How does a Washington landlord lawfully end a tenancy, and when may a tenant leave early?

Landlord: no no-cause period exists, because a landlord must have a reason to end a covered tenancy. Tenant: 20 days.

The tenant's 20 days run backward from the end of a rental period: the written notice must be given 20 days or more before the end of one of the months or periods of the tenancy, so the tenancy ends on a period boundary and a notice given too late takes effect at the end of the following period. The landlord's periods are counted the other way. Each ground carries its own figure and, for the grounds that state it, the notice names a date at least that many days after it is served, so the tenancy can end on any day. One ground stacks two anchors: on a fourth cured violation in 12 months the tenancy ends on the later of the end date of the rental term or a date not less than 60 days after the notice was delivered. A mailed notice adds five days before the landlord may go to court on it.

The termination date must fall on a rental-period boundary or a rent-due date.

Tiers: The landlord's period is fixed by the ground, not by the tenancy. Three days for waste, nuisance, unlawful activity or substantial interference with other tenants. Ten days for a substantial breach of a material lease term or of a subsidized-housing program requirement. Fourteen days for unpaid rent. Twenty days where the unit shares a kitchen or bathroom with the owner or lessor, and 20 days for unwanted sexual advances or sexual harassment directed at the owner, a manager, an employee or another tenant. Thirty days where the premises are certified or condemned as uninhabitable, or as much advance notice as is possible where the agency's order allows less; 30 days on the end of a transitional-housing program; and 30 days for an intentional, knowing and material misrepresentation on the rental application. Sixty days for a legitimate economic or business reason, for a fourth violation cured after written warning in the preceding 12 months, and where the tenant must register as a sex offender during the tenancy or failed to disclose that duty. Ninety days for an owner or immediate-family move-in and 90 days where the owner elects to sell a single-family residence. One hundred twenty days for demolition, substantial rehabilitation or a change of use, and 120 days for a withdrawal to pursue a condominium conversion. Two further landlord notices sit in RCW 59.18.200: 90 days before a change to a policy of excluding children, and the 120 days for the conversion and demolition grounds. The only periods that are not keyed to a ground are the two 60-day no-cause windows at the end of an initial fixed term, which are open only where the initial agreement ran between six and 12 months, or 12 months or more, and are closed for good once the tenancy has been periodic at any point.

A lease may not change the period. Waiver is barred in both directions and the bar is chapter-wide. RCW 59.18.230, subsection (1)(a), makes any provision of a lease or other agreement, oral or written, waiving a section or subsection of the residential act unenforceable as against public policy, except as RCW 59.18.360 allows. RCW 59.18.360's list reaches only RCW 59.18.060, .100, .110, .120, .130 and .190, so the notice section, the fixed-term section, the mitigation section and the just-cause section cannot be contracted around. A lease may not shorten the tenant's 20 days, and it may not create a landlord ground the statute does not give.

Source of the period: it depends on the ground for termination.

Washington is deeply asymmetric. A tenant ends a month-to-month or other periodic tenancy by written notice of 20 days or more preceding the end of one of the months or periods of the tenancy; the same 20 days covers a weekly tenancy, because the section reaches every tenancy from period to period on which rent is payable and the chapter states no separate weekly figure. A landlord may not end a periodic tenancy at all without one of the sixteen grounds RCW 59.18.650, subsection (2), lists, and each ground carries the period set out in the table above, so there is no landlord figure that answers the question for a month-to-month tenancy. Every landlord notice must be served in the manner RCW 59.12.040 prescribes and must identify the facts supporting the ground with enough specificity for the tenant to prepare a defense. A tenant who is a member of the armed forces, or that tenant's spouse or dependent, may end a periodic tenancy on less than 20 days' notice where permanent-change-of-station or deployment orders do not allow 20. Tenancies from year to year are abolished in Washington except where an express written contract creates one.

Yes: a statute bars no-cause termination or non-renewal for covered tenancies across the state once its coverage conditions are met.

How a tenancy comes inside the rule: the landlord-tenant statute itself defines coverage.

Who is covered: Every tenancy inside chapter 59.18 RCW is covered. There is no tenancy-length threshold, no building-age or building-size exemption, no limit to subsidized housing and no locality opt-in. What sits outside the ground requirement is what sits outside the chapter: a lease of a single-family dwelling for a year or more, or a lease with a bona fide purchase option, where the tenant's attorney approves the exemption on the face of the agreement, and the living arrangements RCW 59.18.040 excludes. One condition inside the section turns on the tenancy's own history: the 60-day no-cause route at the end of a specified period is unavailable if the tenancy has been for an indefinite period on a month-to-month or periodic basis at any point since it began, so once a tenancy has ever run month to month that route is gone permanently.

