Lease templates
For landlords, property managers · Last updated
Who this is for
Landlords and property managers who want eSamaHomes to fill in their own lease. eSamaHomes doesn't write leases and never adds or changes lease text: it fills in your placeholders and adds a signature page at the end. Your template is yours, and you are responsible for what it says. Any team member can upload and manage templates.
Before you start
- Have your lease as a Word file (.docx), 5 MB or smaller. A PDF or an old .doc file won't work: save it from Word as .docx.
- In Word, type a placeholder in double braces wherever eSamaHomes should fill in a value, for example {{rentAmount}}. Spaces inside the braces are fine; capital letters must match.
- A full legal name is first, middle and last name. A tenant or owner with no middle name entered prints as first and last name. A middle name is printed on the lease and used for online signing, and nowhere else in eSamaHomes.
| Placeholder | What it prints |
|---|---|
| {{tenantNames}} | Every tenant on the lease, primary first, by full legal name |
| {{primaryTenantName}} | The primary tenant's full legal name |
| {{primaryTenantPhone}} | The primary tenant's phone, e.g. "(305) 555-0142" |
| {{primaryTenantEmail}} | The primary tenant's email |
| {{occupantNames}} | Occupants who don't sign, or "None" |
| {{propertyAddress}} | The property's address |
| {{unitLabel}} | The unit, e.g. "Unit 4B"; empty for a house |
| {{landlordName}} | Landlord: your company's name. Property manager: the property's owner(s), by full legal name |
| {{managerName}} | Property manager: your company's name. Landlord: empty |
| {{companyAddress}} | Your company address (Settings) |
| {{rentAmount}} | Monthly rent, e.g. "$1,550.00" |
| {{depositAmount}} | Security deposit, or "$0.00" |
| {{dueDay}} | The day rent is due, e.g. "1st" |
| {{lateFee}} | The late fee, e.g. "$75.00" |
| {{gracePeriodDays}} | Days of grace before the late fee, e.g. "5" |
| {{startDate}} | Start date, e.g. "October 1, 2026" |
| {{endDate}} | End date, or "Month-to-month" |
| {{termType}} | "Fixed term", "Fixed term, then month-to-month" or "Month-to-month" |
| {{todayDate}} | The day the document is made |
Steps
- In the menu, open Setup → Settings and click the Templates tab. Scroll to Lease Templates.
- Type a name, for example "Florida house".
- Click Choose .docx file, pick your file, and click Upload template. eSamaHomes checks the placeholders and shows "Template saved", or "Template saved, with warnings to check".
- Read any warning in the yellow box under the template. Fix it in Word, then click Replace file on the template and upload the fixed file.
- To check a template before you use it, type a tenant's name or email under Search a tenant to preview with above the list and click them. Choose one of their leases under Lease to preview with (when they have only one, it is chosen for you; Change picks another tenant), then click Preview on the template. The PDF opens in a new tab, filled in for that lease with the signature page at the end. The preview isn't saved anywhere: the lease gets no file and nothing is sent.
- To fill the template for a lease, open the lease and, under Create lease document, pick the template and click Create lease document. Click Open on the link that appears to check the PDF.
Example
Your "Florida house" template says: "The tenants, {{tenantNames}}, agree to pay {{rentAmount}} on the {{dueDay}} of each month."
For a lease with tenants Maria Elena Lopez (middle name Elena) and Ben Cole, rent of $1,550 due on the 1st, the PDF reads: "The tenants, Maria Elena Lopez and Ben Cole, agree to pay $1,550.00 on the 1st of each month."
The signature page at the end has a block for each signer: the landlord (or, for a property manager, the manager and any owner who signs leases), then each tenant, with a printed name, a signature line and a date line. A tenant's or owner's printed name is their full legal name, so Maria's block reads "Printed name: Maria Elena Lopez".
What happens next
- The PDF is saved on the lease as Lease draft - Florida house.pdf. Only your team sees it; tenants and owners never do. Creating it again replaces it.
- To have everyone sign it online, see Sign a lease online.
- Archive hides a template from the list and the pickers. Leases already made from it keep their files. An archived template can't be brought back yet; upload it again as a new template.
If something looks wrong
- "{{…}} is not a placeholder eSamaHomes knows. It will print as a blank line." Check the spelling and capitals against the table above. When eSamaHomes adds a new placeholder, a warning about it goes away on its own; you don't need to replace the file.
- "… has no closing }}." A placeholder is missing its closing braces. Fix it in Word and replace the file.
- A value prints as ________. eSamaHomes has no value for it on this lease, for example no late fee. Fill it in on the lease, or in Settings for your company address, and create the document again.
- "eSamaHomes can't fill this template." The file uses Word codes eSamaHomes doesn't fill, such as {{#…}} or {{/…}}. Remove them in Word and replace the file.
- "eSamaHomes couldn't make the PDF just now. Try again in a minute." The PDF service was busy or down. Try again shortly.
- "This lease is out for signing. Cancel the signing before making a new document." Cancel the signing on the lease first.
- Preview stays greyed out. Search a tenant and choose a lease under Lease to preview with first. A tenant with no lease shows "… has no leases to preview with."; click Change to pick another tenant.
- "That file is over 5 MB." Remove large images from the Word file and upload it again.
Still stuck? See every help article.