State Specific Question About: COLORADO (CO)

Only if CO statute allows or is written that way..

Moving out does not stop the minimum 30 day notice in many states, they simply moved, did they return the keys?

Yeah, we need more details here. Was this a lease or month-to-month? Did it normally run from the 1st? Does CO do a "30 days from notice" termination or no?

In my state and with my lease, 30 days notice is required and it always terminates on the 1st. In other words, if I gave someone notice on October 5th, it would be notifying them that their tenancy ends on December 1st. Because it wouldn't be enough notice (30+ days) for it to terminate on November 1st.

So, "it depends" really matters here -- on lots of missing details.

- John...

Okay, here are more of the details: The tenant's lease is a month-to-month. She has lived there for over 2 years, but has become increasingly problematic. First, she allowed her brother to stay in the unit while she was away, and he flooded the property with marijuana smoke. He broke up with his girlfriend - and she was passed out drunk on the front lawn - after the police had been summoned because she was wreaking havoc. Then, the tenant took in her son and his girlfriend and their baby for a few days. Girlfriend got in a fight with her which ended up with assault allegations. The tenant then began running late on paying her portion of the rent ($5 of a $600 rent). When I stressed to her that she could not let that slide, she accused one of my workers of stealing her jewelry. I told her to call the police at once - or I would - for them to take finger prints. Her boyfriend then showed up and "found" the jewelry before the police got there.

At this point, I was seeking ways of ending her lease. She lapsed on paying her rent (the $5) one more time. On the 5th, I could have filed a Pay Up or Quit notice, but had already done that, so instead, and since the majority of her rent is paid by the state automatically, I opted to go with a Termination of Tenancy without cause with a 30-day notice. I filed that on the 5th, and the 30-days runs it to the 4th of the next month. The amount we would be talking about is $80. It's not a huge amount, but I was not sure how other landlords would handle it.

Yes, I am glad she is out. Yes, she moved voluntarily to avoid messing up her eligibility for aid from the state. All that aside, if a tenant gives a landlord 30-days notice - they are due for that entire 30 days. If a landlord gives the 30-days notice, I was unsure if it would be viewed the same way.

A side question to all of this is that her church paid for her deposit when she moved in...I planned on just writing her the check for security deposit refund, but am wondering if I should check with the church since they paid the deposit. Ack....

To Amy - I appreciate your suggestions. I agree, we each must stay alert to the statutes that apply. I've not had this situation before...in 25 years of landlording.

Regarding letting it go on so long - that's a tough situation, too. I have spent $$$ on legal counsel for this tenant before. Each time, there is one technicality or another that prevents a clean end to her lease. The brother's girlfriend was in the same category as a stranger on the street, or a stalker. Not her fault. Her kid staying - was disputed, and again, unclean for ending a lease over it without contention. The girlfriend assault was another mess legally. All in all, I'm glad for all of us to start fresh. She was a great tenant for a period of time until it all started slipping.

I do not mind walking away from the $80 if it is in doubt, but I did want to know for future reference.

I don't understand why anyone pursues 'violations of lease' when they have month to month tenants. The beauty of M2M is that you can give them a month notice to end tenancy. Just do that. It is easier and cleaner than trying to find a reason. As Amy said, most places is a calendar month notice for M2M agreement, not an actual 30 days. Given that she is gone without much trouble and if the place does not require cleaning or repair from her tenancy, I would just be happy it done and rent on.

Not sure who's the bigger idiot? Maybe the tenant, when you sue them, counter sues you for treble damages. you didn't give proper notice. 30 days from the time the rent is normally due.

Are you saying that CO has some law that states that only 15 days are required to terminate a MTM agreement? If so, can you reference the state law on that? I'm simply curious to read it.

Or are you saying that YOUR lease is written that way? (Which seems odd for a yearly lease that reverted to MTM. If it does have it, I'd have my doubts if it would stand up in court.)

I'm just curious where the "I only had to give 15 days notice to terminate" statement is coming from? State law or local lease?

- John...

John, it is from my lease. I have not conferred with an attorney on the notification periods, except to have it generally viewed previously when I've had evictions. It has never been brought up.

Well, I'll just say "good luck" and leave it at that then. This thread is pretty much full of poor decisions and bad moves. :(

- John...

State and local laws first, then your contract. A judge isn't going to care what you put in your contract if it isn't following what is legal.

So if YOU SAY you can give 15 days notice, then why would you need the extra money anyway? I would drop it. I dont think that's a good business practice to give a tenant a 30 day notice midmonth(mid rent cycle), and when the tenant actually moves out within the time frame, more money is tacked on to match up with the 30 days. With as bad of a tenant as this, I'd be thankful they left without much complaint AND that they hadn't totalled out their security deposit!!

That kind of stuff usually comes back to bite you somewhere down the line. Good luck

As a final update to this saga, I opted to consult an attorney who specializes in this sort of thing for a couple of clarifications. She said that Colorado just changed their law on terminations. If a landlord wishes to end a month-to-month contract, a 7-day notice is required with the day of service not counting. It used to be 10 days. If the lease offers more notice, then the lease is followed, not the state law. She said this does not work in reverse, i.e., if the state law required more notice and the lease provided for less notice, then the state law would prevail. I gave the tenant ample notice. She moved out end of month, so not pursuing the extra days of rent was the proper course.

Regarding paying the deposit back when charitable organizations (or others) pay the deposit for the person renting, unless it is written out specifically, I learned that the deposit goes back to the tenant. This is a loophole that I will address differently in the future. Namely, I will ask the donating party if they wish to have the deposit returned to them, and if so, I will spell that out in the lease for the tenant and the donating party to sign.

A couple of posters thought the whole situation was riddled with mistakes. I rented to a woman who initially was a great tenant. She paid her rent throughout two years. Each time there was reason to gnash teeth over her tenancy, I dealt with the situations quickly and firmly. When necessary, I sought the counsel of an attorney before getting into a no-win situation. The truth is - if you are in this business long enough, you will eventually rent to a tenant who will have a series of events cause them to fall out of balance. In a slow economy, you may begrudgingly accept these tenants to avoid a lengthy vacancy. Either way, when that happens - and it will - you do the best you can with the resources you have and you hope for the best. In some cases, you will end the tenancy before things get worse. That is what I did.

Dani, we just had a renter like that. It was awful. Like you, there were some legal things I had to brush up on and some posts on this site helped.

When you are in the middle of all the drama, it's hard to see what all you have dealt with.

But when it's enough, it's enough. The $5, in its principle, was the final straw after all the other bs you dealt with. That is always the hardest part for me- and has been discussed many times here, that we sometimes want more for our tenants lives than they do. Sometimes we have TOO much hope for them and hold out too long.

Very happy you were able to find out the laws in your state. It makes all the difference in the world.

Colorado does indeed have a 7-day notice law. My mistake. I had incorrectly assumed otherwise. That is just very surprising to me!

In this case, it was good for you. If the situation was reversed (where a tenant only has to give 7 days notice), that could be really bad for us as landlords.

But, that is indeed the law. Crazy stuff! :)

Glad you got it all sorted, Dani!

- John...