Landlord tenant in the state of Washington is a very active area. When I started, I actually helped the Housing Justice ____ deal with tenants that didn’t have representation. And so, it allowed me to see that side of the problem. Then I started to assist landlords in dealing with their rights of ownership. And that often gets to the point where the tenant is no longer paying. And so, what we have to do is go through very specific steps to evict that tenant. The first one is three-day notice; the legislature just passed a provision that we had to give them 90 days’ notice and that really changes the ground rules. If they don’t comply with that three-day notice then we can proceed to do a default judgement and then give a writ of restitution to the sheriff to have them evicted.

If they respond to the complaint, then we have to have a show cause hearing before the commissioner. And then, both sides get to state their reasoning for their position, if there are facts and disputes then that actually goes to a hearing before a judge. That’s rare. In my practice I’ve only gone twice in 15 years and so, it’s a rarity. Just because we’re at the show cause hearing doesn’t mean that we’re not still discussing with the other side on some resolution. And oftentimes, we can get a stipulated order of agreement where we state collectively what we perceive is the issue and then how to go about getting resolutions without the court intervention. This gives the tenant some options. They can come up with the money, pay the back rent. They can negotiate for time to find another place to live and those types of things.