Threatening, Unstable House Guest Won't Leave

My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: California

In July, I moved into a four bedroom house with three friends and signed the lease. A month later, we let a friend's relative, dealing with family issues, use our small spare room until he could find his own place, if he helped with expenses. We didn't put him on the lease, considering him a guest. But when he actually showed up, he showed up with a moving truck full of his own stuff and took over the house.

We tried to have a house meeting with him once over the huge messes he was leaving everywhere, and he started to have what seemed like a panic attack, hyperventilating and becoming extremely confrontational. A little while later, he went to my place of employment when I wasn't around, and made physical threats, just because somebody had eaten his food in the communal fridge. He was medically discharged from the military but the reason why keeps changing. He routinely talks about how many ways he can kill a man with his bare hands. I even started getting calls from my neighbor about the crazy stuff he was doing, Facebook stalking mutual friends to dig up dirt, yelling for supposedly spying on him and breaking into his room and taking things, threatening to ruin friendships.

I've been living this nightmare for months. Everybody is afraid he'll do something crazy if we talk to him. We all sleep behind locked doors at night. We slipped a 30 day notice to vacate, just a few short sentences written and signed by us, under the door in September and a reminder notice in October, but instead of leaving, he moved all his stuff into his room and locked it in there. Half the time he stays in there, as if hiding. We went to the courthouse and they wanted us to give him an "official" 30 day notice -- ANOTHER one! -- and begin eviction process, which costs hundreds of dollars and takes months. All we've done since October is refused to accept his money for November expenses because he is no longer welcome, and we changed the Internet password. Now he's sending us text threats about civil code 789. He might have also overheard our talks to change the locks. The landlord seems to agree that he is not a tenant, but what if he's "established residency"?

There are all kinds of witnesses to this stuff. But he gets his mail here so we're afraid he'll flash it to prove he's a tenant even though he's not when the cops come to get him. I've thought of having 911 on hand before trying to talk him, but because of his military background I'm actually afraid that he'll go ballistic and try to snap my neck if he figures out what's going on. On the legal end, we're afraid that he'll get VA representation if we make some kind of mistake or even if he just spins something up.

What on earth do we do? None of us want to break any laws or get sued, but we also don't want to get hurt! Should we get a restraining order? Is there a succinct thing I can tell the cops even though he's just holed up in his room and avoiding everyone now? Is it really going to take months?

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In July, I moved into a four bedroom house with three friends and signed the lease. A month later, we let a friend's relative, dealing with family issues, use our small spare room until he could find his own place, if he helped with expenses. We didn't put him on the lease, considering him a guest. But when he actually showed up, he showed up with a moving truck full of his own stuff and took over the house.

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do you always charge your guests rent?


He is your tenant. You must treat him as a tenant and terminate his tenancy and, if he fails to leave voluntarily, file an unlawful detainer seeking to have him evicted.

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Everybody is afraid he'll do something crazy if we talk to him.

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I suspect if nobody talks to him is isn;'t going to get any better. He'll just keep living there and you all will just keep on hiding. It could go on forever.

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We went to the courthouse and they wanted us to give him an "official" 30 day notice -- ANOTHER one! -- and begin eviction process, which costs hundreds of dollars and takes months.

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and you are surprised they told you you must follow the laws when evicting him? Gee, what a surprise.

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All we've done since October is refused to accept his money for November expenses because he is no longer welcome,

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and? Until you take proper action to evict him, sounds like he has a great deal with that free rent and all.

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The landlord seems to agree that he is not a tenant, but what if he's "established residency"?

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he isn't your landlords tenant. He is YOUR tenant, and yes, he has established residency. He did that the minute he moved in since you treated him as a tenant and not a guest.

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But he gets his mail here so we're afraid he'll flash it to prove he's a tenant even though he's not when the cops come to get him.

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again, he IS A TENANT. Treat him as such or he simply will never have to leave.

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What on earth do we do?

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one more time:

give him a legally proper notice to terminate the tenancy. If he does not leave at the expiration of the 30 days, file an unlawful detainer and seek to have him evicted.

I would have suggested you file a 3 day (or 7 day or whatever your state requires) notice to pay or quit since he hasn't paid this months rent but since you actually refused it, you kind of shot yourself in the foot on that one.

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Is there a succinct thing I can tell the cops even though he's just holed up in his room and avoiding everyone now?

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You can tell the cops anything you want but if the guy is not an actual threat, they cannot do anything about it.

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Is it really going to take months?

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the way you are going, it may never end. Nothing happens until you start following the laws to terminate his tenancy and then evict him if necessary.

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He is your tenant. You must treat him as a tenant and terminate his tenancy and, if he fails to leave voluntarily, file an unlawful detainer seeking to have him evicted.

