When renting a home in Mexico, many are faced with an unexpected requirement: in addition to the contract, the owner asks to sign some kind of receipts. Usually their number corresponds to the rental period, in particular, 12 receipts for an annual contract. Receipts are called pagaré. This practice is especially common when renting apartments by foreigners.
Pagaré — This is a promissory note in which the tenant agrees to pay a certain amount of money on a specified date. Unlike a regular payment receipt, this document specifically confirms the tenant's obligation to pay.
Pagaré — This is an additional guarantee of the fulfillment of the contract. Evicting a defaulter in Mexico can take many months. But the presence of a pagaré allows the property owner to quickly confirm the existence of a debt, use the receipt in court, and speed up debt collection.
The landlord usually asks you to sign several of these receipts, each for the amount of the monthly rent and with a commitment date for a specific month. After payment for the next month, the landlord returns the corresponding pagaré to the tenant. If the tenant has paid rent for May, a receipt for May will be returned to him. By the end of the contract, all payment obligations must be fulfilled and all receipts must be returned.
The returned pagaré serves as proof of payment. That is why landlords have the opportunity not to issue payment receipts (recibo de renta) at all, although the tenant has the right to ask for proof of payment. A returned receipt means that the obligation has been fulfilled. If the landlord no longer has the original signed pagaré, and according to the contract he is required to have it before payment, he is not able to claim that the month was not paid.
Pagaré is most often purchased at a regular stationery store as blank forms and filled out by hand. For this reason, before signing receipts, it is important to check the amount of each receipt, for what rental period it is, the deadline for payment (it is different for each month), the indication of the lease agreement data in the receipt, etc. Before giving it away, it is advisable to obtain copies of all signed receipts or photograph them.
Is it possible to refuse the pagaré design? The law does not oblige the tenant to sign them. This condition is determined only by agreement of the parties. But in practice, many homeowners, especially in large cities and tourist areas, consider such receipts as a mandatory guarantee. Refusal to sign them can lead to the fact that this housing simply will not be rented to you. Therefore, if you are sure that you will be able to pay the rent for the entire term, signing a pagaré does not threaten you. But if you want to sign a one-year contract but move out after 9 months, then you're better off not signing the pagaré.