My Landlord Emailed a Notice to Evict Me!

I am increasingly seeing NOTICE clauses in residential lease agreements such as the clauses shown below:

NOTICE.  Any notice required or permitted under this Lease or under state law shall be deemed sufficiently given or served if sent by United States certified mail, return receipt requested, addressed as follows if to Landlord to ________; if to Tenant to:__________.

NOTICE: Each Resident shall provide an email address. Resident acknowledges and represents that this email address below is under his/her control and thus constitutes a valid method of notice for each, every, any and all notices given by Owner/Agent (including, but not limited to: legal notices, notices of charges arising out of lease, notices of any violations, etc.) Resident further represents that any notice sent to any Resident shall and will be immediately relayed to any and all other Residents, possessors, sublessors, assignees, and/or other persons occupying and or visiting the premises. Resident is responsible for checking their email each day and all notices are considered received on the day they were sent by midnight. Resident is responsible for keeping email address up to date and obtaining receipt from Owner/Agent in writing for any changes.

I am even seeing clauses where the cost of serving a legal notice, such as a Notice to Terminate Tenancy or a Notice to Cure or to Quit, are charged to the tenant!

But, are these lease clauses legal? No!

A 3-Day Notice to Terminate Tenancy must be served as follows:

1. The landlord must first attempt to personally serve (e.g. hand to you) the Notice but if you are unavailable for personal service, then
2. The landlord can substitute another person, of “suitable age and discretion,” usually age 18 or older, who is at your home or place of work and then send a copy of the Notice by mail, but if
3. The landlord cannot serve you personally or by substituted service, then s/he can post the Notice on your residential door in a conspicuous place and send a copy of the Notice by mail.

If options 2 or 3 are used, then service is not complete until the day after the Notice has actually been mailed.  See Cal. Code of Civ. Proc. section 1162(1)-(3).

A 30-Day or 60-Day Notice to Terminate Tenancy must be served as follows:

A landlord can use any of the service methods for a 3-Day notice OR can serve the tenant by certified or registered mail with return receipt requested.  See Cal. Civ. Code section 1946 and Cal. Code of Civ. Proc. section 1162.

So, in the first lease clause detailed above, the clause is invalid because it states that “any notice” can be served in the manner described which excludes a 3-Day eviction notice.

And, the second lease clause example affords service by EMAIL which is a patent violation of the law.

So, why is any of this important to you?  If service of one of the Notices described above is illegal, you may have a strong defense to an eviction proceeding!

To be fair, these are unusual lease clauses and the landlords who use them are not the norm. But certain landlords flagrantly insert penalizing, invalid lease clauses to assert their "command" of the property.  Bottom line: review any lease agreement prior to signing the contract and keep a copy of the lease agreement handy. Your landlord also must give you a copy of the executed agreement.  If there is a dispute between you and your landlord, the lease agreement will be central to the argument and will be provided to the Court to describe the rights of each party, rights that may be limited by the law.