My question involves landlord-tenant law in the State of: California
Hi, thank you for reading my thread and I appreciate all the advice you can give me.
A girlfriend and I agreed to move in together since I was moving into a new place and her lease was ending soon. I was going to pay the entire year lease upfront and she was going to pay me directly her portion of the rent. The rent is $5,500 a month and she agreed to pay me $2,000 total (no utilities), a month because that's all she could afford. We both signed the lease and she paid me $2,000 at the first of each month in the form of a personal check.
After 8 months of living together she asked me if she could have some slack on the rent for a little bit since she wasn't working. (EXTRA INFO: She was living off of her 401k and waiting for her dream job to hire her. She is in the entertainment industry and said that getting a "regular" job was beneath her). I said ok and she said that she would land her dream job soon and would be able to pay her portion of the rent as well as what she owed me soon.
After 6 months had past the lease was ending and I decided I was going to stay so I paid for the entire term of the lease (1 year), upfront. I was out of the country when the new lease needed to be signed so she signed the lease. During those 6 months from the time she came to me asking for some slack to the time the new lease was signed she had only paid me rent ($2,000), with a check one time and she paid me smaller partial payments a few months also ($500 one time and another time $1,000)
After the 7th month of her not being able to pay I asked her to move out. I told her she could have 2 months to move out which I thought was a nice gesture (she apparently did not share the same viewpoint as I did).
In the following 2 months she paid me rent ($2,000) in the form of a check. After she moved out I sent her multiple texts about what she planned to do about paying me back and she kept putting it off saying she would in a few months. Once another month had past I emailed her about it again and told her that I could really use the money and it would be appreciated if some sort of payment plan could be worked out since the amount she owed me was a lot. She disagreed with me saying it was a very small amount closer to somewhere around $2,000 or so (anyone who can do simple math can clearly see that this number is off by leaps and bounds). We went back and forth with a few emails until she became rude and our friendship ended.
I then took the time to collect all my banking statements and deposit history and put together a very detailed account of what I see on my end as far as rent owed. I sent her an email with the breakdown for each month and included copies of checks I had received and any other documents to support my claim. In the email I asked her to let me know if she had any disagreements with my numbers and if she did I asked her to please provide proof of any kind to support or validate her reasoning. I told her that I know she paid me partial payments a couple months and if she could print out bank statements showing those withdrawals that would be great. I told her we need to agree on a number so a payment plan can be put into action. She responded with a very angry email saying that she paid me in cash for most of the months and that my number was ridiculous and laughable. I responded by saying that she has a right to her own opinion but would need to provide proof of her reasoning.
She later emailed me saying that she was only going to pay me $2,500 and that she wasn't going to pay for the last 2 month she lived there after I asked her to move out. She said that by just checking the last 6 months of withdrawal history she showed making withdrawals of $2,000 at the beginning of one month (a month I was out of the country), as well as another time for $1,500 (which was a withdrawal made in the middle of the month and not at the beginning of the month when rent is usually due).
Since the time she asked me if she could have some slack on rent to the time she moved out is 9 months total. Let's just say for the fun of it she paid full rent for 4 of those months, that leaves 5 months unpaid 5x$2000=$10,000. I'm not going to just sit by and let her get away with screwing me out of that kind of money so I'm taking her to small claims court. *I'm concerned though that she is going to bring in banking statements showing withdrawals and claim that the money she took out was to pay rent with. My question is: can that happen and what can I do/say/show to make sure I win the suit? And what are the problems that may I have? Once she moved out the lease was changed to only having my name on the lease, but I do have the other copies with her name on the lease from before she moved out.
*I went through my banking statements and I have no history of cash deposits for that time period besides once with had nothing to do with her.
Sorry for the long novel and I appreciate you reading it. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

