More Time to "Cure" a Three-Day Notice and to Answer an Unlawful Detainer Complaint Beginning Sept. 1, 2019

On September 1, 2019, two new laws will go into effect relating to Cal. Code of Civ. Proc. sections 1161 and 1167 as follows:

1) The time to "cure" a 3-day notice will exclude Saturdays, Sundays and judicial holidays providing the tenant more time to fix the issue, and 2) the time to answer a unlawful detainer complaint will be 5-days counting from the day after the notice was personally served but these 5-days will also exclude Saturdays, Sundays, and judicial holidays. See Assembly Bill 2343 for more information, the salient part which is excerpted below.

Sec. 1161 (3) of the Code of Civil Procedure is amended to read:

"3. When he or she continues in possession, in person or by subtenant, after a neglect or failure to perform other conditions or covenants of the lease or agreement under which the property is held, including any covenant not to assign or sublet, than the one for the payment of rent, and three days’ notice, excluding Saturdays and Sundays and other judicial holidays, in writing, requiring the performance of such conditions or covenants, or the possession of the property, shall have been served upon him or her, and if there is a subtenant in actual occupation of the premises, also, upon the subtenant. Within three days, excluding Saturdays and Sundays and other judicial holidays, after the service of the notice, the tenant, or any subtenant in actual occupation of the premises, or any mortgagee of the term, or other person interested in its continuance, may perform the conditions or covenants of the lease or pay the stipulated rent, as the case may be, and thereby save the lease from forfeiture; provided, if the conditions and covenants of the lease, violated by the lessee, cannot afterward be performed, then no notice, as last prescribed herein, need be given to the lessee or his or her subtenant, demanding the performance of the violated conditions or covenants of the lease."

Section 1167 of the Code of Civil Procedure is amended to read:
"1167. (a) The summons shall be in the form specified in Section 412.20 except that when the defendant is served, the defendant’s response shall be filed within five days, excluding Saturdays and Sundays and other judicial holidays, after the complaint is served upon him or her."

Judicial holidays are listed here and may differ from "typical" holidays celebrated by businesses in the Golden State.