Illegal in-law unit within garage, should I pay rent?
Question by david s: Illegal in-law unit within garage, should I pay rent?
I lived in an illegal unit for 6months. I just found out that it is indeed an illegal unit and confirmed it with my landlord. I feel duped and upset. Should I stop paying rent? I have mold problems with the unit and i believe that the rent i am paying isn’t worth the price….
any suggestions are very welcome!!! thank you
I read this
http://www.caltenantlaw.com/Habitability.htm
and it says
D. Withholding Rent
At some point, conditions are bad enough that the law permits and encourages you to withhold rent. This happens when the place is an illegal structure and when the unit has a “substantial reduction of habitability.”
The Illegal Unit
If the place is illegal, such as a converted garage or bootlegged duplex, then under Gruzen v. Henry, the landlord is not entitled to collect or request ANY rent. It is illegal if the structure that is there does not match the “Certificate of Occupancy” or equivalent issued by the City. Chances are, there are plenty of defects in an illegal unit: no contractor would touch it.
For example, a prior landlord might have gotten a permit to build a “recreation room” with a bathroom, on the back of his garage, away from his house. After the room was built, however, he had a handyman come in and add a kitchen in the garage area, put wall board and electrical outlets, etc, in the garage, lay down a carpet, and voila! a “back house” is born. This makes it a two-on-a-lot, where it’s supposed to be a single family house, with a detached garage and recreation room. That landlord sells it as income property to your landlord, who pays a premium to have two units paying rent instead of a house. Because a handyman mickey-moused everything, cut corners, was unqualified to do the work, and never got permits, you now live in this back house with odd shaped rooms and things that don’t work well. Guess why? Similar things happen with two story houses, split into an upstairs apartment and a downstairs apartment, both of which are illegal.
If you check with the City Building Department -Records Section, you can get a copy of the Certificate of Occupancy, certified, for your records. If this is supposed to be a single family dwelling and it’s a two on the lot or duplex, nobody owes rent any more. Why? Because the law is not going to reward a landlord who has an illegal structure, and punishes him by declaring the contract leasing that structure “void.” That’s what the Gruzen v. Henry case was all about. Since the Certificate of Occupancy applies to the entire structure, the house and illegal garage are both included, and neither should owe rent. Not all judges may agree, and the law is not clear here; some judges may only find that the illegal unit’s rent is not due, if one one is.
The same reasoning can also apply where the landlord has added rooms without permits, so that the completed structure does not match the Certificate of Occupancy. The City’s citation orders the landlord to restore the building to its original condition, and identifies the structure as illegal. That solves your problem.
Although you may have uninhabitable conditions that justify your withholding the rent, the illegality of the building and what has to happen lead to no rent at all being due, and no repairs being made. What happens is that the landlord tries to evict you for nonpayment of rent, knowing that the place is illegal, and hoping to get an order that you simply be removed from the illegal structure, without owing rent. This is what the Gruzen case concluded. However, in rent controlled areas, such as Los Angeles, where the relocation assistance has to be paid, the eviction should not be permitted if the relocation money and proper notices to remove a tenant from a dwelling to be removed from the market have not be satisfied. That money is due even if the unit is illegal, under Salazar v. Maradeaga. You may be able to sue to recover the back amounts paid, too.
By the way, I never knew and he never told me that it was an illegal unit till now. UGGH
I live in San Francisco, and I signed the rent control stuff when I signed the lease (which now makes no difference). am I eligible for relocation expenses?
Best answer:
Answer by whitefangz1
You are not required to continue paying rent, but you are not allowed to continue living there rent-free either. The law is not set up so you can legally be a squatter. It is set up to ensure that you are not penalized for breaking the lease if you live in an unsafe dwelling and choose to leave. I highly doubt you live in a rent-controlled structure, so the relocation payment won’t apply to you. Most of Los Angeles is NOT rent-controlled.
If you stop paying rent, he will post a 3 day notice to quit. Once 3 days have passed, he can legally file an eviction against you. He will win. You won’t owe back rent, but you will be forced to leave and you will have an eviction on your record for 10 years.
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