CIV § 1941

Landlords Must Keep Dwellings Fit to Live In: CIV § 1941

CIV § 1941 requires lessors of buildings for human occupation to make them fit for occupation and repair subsequent dilapidations that make them untenantable.

Official text CIV § 1941 — California

Section Nineteen Hundred and Forty-one. The lessor of a building intended for the occupation of human beings must, in the absence of an agreement to the contrary, put it into a condition fit for such occupation, and repair all subsequent dilapidations thereof, which render it untenantable, except such as are mentioned in section nineteen hundred and twenty-nine.

Text as published in the 2026 snapshot of the code.

Source: Vaquill Open US Law, compiled from official state publishers (huggingface.co), reproduced under license CC BY 4.0.

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What it actually says

Section 1941 is the root of California's habitability law and it is one sentence long. The lessor of a building intended for the occupation of human beings must put it into a condition fit for such occupation, and must repair all subsequent dilapidations which render it untenantable. Two words in that sentence do most of the work. "Subsequent" makes the duty continuing rather than a one-off condition at handover: something that breaks in year three is as much the landlord's problem as something broken on day one. "Untenantable" sets the threshold — the duty is triggered by dilapidations that make the place unfit to live in, not by every defect a tenant would like fixed.

The sentence carries two qualifications. The first, "in the absence of an agreement to the contrary", is narrower in practice than it reads, because § 1942.1 makes void any agreement by which a tenant waives rights under § 1941 or § 1942 as contrary to public policy. The second is the cross-reference to § 1929: deteriorations caused by the tenant's own want of ordinary care are excluded, and § 1941.2 goes further by suspending the duty where the tenant is in substantial violation of listed obligations and that violation substantially contributes to the problem.

Section 1941 says what the landlord must do. It does not say what counts as untenantable — that is § 1941.1 — and it does not say what the tenant may do when nothing happens, which is § 1942. Read on its own it establishes the duty and nothing more, which is why almost every habitability dispute cites it together with at least one of the sections around it. What a landlord actually owes on a particular defect, and in what order to act, is worth checking with a lawyer or a local tenant service.

When it applies

  • The heater has not worked since the cold started and the landlord keeps postponing
  • A roof leak that soaks the bedroom every time it rains
  • The flat was let to you with a broken window and a dead water heater
  • Plumbing that has failed repeatedly over several years of the tenancy
  • A landlord who says the lease makes repairs the tenant's problem
  • Rodents or an infestation in a part of the building the landlord controls

What this section does not say

  • It is not a duty to keep the place nice. The obligation attaches to dilapidations that render the dwelling untenantable; cosmetic wear, dated fittings and a preference for better appliances are not what the sentence addresses.
  • It does not tell you what untenantable means. The affirmative list is in § 1941.1, and the section standing alone gives no standard a tenant can measure a defect against.
  • It does not give a remedy. Repair-and-deduct and the right to vacate come from § 1942; the bar on collecting rent for a substandard unit comes from § 1942.4.
  • It does not cover damage the tenant caused. Section 1929 and § 1941.2 take the tenant's own carelessness and listed violations out of the landlord's duty.
  • "In the absence of an agreement to the contrary" is not a free pass to contract out. Section 1942.1 voids a tenant's waiver of rights under this section as contrary to public policy.

Worked examples

Invented situations, written to show how the wording bites. They are not real cases, not judgments and not precedent, and nothing here predicts what would happen in yours.

Illustrative example

There has been no hot water for eleven days. The tenant has written twice and each time is told a plumber is coming.

How the wording applies

Section 1941 obliges the landlord to repair dilapidations that render the dwelling untenantable, measured against the list in section 1941.1. It turns on notice and time: the duty to repair later dilapidations arises once the landlord knows of them, so the date of the first written report is the fact that starts every remedy the tenant has.

How the parties settled it

The landlord commits to a replacement within a fixed number of days and credits the rent for the days without hot water, and the tenant gives access on two named days.

Illustrative example

A lease says the tenant is responsible for all repairs to the interior. The heating fails in December and the landlord points at the clause.

