Careful; There are three parts to this, likely: OPTION TO BUY, LEASE/RENT, PURCHASE PRICE/AGREEMENT. Have a professional with experience.

Eileen, you can offer your home for a lease-purchase with the understanding that you are still responsible
for the mortage if the lessor decides not to purchase the house. Nationally, I think the odds of a lease purchase coming to fruition in the sale of home are about 5-15%. Unfortunately, most lessors find a reason not to purchase the home once they are in it. If you are willing to take this chance, at least you have
the mortgage covered until you get a new job.

The lease/purchase does act as a sales agreement in that a specified amount of the lease price
is applied as a down payment to help the lessor buy the home. . This means that the monthly lease
amount should be high enough to cover the mortgage, taxes, insurance and a certain dollar figure to be applied to the down payment at the end of the specified period of the lease. Hopefully, your market will aallow you to set a price that will cover these basics. A good property management firm can give you an idea of what your home would rent for today. And, of course, you will want to know the credit worthiness of anyone who wants to negotiate a lease/purchase. Many buyers with good credit just have not saved enough for a down payment yet.

When you sign a mortgage, you state that the home will beowner occupied. Thus, if the mortgae company
found out they could perhaps call the mortgage. Also, your home owner's insurance will change as the
lessors will want to have insurance on their contents, and you want the house to be insured for any natural disaster. Thus, your insurance rates will most likely increase.

Many of these questions can be answered by a good real estate attorney. Theu will be happy to answer your
questions and draw up a good lease/purchase agreement if the realtor with whom you are working does not
provide one.

Good luck.

Eileen:

It really depends on what you and the tenant/owner agree on in your contract regarding upkeep of the property. It is not uncommon for the tenant to maintain the property in a lease option. The contract price obviously would be negotiated at todays market value. The deposit that you collect should give you a nice cushion for a few months. Typically a 3% deposit of the purchase price is the deposit.

I have never heard of anyone getting in trouble by their lender, however I wouldnt go out of my way to let the lender know-just continue making your payments and you should be fine. You may lose an owner occupant rate on your Home owners insurance and possibly on your property taxes if you have an Owner occupant reduction.