A Conventional Rent Increase Is Preferable to ‘Pet Rent’ Charges

Question: I own apartments in Redding and I would prefer to have no pets in the building. Unfortunately, the previous manager had a soft heart and allowed several residents to bring in cats. We implemented a nonrefundable $100 application/processing fee and a $500 refundable security deposit.

We recently turned the building over to a management company, and they are telling me the nonrefundable $100 is probably illegal and they don’t want to collect it. Is that right? I also have heard of owners charging a monthly pet rent. Which is correct?

Answer: Your management company is right. Nonrefundable fees and deposits are illegal in the state of California. The only exception to the rule is the $30 nonrefundable tenant-screening fee for rental applicants. You should drop the illegal $100 application/processing fee.

You also may want to rethink your pet-rent idea. Under state law, you are allowed to raise rents to market levels with 30-day notices. (A new state law taking effect on Jan. 1, 2001, requires 60-day notices for rent increases of 10% or more.)

You don’t need to identify the specific reason for a rent increase. If you do identify it, such as by calling a rent increase a pet increase, you must consider whether you are going to reduce the “‘pet” rent if the pet, through death, disappearance or adoption, stops occupying the apartment home.

If that is your intention, it is legal to raise the rent and call the increase pet rent. Otherwise, just give the tenants notice of the rent increase.

Monthly Tenant Still Owes 30-Day Notice

Q: I had an apartment in the Valley. At the start of the last month of my one-year lease, the management notified me that the rent would increase with a new lease. If I did not renew the lease, the month-to-month rate would be even higher. The letter said I needed to notify them of my intentions by the end of the month.

I did not renew the lease, and two weeks later I found a new apartment. I let them know that I would be moving out at the end of the month.

After moving out, I called to inquire about my security deposit and was told that two weeks rent would be deducted from the deposit because the 30-day notice requirement was automatically continued with the lease on a month-to-month basis.

I believe that their original letter was misleading and nothing more than a moneymaking scheme. Is there any chance of my getting my money back?

A: It is not uncommon for apartment owners to charge less rent to tenants who are willing to commit to longer terms of tenancy. In most businesses, larger or longer quantities, including quantities of time, usually translate into lower rates.

I don’t understand how you think that the management’s letter clarifying state law, which requires a 30-day notice of your intent to vacate, led to them getting more money. If you had signed a lease extension you could have been liable for more than just 30 days’ rent.

Since you knew you were moving out you could, and should, have given them the state-required 30-day notice of your intent to move at the beginning of the last month of your tenancy. Had you done so, you would have incurred no added rent liability.

Your only chance of recovering any of the last month’s rent would be if the management re-rented the apartment after you moved out and before the two weeks worth of remaining rent you paid was used up. Then they would have to prorate and refund the difference to you.

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Postema is the editor of Apartment Age magazine, a publication of AAGLA, an apartment owners’ service group, and manager of public affairs for the California Apartment Law Information Foundation, which disseminates information about landlord/tenant law to renters and owners in California. Mail your questions on any aspect of apartment living to AAGLA, 12012 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90025.