No-fault grounds: Eight of the sixteen grounds require no fault by the tenant. An owner or a member of the owner's immediate family intends to occupy the unit, on 90 days' notice, with a rebuttable presumption of bad faith if the occupancy does not last at least 60 consecutive days during the 90 days after the tenant left. The owner elects to sell a single-family residence, on 90 days' notice, where the owner makes reasonable attempts to sell within 30 days after the tenant vacates, at minimum by listing at a reasonable price with an agency or on the multiple listing service. Demolition, substantial rehabilitation or a change of use, on 120 days' notice, each defined in RCW 59.18.200 and each requiring that the work displace the tenant. Withdrawal to pursue a condominium conversion, on 120 days' notice. Premises certified or condemned as uninhabitable, on 30 days' notice or as much notice as the agency's order allows. The end of a transitional-housing program, on 30 days' notice. A unit sharing a kitchen or bathroom with the owner or lessor, on 20 days' notice. And a legitimate economic or business reason, on 60 days' notice, where the court may stay the writ up to 60 further days for good cause on condition that rent keeps being paid. The two 60-day windows at the end of an initial fixed term are the only exits requiring no ground at all.

Relocation payment: No ground in RCW 59.18.650, subsection (2), carries a state relocation payment. Relocation assistance is a local option instead. RCW 59.18.440 lets a city, town, county or municipal corporation that plans under the state's growth-management law require owners, after public notice and a hearing, to pay their portion of reasonable relocation assistance to low-income tenants displaced by demolition, substantial rehabilitation, a change of use, or the removal of use restrictions in an assisted-housing development, and in the same sentence bars any local relocation requirement outside that authorization or outside state or federal law. The limits are stated: low-income means combined household income at or below 50 percent of the county median adjusted for family size; the assistance may not exceed $2,000 for each dwelling unit displaced, adjustable for inflation; and the owner's portion may not exceed one-half of it, in cash or services, with the jurisdiction paying the rest. A jurisdiction that has created such a program and otherwise gives 120 days' notice is outside the 120-day notice requirement. A separate duty on a landlord who knew or should have known of the code conditions leading to condemnation is covered on the habitability page.

Local ordinances: an appellate decision settles the question; no statute is on point. No section of chapter 59.18 RCW preempts local just-cause or eviction ordinances, authorizes them, or addresses them at all; the answer comes from a decision instead. In Valley Cities Counseling & Consultation v. Eddines the Court of Appeals held a city ordinance preempted by conflict because it categorically forbade what state law permits, leaving a transitional-housing landlord no way to end a tenancy on a ground the state statute expressly grants. A local ordinance may add protections on top of the state grounds; it may not take one away. The court decided conflict preemption only and distinguished ordinances imposing a merely temporary bar, where the passage of time or some action by the landlord will still let the case proceed, as capable of standing beside the statute. The rent axis is separate and much clearer: local rent control is expressly preempted for cities and towns by RCW 35.21.830 and for counties by RCW 36.01.130, and state law now sets the rent-increase limits itself. That posture belongs to the rent-increase page.

A landlord may not evict a tenant, refuse to continue a tenancy, or end a periodic tenancy except for the causes RCW 59.18.650, subsection (2), lists. There are sixteen of them and each carries its own notice period. Refusing to renew is one of the three barred acts, so a notice of non-renewal is a termination notice and must carry a ground. Only two exits require no ground, both at the end of an initial fixed term and both on at least 60 days' written notice: where the parties entered into an initial agreement of between six and 12 months, the landlord may end the tenancy at the end of that initial period; and where the initial agreement ran 12 months or more, or successive uninterrupted agreements of six months or more, the landlord may give notice that the tenancy will be deemed expired at the end of the specified period. Neither is open if the tenancy has been periodic at any point since it began. A landlord may not use the move-in, sale or demolition grounds to cut a fixed term short before it ends unless both sides consent in writing and the tenant is given at least 60 days to leave. A tenant removed in violation of the section recovers the greater of economic and non-economic damages or three times the monthly rent, with reasonable attorneys' fees and costs.

A statute requires notice before a fixed term ends, or notice of non-renewal (60 days).

