Renting Out the Post or Lodge Hall: Rates, the Agreement, and Who Runs the Bar

A member's daughter wants the main hall for her wedding reception. The quilting guild has had the meeting room every Tuesday for years. A family from town calls the canteen about a retirement party and asks whether they can bring their own beer. Each request is routine. Each raises the same three questions: what rate, whose bar, and who unlocks the door.

Answering them once takes eight decisions. Decide who may rent and at which rate: member, public, or nonprofit, with hourly blocks for weekly groups, half and full days for parties, and a damage deposit. Decide the bar policy: renters use the post's bar, bring their own, or neither, as your license class and insurance allow. Put the post's own calendar first, with the right to cancel for a funeral service written down. Write a hall rental agreement that renters sign before a date is held. Take requests through one booking page that shows open dates. Take card payments online from the public and check or purchase order from boards and groups. Name who holds the keys and walks the hall at checkout. If you rent more than one space, give each its own calendar. Write the answers down once, and every volunteer gives the same one.

Who can rent the hall, and at what rate?

Nearly every post and lodge that rents to the public ends up with three rates, and the ones that run smoothly publish all three.

• Member rate. Members and their immediate families. The lowest rate, because members already keep the building open through dues and volunteer hours.
• Public rate. Anyone from town. It covers the full cost of opening, staffing, and cleaning the hall, plus the margin that pays the heating bill in February.
• Nonprofit or community-group rate. The Little League banquet, the church youth group, the town meeting. Usually between the other two.

Some posts limit public rentals to events sponsored by a member: the member signs alongside the renter and answers for the hall that night. If that is your rule, it belongs on the rate sheet, and the sponsoring member's name belongs on the agreement.

Behind the rates, keep the structure simple. Hourly blocks for the meeting room and weekly groups; half-day and full-day blocks for the main hall, since a reception never fits in four hours. A refundable damage deposit, collected at booking as its own line. Cleaning as a flat fee or a checklist the renter completes to get the deposit back, not both. The kitchen and bar area as add-ons. The amounts are the board's call; what matters is that they live on one page with the rules, including what you decline, so a volunteer on the canteen phone never has to invent policy.

Who runs the bar?

Posts with a liquor license run the bar one of two common ways. In the first, the post's bar serves the event: post bartenders pour under the post's license, and bar revenue often makes the rental worth hosting. No outside alcohol comes through the door.

In the second, the canteen stays members-only and cannot serve a renter's guests. A renter who wants alcohol gets a one-day license from the county or state, hires a licensed and insured server if required, and keeps drinking inside the building. The post approves nothing until the license is in hand.

Which shape you can use depends on license class and state or county rules, and on the carrier, since outside alcohol often affects liquor liability coverage. Confirm both, then name the house chairman, or whoever the post designates, to check licenses and certificates before the event, and say so in the agreement.

If the hall does not hold a license, the choices are simpler: dry rentals only, or alcohol allowed with a licensed and insured bartender the renter hires and a one-day permit where the state requires it. Either way, name the rule. "Ask the bar manager" is not a policy.

The license decides who pours. Every bar rule follows from that.

Whose calendar comes first?

The post's. Monthly meetings, auxiliary meetings, bingo or the Friday fish fry, honor guard practice, Memorial Day and Veterans Day observances, and the funeral services the post provides for members. Those go on the calendar before any rental does, a year ahead where possible.

Funerals do not schedule themselves a year ahead. A military funeral service, or a member's family needing the hall for the gathering afterward, can land on a Saturday already rented. Write the post's right to cancel for that reason into the agreement, with a full refund and help finding a new date. Renters accept it when it is stated up front, and not when they learn it the week of their party.

Weekly groups are the third claim on the calendar: the Thursday AA meeting, the scouts on Monday, the dance class, the quilting guild. Treat them as a type of renter with a standing arrangement: a one-page agreement, a modest hourly rate or a monthly amount, their regular hours held on the calendar, and a plain statement that a post event or a funeral service takes precedence with notice. That page turns "they have always met here" into something the next house committee can read.

What belongs in the hall rental agreement?

