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Notice to vacate
To the landlord or property manager:
This is written notice that I will vacate the rental unit on . My tenancy ends on that date. Please confirm in writing that you received this notice.
After that date, please send correspondence about the tenancy to .
Please send the security deposit, and any written statement that goes with it, to .
Sincerely,
The tenant named in the lease for that unit
Last day to send it
Pick a move-out date above; both dates are counted back here, on this page.
The letter has three blanks and nothing else to fill in. It states a date and two addresses; it does not give a reason, name an amount, or promise a payment. The copy includes whatever you typed in the blanks.
Most leases call for 30 days' notice, but the number written in your lease is the one that controls.
Both lines count calendar days backwards from the move-out date, not business days and not from the day you post the letter. The first line is fixed at 30 days so you can see it next to the number your lease actually states. Neither line tells you what the lease requires; it only does the subtraction.
If the lease is ending early rather than at its natural end, the money question is a different one. The lease break cost calculator works out what an early end costs; this page only dates the notice.
The letter is only useful if the other side receives it before the date counted above. The two ordinary ways to send it differ in what you can show afterwards, not in what the letter says.
| Method | What you can show later |
|---|---|
| Regular mail | A copy of the letter. Nothing dates the day it arrived. |
| Certified mail with a return receipt | The mailing receipt, the tracking record, and the signed receipt. |
Regular mail is fine when the lease accepts ordinary written notice and the date is comfortable. Certified mail costs more and buys a dated record of posting and of delivery. Some leases also accept email; if you use it, keep the sent message and any reply that acknowledges it. The lease and the rules where the unit is decide which method counts, and this page does not decide that for you.
Keep the whole trail in one place, in the order it happened.
Keep them until the deposit is settled. A security deposit return letter is the landlord's document that travels with the money, not this notice; a demand letter for a security deposit is the later one, written when nothing has arrived. Neither changes what this letter has to say.
Many leases accept email. Send it to the address the lease names for notices, and keep the sent message and any written reply. The three blanks on this page work the same in an email as on paper, and the copy button gives you plain text you can paste.
It states the address the deposit should go to. It does not name an amount, list deductions, or dispute anything. A letter that asks for a specific balance is a different document, written after the move-out when the deposit and its statement are due.
A notice only has to state the date and where to reach you. A reason, an apology, or a comment on the condition of the unit adds statements that can be read back later, and none of them help the date. The three blanks are the whole of what needs to change from one tenancy to the next.
Type that number into the calculator. The second line is then counted back by the number you typed, while the first stays at 30 days, so both dates sit side by side. If you have not typed a number, the second line stays blank rather than guessing one.