A Washington fixed term does not expire on its own date. RCW 59.18.220, subsection (1), says a tenancy for a specified time is deemed expired at the end of that time only upon notice consistent with the just-cause section, served in the manner RCW 59.12.040 prescribes. In practice that means either a listed ground with its own period, or one of two 60-day no-cause windows. The first is open where the parties entered into an initial agreement of between six and 12 months: the landlord gives at least 60 days' written notice before the end of that initial period ending the tenancy. The second is open where the initial agreement ran 12 months or more, or where successive uninterrupted agreements of six months or more have run since the tenancy began: the landlord gives at least 60 days' written notice, before the end of the specified period, stating that the tenancy will be deemed expired at the end of it. The second window is closed entirely if the tenancy has been month-to-month or periodic at any point since it began. A tenant ends a fixed term by written notice not less than 20 days before its ending date.

After the term, a statute supplies what a holdover becomes. Where no qualifying notice is given, the statute converts the tenancy: upon the end date of a tenancy of a specified period, the tenancy becomes a month-to-month tenancy. The conversion does not wait on the tenant holding over, on the landlord accepting rent, or on any election by either side, and once it happens the landlord needs a ground to end the tenancy like any other. Because almost every expired term becomes periodic this way, the ground aimed at a tenant who stays after expiry without signing a proffered new agreement reaches very few tenancies: it does not apply to a tenancy that is or has become periodic.

A fixed term expires only on a notice consistent with the just-cause section, served in the manner the unlawful-detainer chapter prescribes; without one the tenancy becomes month-to-month by operation of statute on the end date. The landlord's two no-cause routes both need 60 days' written notice and both depend on the length and history of the tenancy. The tenant's route is 20 days' written notice before the ending date. Washington has no statute requiring a landlord to remind a tenant before an automatic-renewal clause takes effect, and no statute requiring any other notice of non-renewal: non-renewal is inside the ground requirement, because refusing to continue a tenancy is one of the things a landlord may not do without cause.

Because an expired specified term becomes a month-to-month tenancy by statute, a Washington tenant who stays past the end date is usually still a tenant rather than a holdover. A true holdover arises only once the tenancy has actually been ended, and it is unlawful for the tenant to hold over or to shut the landlord out after termination except under a court order authorizing it. Even then the landlord takes possession through the court; the landlord's remedy is a case for possession and damages, not self-help.

Damages: There is no holdover-rent multiple in Washington, and the exclusion is express rather than inferred: RCW 59.18.420 makes the unlawful-detainer double-damages section inapplicable to any rental agreement under the residential act. A landlord deprived of possession recovers possession and the damages actually sustained, and the prevailing party recovers costs and reasonable attorneys' fees. Two limits sit on the fee award against a tenant: no fees where the judgment for possession is entered after the tenant failed to respond to a pleading or notice requiring a response, and none where the total rent awarded is equal to or less than two months of the tenant's monthly contract rent or $1,200, whichever is greater. One statutory ground reaches a tenant who stays after a fixed term without signing a new agreement the landlord offered at least 30 days before expiration on reasonable terms, but it does not apply to a tenancy that is or has become periodic.

Yes: a statute imposes the duty.

When it attaches: The duty attaches when the landlord learns of the abandonment. The statute's proviso is that upon learning of the abandonment of the premises the landlord shall make a reasonable effort to mitigate the damages resulting from it, and abandonment in this sense means the tenant has defaulted in rent and has reasonably indicated by words or actions an intention not to resume the tenancy.

Burden of proof: no authority allocates it.

The standard: A reasonable effort to mitigate the damages resulting from the abandonment. The statute does not define the effort, and no Washington appellate decision says what it takes. What the departing tenant owes is capped in the same section. On a month-to-month tenancy the tenant is liable for the rent for the 30 days following the earlier of the day the landlord learned of the abandonment or the day the next regular rent payment would have come due. On a term longer than month-to-month the tenant is liable for the lesser of two figures: the entire rent due for the remainder of the term, or all rent accruing during the period reasonably necessary to re-rent at a fair rental plus the difference between that fair rental and the rent the tenant had agreed to, plus the landlord's actual costs of re-renting, statutory court costs and reasonable attorneys' fees.

A lease clause accelerating all remaining rent is enforceable only with an offset for re-letting or another limit.

The lease may not waive the duty.