A hall rental agreement is the contract between the post and the renter, signed before the date is held. It is the same checklist we gave churches, with three additions a post needs: the sponsoring member, the bar policy, and the funeral clause. A complete agreement covers:

• The renter: one named adult with phone and email, the organization if there is one, and the sponsoring member if your bylaws require one.
• Spaces included and excluded: the main hall but not the meeting room, the kitchen and the pavilion only if added.
• Date, arrival time, and departure time, with setup and teardown inside them.
• Overtime: the charge for running past the departure time, so nobody negotiates it with the bartender at midnight.
• Fees, the damage deposit, what it covers, and when it is returned.
• Cancellation and refund terms for the renter, and the post's right to cancel for a funeral service or post emergency, with a full refund.
• Bar policy: whether the renter must use the post's bar, whether outside alcohol is prohibited, who may serve, and when last call is.
• Outside vendors and caterers: whether a caterer must be licensed and insured, rules for DJs and rental companies, and load-in and load-out times.
• Decorations: what may be hung and how, no open flame, nothing on the memorial wall or the flags.
• Capacity and fire code: the posted occupancy, exits kept clear.
• Noise and end time: when amplified music stops, and when the building is empty and locked.
• Cleanup: tables down or left up, trash out, floors swept, bar area and kitchen wiped.
• Equipment the renter may use (tables, chairs, sound system) and may not (the canteen, the flag cases, the kitchen range).
• Minors: whether they may attend, a minimum ratio of adults, and who is responsible for them where alcohol is served.
• Insurance and hold harmless: a certificate of insurance from organizations where you require one, and a hold harmless clause (the renter agrees not to hold the post responsible for injuries or losses during their event).
• Signature and date from the responsible adult, and from the sponsoring member if there is one.

Among venues that run their rentals on Check Cherry and wrote their own agreement, nearly all cover cancellation and the damage deposit, about two thirds reserve the venue's own right to cancel and set rules for outside vendors, about half address alcohol, and roughly four in ten cover minors, capacity, and overtime. The full list, clause by clause, with how often venues write each one, is in What Belongs in a Facility Rental Agreement.

How do you take requests when nobody sits in an office?

One request form or booking page gives the canteen phone, the commander's cell, and the post's Facebook page the same door. It asks the same questions every time (which space, date, hours, head count, member or public, bar service) and shows only the dates that are open. When a renter sees the hall is taken on the 14th and open on the 21st, they ask for the 21st.

Not every request should confirm itself. A member reserving the meeting room can book instantly. A public reception with bar service should land as a request the house committee approves before the agreement goes out. Check Cherry is booking software that posts, lodges, and community halls use to take rental requests, get the hall rental agreement signed, and collect the deposit. Each space takes the path you choose: book now, with the agreement signed and the deposit paid, or request first and approve. Member and public rates are separate options the renter picks from, and post events block the calendar through a sync with the calendar you already keep.

How should the post take payment?

Cash and checks are how many posts have always been paid, and that can stay true for members. The public expects to pay by card online when they book, which is also the moment to collect the deposit, so the date is never held on a promise.

Boards and organizations are the other case. A school district or a town committee pays by check or purchase order because that is how their books work. In Check Cherry, you add check or purchase order as a payment option. The renter chooses it when they book, the agreement still gets signed, and you record the payment when it arrives. Reminders reach the renter before each payment either way, so the treasurer is not keeping a list.

Who holds the keys?

Volunteers do, and the volunteer who agreed to open in March may not remember in October. A short routine covers it:

The checkout walk is the step most posts skip and the one we would keep. Done together, there is very little left to argue about.

How do you rent the hall and the pavilion without double-booking?

Most posts rent more than one thing: the main hall, a meeting room, the bar area, the kitchen, a pavilion in summer. A wall calendar cannot answer "is the kitchen free Saturday?" One calendar with each space on it can. The main hall and the meeting room book independently. The kitchen and the bar area are add-ons either hall can include, each limited to one booking at a time, so once Saturday's reception takes the kitchen it disappears from the meeting room's options that day. The help article How do I take bookings for multiple rooms or spaces? walks through the exact settings. If your hall operates more like a rental venue than a post with a side room, the event space booking page covers that setup.

Common questions about renting out a post or lodge hall

Can we require renters to use our bar?

Some posts do. Where the license class allows service to a renter's guests, requiring the post's bar is often how the hall pays for itself. Other posts keep the canteen members-only and require the renter to hold a one-day license instead. License class and state or county rules decide which you can do, so confirm with your state liquor authority and your carrier, then write the answer into the agreement.

Should members and nonprofits pay less?

Yes, and publish all three rates. The member rate rewards the people whose dues and volunteer hours keep the building open. The nonprofit or community rate is goodwill the board decides once, so nobody has to decide it again when the Little League calls.

What if we need the hall for a funeral service?

Write the right to cancel into the agreement, with a full refund and help finding another date. Renters accept the clause when it is stated up front, because they understand what the post is for. Keep a short list of nearby halls you can refer them to, so the call offers somewhere to go and not only an apology.

Start with the rate sheet and the bar policy

If you do one thing before the next meeting, write the three rates and the bar policy on one page and bring it for a vote. Everything else above, from the sponsoring member to the funeral clause, becomes a line in the agreement behind that page. Once both exist, the wedding, the quilting guild, and the retirement party get the same answer from whoever answers the canteen phone.