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Concur. There is a right way to do this, and a wrong way, and you've unfortunately been proceeding in the wrong way.

When he didn't leave at the end of the first 30 day notice period, you needed to go down to the courthouse and file an unlawful detainer action. Since you didn't, you'll have to start all over again from jump - and yes, that means another 30 day notice, then IMMEDIATE action if he does not leave.

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Now he's sending us text threats about civil code 789.

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"Threats"? Read the code here.

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He might have also overheard our talks to change the locks.

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You cannot do this. This is called a "self-help" eviction, and it is illegal. If you do that, you will hold up the legal eviction process - meaning you'll have to start over AGAIN - and he can sue you for damages. That, incidentally, is what 789 is about.

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But he gets his mail here so we're afraid he'll flash it to prove he's a tenant even though he's not when the cops come to get him.

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...except that he IS a tenant. You've accepted money from him and he gets mail there - getting mail is one of the primary ways one establishes that one is a TENANT of a given property.

If you want him out, you need to stop shilly-shallying around and do this the correct way. On December 1st, deliver another 30 day notice. (You need to do it by rental period, so you're stuck waiting now.) When he does not vacate, get down to the courthouse and get the show on the road. Yes, it might well take a couple months, but if you don't do this by the book, you're going to be stuck with him for far longer than that.

Read EVERYTHING here - all of the links out, too.

To Jk: Listen, although I admit that this must have been a satisfying post to respond to because of how boneheaded our approach must seem to you, is it actually necessary to be so condescending? Everything about your tone seems to assume that I am incapable of following advice, incapable of taking action, or am otherwise somehow blithering. If any of those things were true, I should think that I wouldn't have even bothered to ask the question. I asked in case somebody's more knowledgeable could provide additional perspective. Your perspective, ultimately, is simply the same as the courthouse, which none of us is so insipid as to think was wrong or bad advice, only that it requires commitment to a long process, and it is helpful to know whether, given the circumstances, it is actually the only one or whether there is something we missed. Not accepting any more money from this was simple stopgap to prevent the person in question from feeling entitled to being here if something in the law revealed that he was not. People charge guests for crashing on the couch all the time, and if such a person overstayed their welcome, it's can seem perfectly senseless to keep taking money from them. This guy is staying in what was essentially our storage room, so it was not intuitive to think of him as doing much more than couch crash when we let him stay here.

The difference between your advice and the courthouse clinic's is that yours is dripping with hostility and sarcasm. It's a shame to think that this is the cost you've incurred for having all the answers. All the same, thanks for taking the time.

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Thanks, LawResearchMonkey, the bit about the self-help eviction and receiving mail confirmed exactly what were afraid of and why we didn't move forward on it. Also, I read the code, and I think he's trying to say that he is entitled to Internet as an essential utility that he's being deprived of, but we surely can't get in trouble for THAT, right?

Also, thanks for the link, will definitely read all of that over.

Monkey, really? You have the nerve after asking for free help?

Were you raised by wolves??

Obviously not, canines have better manners.

Wel

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What did you want? You had already been told what you needed to do yet you continued to deny you have a tenant and must deal with the accordingly. Now, either do what you must do as a landlord or continue to be stuck with the guy that is scaring the bejesus out of you.

LawResearchMonkey? I think you've had all the help you're going to get here.

If you decide to move this question to another forum, please be aware that many of us post on multiple forums.

You are of course referring to the internet, his use of which was agreed to in your contract? Do I really need to answer that?

Ack, by my honor, LawResearchMissy, the LawResearchMonkey thing was a typo! I'm so, so sorry, I totally misread your handle when I went to include it in my reply. Your response was very helpful. I've already been communicating everyone else why we have to consider him a tenant.

I DID think jk's reply condescending, but I never in a million years would have stooped to making up schoolyard names. Not asking for an unban, but I just couldn't stand by and let someone think that there was another troll in the world.

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Disagreeable: I suppose I don't really know how verbal contracts work. We all pay our share of utilities and Internet and what we consider to be a fair amount for the size of our room, but as we didn't ask him for internet expenses this month, we didn't think him entitled to them. Was there a tacit contract we need to think about? I'm sorry if I seem to be asking dumb questions about this, but though I've been reading around, how it all actually works can be confusing.

Why even consider antagonizing him with the Internet issue? Just let him use it to avoid any additional hassle and terminate his tenancy as required including eviction if necessary.

no need to give the guy that freaks you out any more reason to be pissed at you since it isn't costing you anything extra anyway.

and if you think me a troll, feel free to act in direct contrast to what I suggest. It isn't my fear he will be snapping my neck