Washington imposes the duty by statute. RCW 59.18.310, subsection (1), makes a tenant who defaults in rent and indicates an intention not to resume the tenancy liable on the terms above, subject to the proviso that the landlord must make a reasonable effort to mitigate on learning of the abandonment. Neither the statute nor any Washington appellate decision says which side must prove that reasonable efforts were or were not made, so that allocation is open. No section of the residential act mentions a lease clause accelerating the remaining rent, but the structure limits one: on a term longer than month to month the tenant owes the lesser of the whole remaining rent or the mitigated measure, so a landlord who could reasonably have re-rented cannot collect the accelerated remainder. The duty cannot be waived by lease, because the mitigation section is not among the six sections the parties may contract out of. The one appellate decision construing the section, Wright v. Miller, turns on attorneys' fees rather than on the standard: it holds that only the mitigated measure carries fees under the section, while a lease's own prevailing-party clause still supports them.

No statute addresses a fee a landlord may charge for ending a lease early; the general damages rules govern.

Cap on damages after an early departure: Washington caps what a departing tenant owes through the abandonment section rather than through a fee rule. On a month-to-month tenancy the exposure is 30 days' rent, counted from the earlier of the day the landlord learned of the abandonment or the day the next rent payment would have come due. On a longer term it is the lesser of the whole remaining rent or the rent accruing during the period reasonably necessary to re-rent at a fair rental, plus the shortfall between that rental and the agreed rent, plus the landlord's actual re-renting costs, court costs and fees. Those are ceilings on the landlord's recovery, not a price the tenant may pay to leave.

No Washington statute authorizes, caps or bars a fee for ending a residential lease early, so a lease term of that kind is left to the general damages and mitigation rules and to the ceilings just described. Two statutory limits sit near the question without being fee caps. A tenant who ends the lease as a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, unlawful harassment or stalking is entitled to the return of the full deposit notwithstanding any lease provision allowing forfeiture of a deposit for early termination, and a landlord who seeks reimbursement from the state landlord mitigation program may not then pursue that tenant for more than the amount of the deposit. The chapter's fee sections do not reach an early-termination charge: RCW 59.18.285 governs only how a nonrefundable fee must be labeled, and a fee the written agreement does not specify as nonrefundable is treated as a refundable deposit, while RCW 59.18.610 governs installment payment of deposits, nonrefundable fees and last month's rent and caps a hold fee at 25 percent of the first month's rent. The state's administrative rules were consulted as well: the only landlord-tenant chapter in the Department of Commerce's title concerns confidentiality in the landlord mitigation program and sets no fee of any kind.

Early-exit rights by ground: domestic violence and related grounds, a statutory right to end the lease; military service beyond the federal act, a spouse or dependent may terminate in their own right and termination takes effect sooner than under the federal act; death of the tenant, a statutory route; and other statutory grounds.

Domestic violence and related grounds: a victim may end the lease on notice.

Who qualifies: A tenant, or a household member other than the perpetrator, who is the victim of an act constituting a crime of domestic violence, sexual assault, unlawful harassment or stalking. The definitions come from RCW 59.18.570 and point out to the general protection-order and criminal statutes; unlawful harassment expressly includes a request for sexual favors from a tenant or household member in return for a change in, or performance of, any term of the lease. Household member means a child or adult living with the tenant other than the perpetrator. The statute states no relationship requirement and does not require that the act happened on the premises. Human trafficking is not a listed ground: a trafficking victim who is not also a victim of one of the four listed acts has no right to end the lease under this section, and no other Washington statute supplies one.

Separate schemes: Two routes run side by side. On the ordinary route the tenancy ends when the tenant makes the documentation available to the landlord. A separate route applies where the landlord is the perpetrator of sexual assault, stalking or unlawful harassment: there the tenant may quit first and deliver the documentation afterwards, by mail, fax or personal delivery by a third party, within seven days of quitting. Rent then stops on the later of the day the tenant vacates or the day the record and the written notice of vacating are delivered, with a pro rata refund of prepaid rent. That second route does not cover domestic violence by a landlord.

Documentation: Either of two things, and one is enough. A protection order: a domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking or antiharassment protection order under chapter 7.105 RCW, or a valid order under the named parentage, criminal-procedure or former harassment statutes. Or a written record of a report the tenant or household member made to a qualified third party acting in an official capacity, signed by that third party on the form printed in the statute and sworn by the tenant under penalty of perjury. Qualified third parties are law-enforcement officers, health-care providers regulated under chapter 18.120 RCW, employees of a state court, licensed mental-health professionals and other licensed counselors, trained advocates employed by crime victim and witness programs, and members of the clergy. No police report, criminal charge or court hearing is required. The record given to the tenant does not name the alleged perpetrator; the third party keeps a copy that does.

