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Does a 3-Day Notice to Quit or Pay supersede a prior 30-Day Notice to Vacate?

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WilliamC

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

Hi,

I live in Los Angeles, which is under rent control. I have a written rental agreement, with building management, for the two-bedroom apartment in which I live. Several months ago, I rented out the second bedroom to another person, pursuant to an oral agreement.


The rental agreement does permit my renting out my second bedroom. Any new tenant must fill out a rental application and pass a credit check. Then, management draws up a new rental contract, for the both of us to sign. Management did approve my roommate's application and credit check. However, the current rental agreement is still in my name only.

He did not pay for March rent. Therefore, on March 6, I handed to my roommate a signed and dated notice. The following is the rest of the text:


“I did not receive your rent, $[xx.xx], plus payment for your share of the utility bill. This is a 30-Day Notice to pay or quit.”



Later, I realized that I should have, instead, served him with a Three-Day Notice to Pay Rent Quit or Pay, pursuant to CCP 1161. Accordingly, on March 9, I served on him a Three-Day Notice to Pay Rent or Quit. In the body of the notice, I believe that I properly included the required information for a valid 3-Day Notice.

At the top of that notice, I wrote, “This notice supersedes any and all notices served to you.“

1. Notwithstanding the above statement (regarding the superseding of prior notices), can my roommate successfully argue that he still has that original thirty-day period to pay the rent or quit and therefore the three-day notice, which I served within that 30-day period, is not valid?

2. How does my prior serving of the thirty-day notice affect any future unlawful detainer action that I may file, where I base the suit upon that three-day notice?

3. I saw the following information in my research:

“If you have already served a Thirty-Day Notice of Termination of Tenancy, and you serve a Three-Day Notice for rent for any period beyond the Thirty-Day Notice, you may have waived the Thirty-Day Notice.”

a. What is the meaning of the above statement?
b. How does it relate to my situation, if at all?

4. I did not include my telephone number in that Three-Day Notice, as required by CCP 1161. Does that make the notice fatally defective?

--------------------------------------------------------------

(Below, is an excerpt from the relevant Three-Day Notice statute.)

California Code of Civil Procedure Section 1161

A tenant of real property, for a term less than life, or the
executor or administrator of his or her estate heretofore qualified
and now acting or hereafter to be qualified and act, is guilty of
unlawful detainer:

1. …

2. When he or she continues in possession, in person or by
subtenant, without the permission of his or her landlord, or the
successor in estate of his or her landlord, if applicable, after
default in the payment of rent, pursuant to the lease or agreement
under which the property is held, and three days' notice, in writing,
requiring its payment, stating the amount which is due, the name,
telephone number, and address of the person to whom the rent payment
shall be made, and, if payment may be made personally, the usual days
and hours that person will be available to receive the payment […] shall have been served upon him or her and if there is a subtenant in actual occupation of the premises, also upon the subtenant.


--------------------------------------------------------------


Thank you,

WilliamC
 
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sandyclaus

Senior Member
The basic difference between these two notices are that the 3-day notice is a curable notice, whereas the 30-day notice is not.

What that means is that the 3-day notice conditions allow for a cure to restore the tenancy as it was, as long as the violations are corrected within the 3-day notice period. In your case, if he pays the rent in that time, he gets to stay for at least another month. (He remains your subtenant on a month-to-month basis unless and until he actually gets added on to your existing fixed term lease with the LL.)

By writing that the 3-day notice supercedes the 30-day notice, that does effectively waive the 30-day notice. If you want to terminate his tenancy altogether, you would need to serve them with another 30-day notice to terminate.

Regarding your statement, "If you have already served a Thirty-Day Notice of Termination of Tenancy, and you serve a Three-Day Notice for rent for any period beyond the Thirty-Day Notice, you may have waived the Thirty-Day Notice", that refers SOLELY to a demand for rent beyond that which your tenant would have paid up to the end of the 30-day notice you wrote. (If they are expected to leave at the end of 30 days, you couldn't demand that your tenant pay beyond those 30 days.)

Lastly, if you did not put your telephone number on the notice, that in itself may not make the notice fatally defective - especially if you can prove that your tenant already had your phone number to begin with. With a 3-day notice, the other information is more critical, in that if the tenant doesn't know where to send the payment, or the hours when they can submit that payment, it affects their ability to comply.
 

WilliamC

Junior Member
I'm glad I sought advice on this site.

SandyClaus,



I very much appreciate your clear and concise reply to my post.

Okay, a three-day notice provides the recipient with an opportunity to restore the tenancy by correcting something within that time-frame.

I now realize that there is no such thing as a statutory provision for a 30-day notice to pay or quit, which I what I gave my roommate.

However, there is a statutory provision for a 30-day notice to vacate (quit); this provides no opportunity for a cure.


I understand that if I had given my roommate a statutory 30-day notice to vacate, then I could later waive such a notice, by serving a three-day notice to pay or quit.

But, even though I gave him thirty days to pay the rent or quit, I can subsequently shorten that period by giving a three-day notice to pay or quit within that thirty-day period, if I write that the three-day notice supersedes the thirty-day notice to pay or quit?

I just fear that he will argue that he reasonably relied upon my giving him 30-days to pay, and that it was unfair that I subsequently unilaterally shortened that period, e.g., to three-days.

Cheers,

WilliamC
 
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FarmerJ

Senior Member
When you live in a state where you must give a advance warning that they have x days to pay ( or risk being taken to court ) VS 30 day notice to get out is that the first one is where your planing on taking them to court for the money if they dont pay , the second one you recover nothing because your not asking for money if you have to still take them to court to get out after giving a tenant proper notice . So when you wiegh them out you may find one more attractive than another pitfalls with 30 day is when they dont pay you still have to take them to court for the money or to get them out when they refuse where as notice to cure and taking tenant to court may get you a judgement but you will have them out sooner.
 

WilliamC

Junior Member
Which notice is current valid the thirty-day or the subsquent three-day notice?

When you live in a state where you must give a advance warning that they have x days to pay ( or risk being taken to court ) VS 30 day notice to get out is that the first one is where your planing on taking them to court for the money if they dont pay , the second one you recover nothing because your not asking for money if you have to still take them to court to get out after giving a tenant proper notice . So when you wiegh them out you may find one more attractive than another pitfalls with 30 day is when they dont pay you still have to take them to court for the money or to get them out when they refuse where as notice to cure and taking tenant to court may get you a judgement but you will have them out sooner.

I first served a thirty-day notice to pay or quit.

Does the subsquent serving of a three-day notice to pay or quit, within that thirty-day period, effectively vitiate or destroy the legal validity of the prior thirty-day notice to pay or quit, because I explicitly indicated that the latter notice superseded any and all notices [already] served?
 

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