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Working
For Justice In Housing
TENANTS,
OCCUPANTS, ROOMERS, GUESTS OR TRESPASSERS - KNOW YOUR RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES
Tenants,
roomers, guests and trespassers, all are involved in living in someone
else’s property. Eventually,
an owner or legal occupant may face refusal to leave by someone they have
allowed to live in the premises. All
parties need to know their rights and responsibilities.
- Tenants
are individuals who rent facilities that usually contain living and
sleeping areas, bathrooms and especially a kitchen and cooking
facilities. These include
people who sublet half an apartment from another tenant or half the
house from an owner who remains an occupant as long as the subletting
tenant has full use of all facilities except the bedroom of his
landlord. In Baltimore
City, except in special circumstances, tenants have to be given a
minimum 60 day notice that runs with the rent cycle* before the day
that they are to leave. (The
tenant has to give the landlord a minimum of 30 days notice that runs
with the rent cycle). In
Maryland counties, a week’s tenancy requires a minimum of a week’s
notice that runs with the rent cycle and a monthly tenancy requires a
minimum of a month’s notice that runs with the rent cycle
by either tenant or landlord.
If the tenant refuses to leave at the end of the notice, then
the landlord has to refuse future rent and file a Tenant Holding Over
action with District Court.
“That runs with
the rent cycle” is best explained by example.
If for example, the tenant pays rent on the 1st of
each month and the landlord wants to give the tenant notice a sixty
day notice to move and the date the landlord decides to give the
notice is March 3rd, the landlord must give the tenant
notice to move by May 31st.
This allows the tenant sixty days within his rent cycle.
The rent cycle in this case is from the 1st day of
the month until the last day of the month.
The landlord’s notice would be improper if it was for sixty
days beginning March 3rd since the sixty days would end
within the tenant’s rent cycle.
- Occupants
live with tenants but are not responsible to the landlord for rent.
However, if the tenants fail to pay the rent, the landlord has
the same right to evict the occupants as he does the tenants.
Likewise, occupants are obligated to abide by the provisions of
the tenants’ lease. Occupants
are often named in a written lease.
A written lease will often limit occupancy of a leased premises
to the tenants and those listed as occupants in the lease.
Occupants are often the minor children of the tenants and may
also be non-tenant roommates.
- A
roomer is defined as someone having a non-housekeeping room, i.e.,
without cooking facilities. He
may have very limited kitchen/living room privileges, etc., outside
his room. Baltimore City
law defines a roomer as a kind of tenant in that it requires a roomer
to be given At least a 30 day notice to quit that runs with the rent
cycle. Some of our
lawyers believe that outside Baltimore City, a roomer has the right to
stay in the property only until the rent is consumed and then may be
told to leave immediately or be considered as trespasser.
However, some branches of the District Court seem to consider a
roomer to be a tenant requiring proper notice, and the filing of a
Tenant Holding Over action if the roomer refuses to leave.
So check with you local court.
- A
guest may be a visitor or a family member of the owner who has entered
the premises with the owner or tenant’s permission.
The guest may occasionally share minor expenses, but they do
not pay rent. If the
guest refuses to leave when asked, then the owner or tenant may seek
to evict him by filing a civil action called a Wrongful Detainer with
the District Court alleging that he is the rightful occupant of the
premises and that the defendant refuses to leave.
- A
squatter or trespasser is someone who enters the premises without the
permission of the legal occupant or the owner. This
situation comes up primarily when a legal tenant shares the premises
by subletting to another tenant.
Then the original tenant either leaves voluntarily or is
evicted. The subletting
tenant, while having had a claim in the legal tenant, has no such
claim on the owner of the property.
The owner can consider the subtenant a trespasser if the
subtenant attempts to stay in the property.
The owner may file a Wrongful Detainer action in District Court
for repossession of the property stating that the occupant is a
trespasser.
No
one should attempt an eviction by taking the law into his or her own hands
and evicting someone without using the proper legal process.
If they do, they may be sued for damages and in some jurisdictions
may receive a fine and/or imprisonment.
Click
here to see what Maryland law says about Roomers
Click
here to see what Maryland law says about House Guests and Squatters
Legally Reviewed
- BNI. Last Update - March 2001
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