Notice to vacate (rooming houses)

If you receive a Notice to Vacate, contact us for advice as soon as possible. If the notice was not filled in correctly or was not given to you the correct way it may not be valid.

To be valid, a Notice to Vacate:

• must be in writing, and
• must state the reason they want you to leave (except the 120-day notice), and
• must state the the date they want you to leave, and
• must be signed and dated by the owner, and
• must be given to you in person or sent by registered mail, and
• must be given to you a minimum number of days before the vacate date.

If the Notice to Vacate does not meet all these requirements, it may not be valid.

There are many reasons for a Notice to vacate, and the amount of time before the vacate date depend on the reason for the notice and if you have a tenancy agreement for your room.

The rooming house owner can give an immediate Notice to Vacate if you or a visitor of yours does one or more of these:

Even though it is called an Immediate Notice to Vacate, you do not have to leave immediately. The owner/manager must apply to VCAT if they want to evict you. And VCAT will not give the owner a Possession Order unless the owner can prove that you or your visitor caused one of the problems listed above.

A 2-day Notice to Vacate can be given when:

The owner can give you a 60-day Notice to Vacate if immediately after the 60th day the rooming house will be:

However, you can only be given a 60-day Notice to Vacate if:

The owner can give a 120-day Notice to Vacate for no specific reason if:

If you think that you have been given a 120-day Notice to Vacate in retaliation for exercising your rights as a resident (for example, because you asked for repairs), you can challenge the notice. But you need to do this within 60 days from the day that you received it.