How to show an occupied apartment building to buyers

What Civil Code section 1954 allows

You can show an occupied unit to buyers. Civil Code section 1954 lists the reasons a landlord may enter a dwelling unit, and one of them is to exhibit it to prospective or actual purchasers. The same clause covers mortgage lenders, prospective tenants, workers and contractors. Treat the buyer's inspection and the lender's appraisal as entries under the same rules, and give the same notice for them.

Every entry of this kind has the same conditions:

• The notice is in writing and gives the date, the approximate time and the purpose of the entry.
• The entry happens during normal business hours.
• Twenty-four hours' notice is presumed reasonable unless there is evidence it was not.
• A notice sent by mail is presumed reasonable if it goes out at least six days before the entry.

The 24-hour presumption is a default, and a tenant can rebut it with evidence. A tenant who works nights, or who has told you before that a day's notice is not enough, has something to point to. Giving more notice than the minimum costs you little and takes the argument away.

Phone notice once tenants know the property is for sale

Section 1954 has a rule written for sales. If you or your agent notify the tenant in writing that the property is for sale, and that you may contact them orally to arrange showings, you can give later showing notices in person or by phone. The written notice has to have been given within 120 days of the oral one.

That rule shapes how a listing should run:

• Send the written sale notice at the start, before the first showing, so every later call is covered.
• Track the date. If the listing runs past 120 days, send a fresh written notice before you rely on phone notice again.
• Give the date, approximate time and purpose on every call, just as a written notice would.
• Leave written evidence of the entry inside the unit each time. A dated card on the counter, naming who came in and why, is one simple way to do it.

What Los Angeles adds

In the City of Los Angeles, the Tenant Anti-Harassment Ordinance turns careless access into a legal problem. LAMC section 45.33 defines harassment as a landlord's bad faith conduct aimed at a tenant that causes the tenant harm, and bad faith includes reckless or grossly negligent conduct as well as willful acts. Abusing the right of access under section 1954 is on its list, and the ordinance says what that includes:

• entering or photographing parts of the unit beyond the scope of a lawful entry
• not stating the specific reason for the entry
• not reasonably coordinating the entry with the tenant's schedule
• misrepresenting the reason for the entry
• not giving an approximate time window, or giving one that is unreasonably long
• not telling the tenant in time when an entry is cancelled
• asking for entry too often without a reasonable justification

The penalties add up quickly in a building with many showings. Under LAMC section 45.35, a tenant who wins a harassment case is awarded civil penalties of $2,000 to $10,000 per violation, depending on severity, plus three times compensatory damages, rent refunds and attorney's fees. The court can add up to $5,000 per violation if the tenant was older than 65 or disabled.

State law has its own penalty. Under Civil Code section 1940.2, a landlord who commits a significant and intentional violation of section 1954 to influence a tenant to move out faces a civil penalty of up to $2,000 for each violation, and a tenant can bring that claim in small claims court.

A showing schedule tenants can live with

These rules are easier to keep with a plan than one showing at a time. Here is one order that keeps the number of entries low:

1. Show what you can without entering anyone's home. The exterior, the common areas, the roof, the meters, the laundry and storage rooms, and any vacant unit tell a buyer a lot before anyone knocks on a tenant's door.
2. Save occupied units for buyers who have committed. One approach is to open them only after you accept an offer, during the buyer's inspection period, so each tenant hosts one or two visits rather than a dozen.
3. Group visits. One window per unit, with every interested party seen in that window, is better for the tenant than a string of separate entries.
4. Keep windows narrow, such as an hour, and name the hour. The ordinance counts an unreasonably long window as abuse of access.
5. Ask each tenant which days and hours work, and write down the answer. Coordinating with the tenant's schedule is part of the ordinance's test.
6. If a showing is cancelled, tell the tenant right away.
7. Have your agent at every entry, keep the group small, and stay out of closets, drawers and personal belongings.
8. Take interior photos only with the tenant's permission, and say in the notice that photos are part of the visit.

What an owner may not do

A showing is not a tool for moving a tenant out, and both state law and the City's ordinance reach showings used to push a tenant toward the door. These are the lines to stay behind:

• Do not enter for a showing without written notice, or on phone notice without a written sale notice from the last 120 days.
• Do not enter for a showing outside normal business hours.
• Do not state one purpose and use the visit for another.
• Do not schedule entries so often that they wear a tenant down, and do not use them to pressure a tenant to leave. Section 1940.2 and the City's ordinance both reach that conduct.
• Do not offer a tenant in an RSO unit money to leave, during a showing or at any other time, before giving LAHD's disclosure notice under the Tenant Buyout Notification Program. The ordinance lists that offer as harassment, and the tenant buyouts page covers the steps.
• Do not threaten a tenant who objects to a showing.

If a tenant refuses a properly noticed showing, write down what happened and talk to a landlord-tenant attorney before you respond. Shaya is a real estate agent, not an attorney, and a refusal is a legal question rather than a sales one. In the meantime, keep showing the parts of the building you can reach without that unit.