Window: 90 days; the tenant must give notice within that window after the incident. The request to end the rental agreement must come within 90 days of the reported act, event or circumstance that gave rise to the protection order or the report to a qualified third party. It is a deadline for the tenant to act rather than a limit on which incidents count, and the statute gives the landlord no power to extend or waive it.

Notice: none required; the tenant may leave at once. There is no waiting period. When a copy of a valid order for protection, or a written record of a report signed by a qualified third party, is made available to the landlord, the tenant may end the rental agreement and quit the premises without further obligation under the agreement or under the chapter. The ordinary 20-day tenant notice does not apply to a termination on this ground, and the statute sets no minimum lead time in its place.

Rent owed: The tenant is discharged from rent for any period following the last day of the month of the quitting date, and stays liable for the rent for the month in which the tenancy was ended, unless the termination is also made under the ordinary 20-day tenant notice. On the route for a tenant whose landlord is the perpetrator, rent stops on the later of the day the tenant vacates or the day the documentation and the written notice of vacating are delivered, and prepaid rent is refunded pro rata.

Cost to the tenant: Nothing. The statute allows no fee, penalty or liquidated charge for the termination, and the tenant is entitled to the return of the full deposit notwithstanding any lease provision allowing forfeiture of a deposit for early termination, subject only to the ordinary deposit rules.

Other tenants on the lease: the lease continues for the other tenants and the victim is released while the lease continues. Other tenants who are parties to the rental agreement are not released from their obligations, with one carve-out: household members who are themselves victims of the domestic violence, sexual assault, unlawful harassment or stalking are released. The same carve-out appears in the lock-change section, where a cotenant excluded by a court order stays liable under the agreement unless that cotenant is a household member who is a victim. The statute states no condition about the remaining tenants' ability to pay and requires no new screening or new lease.

Locks: The victim may require the landlord to change the locks. A tenant who has obtained a court order granting possession to the exclusion of one or more cotenants may ask the landlord to replace the lock or reconfigure it for a new key, at the tenant's expense; on being given a copy of the order the landlord must comply and must not give copies of the new keys to the person the order excludes, and a landlord who complies is held harmless. Where the landlord is the perpetrator of sexual assault, stalking or unlawful harassment, the tenant may instead change or add locks personally, at the tenant's expense, after delivering written notice within seven days together with the order or the third-party record. The tenancy then ends on the ninetieth day after that notice unless within 60 days the tenant tells the landlord otherwise or ends it sooner. After the lock change the landlord may not enter except in an emergency accompanied by law enforcement or fire officials, or on the ordinary entry notice stating the time, date and purpose; common-area locks may not be changed and keys must be made available to the other household members; and the keys go back to the landlord when the tenant leaves. Changing the locks does not by itself discharge the rent.

Later screening: more than one form of protection. RCW 59.18.580 runs two ways. A tenant screening service provider may not disclose a tenant's, applicant's or household member's status as a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking, and may not knowingly disclose that any of them previously ended a rental agreement as a victim. Separately, a landlord may not end a tenancy, fail to renew one, or refuse to enter into a rental agreement based on that status or on the fact that the tenant or applicant once ended a rental agreement on that ground. A violation supports an action for damages with attorneys' fees and is a defense to an unlawful detainer action. A decision resting on other lawful factors within the landlord's knowledge is untouched.

The landlord must keep the victim's documentation or status confidential.

Withdrawing the notice: On the route where the landlord is the perpetrator and the tenant changes the locks, the tenancy ends automatically on the ninetieth day after the tenant's notice, and the tenant may stop that by telling the landlord within 60 days that the tenancy is not to end. The statute states no way to withdraw an ordinary victim termination once the documentation has been made available to the landlord.

The landlord's side: The landlord may require the protection order or the signed third-party record before the tenancy ends, and may learn the alleged perpetrator's name only where that person meets the statute's own definition of landlord. The landlord's offset is the state landlord mitigation program: the qualified third party must confirm having told the tenant where information about that program can be found, and a landlord who seeks reimbursement from it gives up any recovery from the terminating tenant beyond the deposit. Taking the documentation does not waive the confidential or privileged character of the underlying communication, and no record or evidence obtained from the disclosure may be used against the victim in a civil, administrative or criminal proceeding without a written waiver of the privilege.

