all sign
What it must recite
No tenancy rights, and no right to cure
Screening allowed
Conduct and criminal record – NOT credit or income
Deposit when one tenant leaves
Waits for the rest to deliver possession
Screening is inverted, and the deposit is frozen
Two Oregon rules are worth knowing precisely. First, ORS 90.275 permits the landlord to screen a proposed temporary occupant for conduct and criminal record but forbids screening for credit history or income — the inverse of ordinary tenant screening, and sensible once you remember the occupant is not liable for rent. Second, ORS 90.456: where one tenant leaves under the domestic-violence provisions, “the tenancy shall continue for those tenants” who remain, and the deposit accounting happens only “following termination of the tenancy and delivery of possession by the remaining tenants”. Note: with the 31-day clock in ORS 90.300 running from termination and delivery of possession, that means the departing roommate is owed nothing by the landlord at the moment they leave. Reimbursement is purely private, and that is the clause an Oregon roommate agreement most needs.
How to use an Oregon roommate agreement
Decide whether the new person is a tenant or a temporary occupant
ORS 90.275 creates a specific instrument for the second, signed by all three parties, and it carries no tenancy rights at all.
If it is a temporary occupancy, get the landlord’s signature
The agreement is a three-signature document. Without the landlord it is not a section 90.275 occupancy.
Write a buy-out for the deposit
ORS 90.300’s clock does not start until the tenancy terminates and possession is delivered, so a departing roommate has no claim on the landlord in the meantime; ORS 90.456 says the same expressly where a roommate leaves under the domestic-violence provisions.
Check the bedroom, not the bed count
ORS 90.262(3) stops a landlord’s guideline being stricter than two people per bedroom, and a bedroom means at least seventy square feet excluding bathrooms, closets, halls and storage.
Keep a signed copy each
The agreement is only useful as evidence if every roommate can produce the same version.
About the Oregon roommate agreement
A roommate agreement settles rooms, rent shares, deposit shares, shared costs, guests and exit terms between the people living together. It settles none of them against the landlord. Every tenant named on the rental agreement remains liable for the whole rent where the agreement makes that liability joint and several, and Oregon creates no such rule: “joint and several” and “jointly and severally” return zero across all 533,393 characters of chapter 90. The two occurrences of “jointly liable” both concern a domestic-violence perpetrator’s liability before exclusion, not how roommates divide rent.
What an Oregon roommate agreement should record
- Who is a tenant on the rental agreement and who is a temporary occupant under ORS 90.275
- Whether a three-signature temporary occupancy agreement has been signed
- That a temporary occupant has no tenancy rights and no right to cure
- Each roommate’s share of the rent, and who pays the landlord
- Each roommate’s share of the deposit, and a buy-out for anyone leaving first
- That the deposit accounting waits for the remaining tenants to deliver possession
- Guests, and the tenant’s duty under ORS 90.325(1)(g) to require them to behave
- The notice a departing roommate gives the others, and who approves a replacement
- That the agreement binds the roommates only and does not bind the landlord
Common Oregon mistakes
- Calling someone a temporary occupant without the paperwork. ORS 90.275 requires a written agreement signed by the landlord, the tenant and the occupant.
- Assuming the tenant is safe if the occupant overstays. Subsection (9) lets the landlord terminate the tenant’s own tenancy, except where ORS 90.449 protects the tenant.
- Screening a proposed occupant for credit or income. Section 90.275 permits conduct and criminal-record screening and forbids those two.
- Expecting a deposit refund when you move out first. ORS 90.300’s clock runs from termination and delivery of possession, and ORS 90.456 says so expressly in the domestic-violence case.
- Looking for a city cap on unrelated occupants. ORS 90.112 voided those ordinances statewide.
The temporary occupancy agreement
Most states leave the person who lives in the spare room without a legal category. Oregon gives them one. ORS 90.275 allows a landlord to permit an individual to become a temporary occupant of a dwelling unit under a written temporary occupancy agreement, and the section then specifies both who signs it and what it must say.
All three parties sign: the landlord, the tenant, and the proposed occupant. That is the first practical point, because an arrangement the roommates make between themselves is not a section 90.275 occupancy no matter what it is called.
The agreement must expressly state that the occupant has no tenancy rights, that the tenant may terminate the occupancy at will, that the landlord may terminate only for a material violation of the temporary occupancy agreement, and that there is no right to cure a violation. Under subsection (8) no written notice of termination is required. Under subsection (10) an occupant who remains after the tenancy has ended, or after the tenant revokes permission by terminating the agreement, is treated as a squatter — and ORS 90.110(5) puts squatters outside chapter 90 entirely, so none of the residential act’s protections apply.
Two further provisions matter to the tenant rather than the occupant. Subsection (9) allows the landlord, except where ORS 90.449 protects the tenant, to terminate the tenant’s own tenancy under the ordinary termination sections if the occupant fails to promptly vacate — or if the tenant materially violates the temporary occupancy agreement. And subsection (11)(c) provides that a tenancy may not consist solely of a