Re: Damages after vacating - no rental agreement

Re: Damages after vacating - no rental agreement by MrDan (GA) on April 25, 2016 @21:28

Any landlord operating under a oral/verbal rental agreement may run into a lot of liability. Not knowing all the facts of the agreement, here are some pitfalls;

California consider an oral rental agreement greater than one year is not enforceable.

As the landlord, you will have no written proof of the terms of your rental agreement.

The landlord would not be able to collect attorney’s fee, should a tenant lose a court case.

A landlord may not evict a tenant for breach of a lease provision other than failure to pay rent unless the provision breached is in a writing signed by the tenant.

With an oral agreement, rent is due at the end of the month.

"Civil Code Sec. 1947. When there is no usage or contract to the contrary, rents are payable at the termination of the holding, when it does not exceed one year. If the holding is by the day, week, month, quarter, or year, rent is payable at the termination of the respective periods, as it successively becomes due".

"I did not have a rental agreement signed by my last tenant" was this perhaps due to the tenants failure to sign or did you just not present the tenant with a rental agreement?

Either way, the cost of the carpet is its depreciation value. If the carpet is say seven years old and would likely last for ten years, you have three years of useful life left. You may charge the tenant for the remaining useful life of the carpet. If the carpet has no remaining useful life, then you cannot charge the tenant.

You did not state if the tenant vacated early or at the end of the agreed upon termination date. Be sure to get your security deposit settlement statement out within 21 days or you will have to return the full deposit.

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