A tenant, or a household member who is not the perpetrator, who is the victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, unlawful harassment or stalking may end the tenancy by making available to the landlord either a valid protection order or a written record of a report signed by a qualified third party on the statutory form, so long as the request comes within 90 days of the incident. There is no waiting period and no charge: the tenancy ends, the tenant owes rent only through the month of quitting, and the full deposit comes back despite any lease clause forfeiting it for early termination. Other tenants on the lease stay bound unless they are victims themselves. A tenant holding a court order excluding a cotenant may require a lock change at the tenant's expense, and a tenant whose landlord is the perpetrator of sexual assault, stalking or unlawful harassment may change the locks personally or quit first and deliver the documentation within seven days. A screening service may not disclose the status or the past termination, and a landlord may not refuse, decline to renew or terminate because of either. Washington requires no lease notice telling tenants the right exists.

Military service: A spouse or dependent may terminate in their own right and termination takes effect sooner than under the federal act.

When the state rights attach: The rights sit in the residential act rather than in the military title, and they turn on the orders rather than on when the lease was signed. The fixed-term right requires written notice including a copy of the official military orders or a signed letter from the service member's commanding officer confirming one of the six listed triggers; most of them require a move of 35 miles or more from the rental premises, and temporary-duty or temporary-change-of-station orders must run not less than 90 days.

Washington adds materially to the federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, and it does so inside the residential act. A tenant who is a member of the armed forces, including the National Guard and the armed forces reserves, or that tenant's spouse or dependent, may end a rental agreement on less than 20 days' written notice where permanent-change-of-station or deployment orders do not allow a 20-day notice. The same people may end a tenancy for a specified time on written notice of 20 days or more, with the orders or a commanding officer's letter, on any of six triggers: permanent-change-of-station orders requiring a move of 35 miles or more from the premises; premature or involuntary discharge or release from active duty; release from active duty where the premises were leased while on active duty and are 35 miles or more from the home of record before entering active duty; a commanding officer's direction into government-provided housing after the agreement was entered into; temporary-duty, temporary-change-of-station or active-duty orders to an area 35 miles or more away for a period of not less than 90 days; and change-of-station orders 35 miles or more away received after the agreement but before taking possession. The state definition of permanent change of station reaches separation and retirement, which the federal act does not. Chapter 38.42 RCW, Washington's own service members' civil relief chapter, declares the federal act applicable in all the state's courts and makes a federal violation a state violation, but it creates no residential lease-termination right of its own: its contract-termination section reaches telecommunications, internet, health-studio and subscription-television contracts only.

Death of the tenant: A statute provides for ending the lease on the tenant's death. Where the tenant who dies was the sole occupant of the unit, RCW 59.18.595 ends the tenancy on a clock the landlord starts. On learning of the death the landlord must promptly mail or personally deliver written notice to any known personal representative, to a person the tenant designated, to a known emergency contact, to a known successor, and to the deceased tenant at the unit, and must also send it by email to any address the landlord knows is used for electronic messages. The notice must state that the tenancy will end 15 days from the date it is mailed or delivered, or the date through which rent is paid, whichever comes later, unless within that time a tenant representative arranges with the landlord to pay rent in advance for no more than 60 days from the date of death so that the tenant's property can be removed in an orderly way; at the end of the period paid for, the tenancy ends. A landlord who knowingly violates the section is liable to the estate for actual damages, with fees to the prevailing party, and a landlord who follows it is protected. Separately, RCW 59.18.590 lets a tenant name, in a signed writing separate from the rental agreement, a person authorized after the tenant's death to enter the unit, remove property, receive refunds and dispose of property consistent with the will or intestate succession; the designation lasts until the tenant revokes or replaces it and gives way once a personal representative or statutory successor appears. What happens to the property itself is covered separately from this page.

