Facts
- Adria Adams leased a residential apartment from Re/Max Property Management (Re/Max) for a 12-month term at $625 per month and paid a $625 security deposit.
- The written lease included a holdover/month-to-month provision stating that if Adams remained after the fixed term, the tenancy would continue on a month-to-month basis and either party had to give 30 days’ notice to terminate.
- After the initial term, Adams renewed for another 12 months, with the renewed term ending March 31, 2017.
- On March 9, 2017, Re/Max sent Adams a renewal letter offering four choices: renew for 12 months, renew for six months, convert to month-to-month, or give written notice and vacate.
- The renewal letter did not state a deadline by which Adams had to select an option or give notice to move out.
- Adams stayed past March 31, 2017. On April 26, 2017, she told Re/Max she would vacate on May 1, 2017.
- Adams returned the keys on April 29, 2017.
- Re/Max treated Adams’s notice as too short under the lease’s 30-day notice requirement and refused to return the $625 security deposit.
- Adams sued Re/Max seeking return of the deposit.
- The trial court ruled for Adams, reasoning that because Re/Max’s renewal letter lacked a response deadline, Adams was not required to provide 30 days’ notice to terminate the month-to-month tenancy.
- Re/Max appealed.
Issues
- Whether the lease’s 30-day notice requirement applied when Adams remained in possession after the renewed fixed term and then sought to terminate a month-to-month tenancy.
- Whether Re/Max’s renewal letter—by offering renewal options without a response deadline—modified or waived the lease’s contractual 30-day notice requirement.
Decision
- The court of appeals reversed the trial court and remanded for further proceedings.
- The appellate court held that the lease’s holdover/month-to-month provision governed once Adams remained after March 31, 2017, and the 30-day notice term applied to termination of the month-to-month tenancy.
- The appellate court rejected the trial court’s view that the renewal letter’s lack of a response deadline excused the lease’s notice requirement.
- Because Adams gave only a few days’ notice before moving out, the dispute over the security deposit had to be evaluated using the lease’s continuing 30-day notice obligation rather than the trial court’s “no deadline, no notice” theory.
Legal Principles
- A residential lease is a contract, and clear termination-notice terms are applied as written.
- When a tenant remains in possession after a fixed lease term under a holdover clause creating a month-to-month tenancy, termination of that tenancy is governed by the contract’s notice requirement.
- A later communication about renewal options does not change an existing lease term unless it clearly shows an agreement to modify the lease or a clear waiver of the contractual right.
- The absence of a response deadline in a renewal letter, without more, does not cancel an agreed 30-day notice-to-terminate provision tied to a month-to-month holdover tenancy.
Conclusion
The Ohio appellate court reversed the judgment awarding Adams her security deposit because the lease’s holdover clause required 30 days’ notice to end a month-to-month tenancy after the renewed term expired, and Re/Max’s renewal letter—though it did not include a reply deadline—did not change or waive that contractual notice requirement; the case was remanded for further proceedings consistent with that interpretation.