LANDLORD’S GUIDE TO NONPAYMENT SUMMARY PROCEEDINGS

Page 3 of the Non-Payment Manual

Before Starting a Nonpayment Summary Proceeding 

(the text of the page, with suggestions in Italics)

What to do Before Starting a Nonpayment Summary Proceeding

Before starting a Nonpayment SummaryProceeding, a landlord must ask the tenant to pay the past due rent. This is called making a Demand for the rent. There are two types of “demands.” As a landlord, you are allowed to use either one:

   • Oral Demand. You may speak to the tenant in person and ask for the past due rent. If the tenant does not pay after you have made the Oral Demand, you can begin the Nonpayment Summary Proceeding immediately.

I do not recommend that you make this oral demand. The trial could easily degrade into a “he said she said” scenario. While the spoken demand is upheld as being legal, its far easier for court purposes to have the written demand. The spoken demand will probably not save you much time in the eviction process.


• Written Demand. You may provide the tenant a written notice demanding that the tenant pay the rent or leave the rental property. A Written Demand must be given to the tenant in the same way as the Notice of Petition and Petition. See pages 4 and 5 of this booklet for the rules on delivering or “serving” court papers. You are not allowed to give the tenant a Written Demand yourself.

If you make a Written Demand, you must allow three days for the tenant to pay the rent. If the rent is not paid after the three days, you may begin the Nonpayment Summary Proceeding. (The three days will not include weekends or holidays. It must be three business days. Example, tenants were served with a 3 day notice on Tuesday the 2nd. The three days included Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. The soonest I could file in court if they did not pay would be the Monday following. I also recommend using a process server. I will find local process servers that can be contacted and post them on this blogsite.)

If you accept a partial rental payment from the tenant after you have made a Demand, you must make a new demand for the correct amount due before beginning a Nonpayment Summary Proceeding. If the tenant pays the entire amount of past due rent, you may not bring a Nonpayment Summary Proceeding. (You do not have to accept a partial payment. If you do it could end up with more paperwork and running around than you’d want to do.)

(Also, if the TENANT pays the entire amount of the rent due when you get to court, they will not be evicted. This is why its important to amend the amount due if the court date goes into the next month.

For my own recent experience (updates as available) please go to this page: Me vs Them