Other grounds: Four further statutory grounds let a Washington tenant leave. A tenant threatened by another tenant may end the tenancy on written notice, without further obligation and with prepaid rent refunded, where the threat was made with a firearm or other deadly weapon, the tenant who made it was arrested for the threatening behavior, and the landlord failed to file an unlawful detainer action against that tenant within seven calendar days after being notified of the arrest by a law-enforcement agency; the section does not require a landlord to end the other tenancy or to file the case. A tenant threatened by the landlord with a firearm or other deadly weapon may end the tenancy on the same terms where the threat led to the landlord's arrest. The victim provisions above include a route for a tenant whose landlord is the perpetrator of sexual assault, stalking or unlawful harassment. And where a tenant permanently leaves for reasons other than the landlord ending the tenancy, the landlord must serve a notice on any remaining occupant who had lived with that tenant for at least six months before the departure, requiring the occupant either to apply to become a party to the rental agreement or to leave within 30 days of service; the landlord may apply the same screening, background and financial criteria used for any prospective tenant, and once the occupant is admitted the tenancy may be ended only on a statutory ground. That succession rule does not reach tenants in subsidized housing. Washington has no care-facility, senior-housing, disability or job-transfer termination right. Ending a tenancy because the landlord will not make the unit habitable, and protection against retaliation, are covered on the habitability page.

Rent default plus stated conduct, such as removing belongings.

Washington has no absence clock and no notice of belief of abandonment. The test has two elements and both must be met: the tenant has defaulted in the payment of rent, and the tenant reasonably indicates by words or actions the intention not to resume the tenancy. There is no number of days, no presumption, and no procedure by which the tenant answers a notice. Where both elements are met the landlord may immediately enter and take possession of any of the tenant's property found on the premises and store it in a reasonably secure place, and from the moment the landlord learns of the abandonment the duty to make a reasonable effort to re-rent applies and the caps on what the departing tenant owes take effect. What the landlord must do with property left behind, including the notice to the last known address and the waiting periods before anything may be sold or disposed of, is covered separately from this page, as is the property of a tenant who has died.

Every termination notice under the residential act must be served in the manner RCW 59.12.040 prescribes, and that section is a three-step cascade. First, deliver a copy personally to the person entitled to it. If that person is absent from the premises, leave a copy there with some person of suitable age and discretion and send a copy through the mail to the person's place of residence. If the person is a tenant or an unlawful holder whose place of residence is not known, or if no person of suitable age and discretion can be found there, affix a copy in a conspicuous place on the premises, also deliver a copy to a person residing there if one can be found, and also send a copy through the mail addressed to the tenant at the premises. A rooming-house guest, lodger or boarder may be served by affixing the notice in two conspicuous places on the premises. A corporation is served through any officer, agent or person having charge of its business at the premises, or by posting plus mail. Ordinary first-class mail is enough today: a certified-mail requirement was added in July 2025 and repealed effective June 11, 2026.

Electronic delivery: the statute lists the permitted methods and excludes it.

Mailing: 5 days are added to the period when the notice is mailed. Service by mail is complete when the copy is deposited in the United States mail from within Washington, properly addressed with postage prepaid. The five days are not part of completing service: when service is made by mail, five additional days must be allowed before an action based on the notice may be started. The allowance reaches every notice served under RCW 59.12.040, which includes each termination notice given under the residential act, and it applies whatever class of mail is used. It rose from one day to five on July 27, 2025, so a figure of one day describes the law before that date.

What the notice must contain: Two content rules apply to a Washington termination notice. Every notice served under RCW 59.12.040 must specify the date by which the person to whom it is sent must vacate or, where applicable, comply; that sentence was added in July 2025 and kept in place by the 2026 amendment. And every notice given on one of the statutory grounds must identify the facts and circumstances known and available to the landlord when the notice was issued, with enough specificity to enable the tenant to respond and prepare a defense to the incidents alleged; the landlord may add facts later only where they were unknown or unavailable at the time. In Garrand v. Cornett the Court of Appeals held that this does not require an owner-move-in notice to identify the actual family member who intends to occupy the residence. Two grounds carry further content rules: the ground for a fourth cured violation requires the earlier written warning notices to meet four stated requirements and the 60-day notice to include all of the notices supporting it, and the no-cause expiry notice must state that the tenancy will be deemed expired at the end of the specified period.

The federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act applies of its own force and is expressly declared applicable in all the courts of this state by RCW 38.42.120, which also makes a violation of the federal act a violation of the state chapter; Washington's own additions to the lease-termination right sit in the residential act and are described above. The federal Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act and the federal Violence Against Women Act housing protections apply to covered dwellings and are not restated here.