How the wording applies

The section opens with the words in the absence of an agreement to the contrary, which reads like a free pass and is not one: section 1942.1 voids a tenant's waiver of rights under it as against public policy, and section 1953 voids listed waivers in a residential lease. What this turns on is that heat is a section 1941.1 characteristic, so the clause cannot shift it whatever it says.

How the parties settled it

The landlord repairs the heating, and the parties replace the repairs clause with one limiting the tenant to minor items under an agreed value.

Illustrative example

Rats are getting into a ground-floor flat from a rubbish store in the building's yard, which the landlord manages.

How the wording applies

Building and grounds kept free from rodents and vermin, clean and sanitary, is on the section 1941.1 list, and the store is in a part of the building the landlord controls. It hinges on control: an infestation originating in a common area is the landlord's, while food waste left inside the flat brings section 1941.2 into it.

How the parties settled it

The landlord engages a pest control contractor for a full treatment and replaces the bin store doors, and the tenant bags waste and uses the new bins.

How courts have read it

Decisions construing this provision. The question and the summary are ours; the quoted sentence is the court's own words, taken from the published opinion. These are the decisions in our corpus, not every decision there is, and nothing here predicts any other case. Reported 1991 to 2017.

Erlach v. Sierra Asset Servicing, LLC, 226 Cal. App. 4th 1281 (2014)

Court of Appeal

What the court had to decide

Does a red-tag order from a code enforcement agency automatically terminate a residential lease, thereby relieving the landlord of obligations under Civil Code section 1941?

What it held

A tenancy is not terminated by a red-tag order; the landlord's duty under Civil Code section 1941 to put the property into a condition fit for occupation and repair dilapidations continues despite the red tag.

In the court's words
Rather, pursuant to Civil Code section 1941, with exceptions not relevant here, and Health and Safety Code section 17980.6, the landlord must put the property into a condition fit for occupation and repair all subsequent dilapidations.

Hyatt v. Tedesco, 96 Cal. App. 4th Supp. 62 (2002)

Court of Appeal

What the court had to decide

Whether the trial court misapplied the law by finding a nonsubstantial breach of the warranty of habitability that justified a rent reduction, but still entering judgment for the landlord.

What it held

The court held that a tenant is entitled to a reduction of rent only upon a showing of a substantial breach of the warranty of habitability or of Civil Code section 1941, and that the undisputed evidence showed such a substantial breach, entitling the tenant to a conditional judgment for possession and reduced rent.

In the court's words
Here the words of the statute are clear and unambiguous: a tenant is entitled to a reduction of rent only upon a showing of a substantial breach of the warranty of habitability or of Civil Code section 1941.

Source: Caselaw Access Project, CC0 1.0 Universal (public domain dedication).

The same problem elsewhere

The other legal systems in this collection answer the same everyday problem with their own provisions.

The comparison and these one-line summaries are in English.

The landlord will not repair: damp, mould and no heating in 7 jurisdictions

Read the full comparison →

Related sections

CIV § 1941.1 Untenantable Rental Standards: CIV § 1941.1 CIV § 1941.2 Substantial Tenant Breach Cancels Repairs: CIV § 1941.2 CIV § 1942 Deduct Up to One Month's Rent or Vacate: CIV § 1942 CIV § 1942.4 No Rent After 35 Days Unrepaired: CIV § 1942.4 CIV § 1929 Repair damage from own lack of ordinary care (CIV § 1929)

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We copy this text from the official publisher and re-check it against that source on every page load, but we cannot guarantee it is complete, current or free of error, and we accept no liability for any reliance on it. An amendment can take effect before a consolidation catches up. The publisher's own copy is linked below; where the two differ, it is the official one that counts.

This page reproduces the text of CIV § 1941 in force at the date shown and explains it in general terms. It is not legal advice and takes no account of the circumstances of your case, which can change the answer completely. For a live dispute, for limitation periods, and before taking any step in court, consult a qualified lawyer in California.

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