The federal CARES Act 30-day notice to vacate for covered properties, as read in this state's courts: held by a state appellate court to apply to nonpayment only. The Supreme Court of Washington held, sitting en banc in Housing Authority of the County of King v. Knight, 563 P.3d 1058 (2025), that section 4024(c) of the CARES Act requires 30 days' notice only where a tenant of a covered dwelling is being evicted for failure to pay rent. The decision resolved a split between the divisions of the Court of Appeals in favor of Division I and abrogated Pendleton Place, LLC v. Asentista, which had applied the notice to every ground. It is a holding about the provision's scope, not about its expiration: in Washington the 30-day notice is live, and it is limited to nonpayment. (Appellate picture read as of September 2, 2026.)

2026 c 55, section 1 (Engrossed Substitute Senate Bill 5937), takes effect January 1, 2027: On January 1, 2027 the residential act's definition section is reenacted with new definitions for smart access systems, and the later definitions are renumbered. Four definitions this page depends on move: immediate family from (14) to (16), orders from (18) to (20), permanent change of station from (20) to (22), and service member from (31) to (34). The wording of each is unchanged, so no answer on this page changes; only the subsection numbers a reader will find them under. Text: RCW 59.18.030 (version effective January 1, 2027).

2024 c 321, section 408, takes effect January 1, 2028: On January 1, 2028 the landlord-notice section's condominium-conversion notice changes its statutory reference, from a conversion in compliance with RCW 64.34.440(1) to one in compliance with RCW 64.90.655. The 20-day tenant notice, the armed-forces exception, the 90-day exclusion-of-children notice, the 120-day demolition, rehabilitation and change-of-use notice and every definition in the section stay as they are. Text: RCW 59.18.200 (version effective January 1, 2028).

2024 c 321, section 409, takes effect January 1, 2028: On January 1, 2028 the just-cause section's ground for withdrawing a unit to pursue a condominium conversion is keyed to RCW 64.90.655 alone, where today it names either RCW 64.34.440 or RCW 64.90.655. No notice period and no other ground changes, so every figure on this page stays the same. Text: RCW 59.18.650 (version effective January 1, 2028).

Wright v. Miller, 93 Wn. App. 189, 963 P.2d 934 (1998), review denied, 138 Wn.2d 1017 (1999) (Washington Court of Appeals, Division I; residential lease; bears on the duty to re-let): Construing the residential act's abandonment section, the court held that the landlord recovers the lesser of the rent for the remainder of the term or the mitigated measure, and that only the second of those carries attorneys' fees, so the section limits fees where a residential tenant fails to pay rent or abandons the premises. The court then harmonized the section with the general fee statute, so a lease's own prevailing-party clause still supports an award.

Klee v. Snow, 531 P.3d 788 (Wash. Ct. App. 2023) (Washington Court of Appeals, Division II; residential lease; bears on whether a reason is required): An owner ending a tenancy on the ground that the owner elects to sell a single-family residence must make reasonable attempts to sell or advertise the residence within 30 days after the tenant has vacated, but is not required to do so before the tenant leaves. A tenant served with the 90-day notice cannot defeat it by pointing to the absence of a listing during the notice period.

Garrand v. Cornett, 550 P.3d 64 (Wash. Ct. App. 2024) (Washington Court of Appeals, Division II; residential lease; bears on how a notice is delivered): A notice ending a tenancy so the owner or a member of the owner's immediate family may occupy the unit meets the statute's specificity requirement without naming the actual family member who intends to occupy the residence. The court separately vacated an award of unpaid rent and remanded, because the record held insufficient evidence to support the amount awarded.

Valley Cities Counseling & Consultation v. Eddines, 553 P.3d 693 (Wash. Ct. App. 2024) (Washington Court of Appeals, Division I; residential lease; bears on whether a reason is required): A city ordinance that categorically forbids what state law permits is preempted by conflict, so a local rule leaving a transitional-housing landlord no way to end a tenancy on a ground the state just-cause statute expressly grants cannot stand. The court decided conflict preemption only, having had no argument on field preemption, and distinguished ordinances that impose a merely temporary bar, where time or some action by the landlord will still allow the case to proceed.

Housing Authority of the County of King v. Knight, 563 P.3d 1058 (Wash. 2025) (Supreme Court of Washington, en banc; residential lease; bears on the federal 30-day notice): Section 4024(c) of the CARES Act requires 30 days' notice only when a tenant of a covered dwelling is being evicted for failure to pay rent, because the notice provision is tied to the moratorium on nonpayment evictions. The court affirmed Division I, abrogated a contrary Division II decision, and did not hold that the provision has lapsed.