By LeaseHelper
In California, every rent increase requires written notice — 30 days for increases of 10% or less, and 90 days for anything above 10% — and for most rental properties, the amount you can raise is also capped by state law.
This post walks through the two governing statutes — Cal. Civ. Code § 827 (notice periods) and Cal. Civ. Code § 1947.12 (AB 1482 rent caps) — using a concrete hypothetical scenario. We cover who the cap applies to, the 2026–2027 regional maximums, how stacking increases within 12 months changes your notice obligations, and the exemption disclosure landlords of single-family homes most often miss.
The Scenario: A 6-Unit Building in Los Angeles, Rent Due for Increase
Let's use a concrete example throughout this post. Maria owns a six-unit apartment building in Los Angeles built in 1992. She has a tenant, David, who has rented unit 3 on a month-to-month basis for three years at $2,000 per month. Maria has not raised his rent in over 12 months and wants to increase it. She needs to know: how much can she raise it, how much notice does she need to give, and how does she serve that notice so it actually counts?
Maria's property is more than 15 years old, located in a city with local rent control, and she has not provided any exemption notice — so she needs to work through two layers of law: AB 1482's statewide cap and LA's local ordinance. This is the situation most small landlords in California are actually in.
Notice Requirements Under Cal. Civ. Code § 827
In California, you must give a tenant at least 30 days written notice for a rent increase of 10% or less in any 12-month period, and 90 days written notice for any increase over 10% (California Civil Code § 827). These rules apply regardless of whether the property is covered by AB 1482 — even exempt properties must comply with § 827 notice periods.
The 10% threshold is not measured against the last increase in isolation. Under California Civil Code § 827, increases within the same 12 months stack for notice purposes: if the proposed new rent is more than 10% above the rent charged at any time during the 12 months before the effective date, you must give 90 days written notice — even if the latest increase alone is under 10%. In Maria's scenario, because she has not raised David's rent in over 12 months, her proposed increase is measured clean against the current $2,000 baseline.
Notices must be delivered properly: by personal delivery to the tenant, substitute service with mailing, or posting and mailing. Email alone is not sufficient. If serving by mail, add 5 days to each notice period. So if Maria mails a 30-day notice, she should treat it as a 35-day requirement to be safe.
The AB 1482 Rent Cap: How Much Can Maria Actually Raise?
The Tenant Protection Act (Cal. Civ. Code § 1947.12, AB 1482) provides that an owner "shall not, over the course of any 12-month period, increase the gross rental rate... more than 5 percent plus the percentage change in the cost of living, or 10 percent, whichever is lower" for covered units, with no more than two increases yearly.
The CPI figure used is the April-to-April measurement for the region where your rental property is located. Every August 1, the allowable increase resets to 5% plus the change in the regional Consumer Price Index, with a hard ceiling of 10%. For Maria's property in Los Angeles, the new AB 1482 maximum annual rent increase is 8.7%, effective August 1, 2026, applying to qualifying rent increases that take effect from August 1, 2026 through July 31, 2027. The April 2026 Los Angeles-area CPI-U annual change was 3.7%, so the calculation is 5.0% + 3.7% = 8.7%.
For Maria, that means the most she can raise David's $2,000 rent (if the increase is effective on or after August 1, 2026) is $174 per month — bringing rent to $2,174. Because that 8.7% increase is below 10%, she needs only 30 days' written notice, or 35 days if she serves by mail. AB 1482 does not expire in 2026 — the Tenant Protection Act is in effect through January 1, 2030.
2026–2027 AB 1482 Caps by Region
The CPI component of the formula varies by region, so your maximum depends on where your property sits. For properties subject to the Tenant Protection Act (AB 1482), the maximum increase from August 1, 2026 through July 31, 2027 is 5% plus the regional Consumer Price Index — working out to 8.7% in Los Angeles and Orange County, 8.1% in Riverside and San Bernardino, 8.2% in San Diego, 8.8% in the five core Bay Area counties, and 8.6% everywhere else.
| CPI Region | Counties Covered | April 2026 CPI | AB 1482 Max (Aug 2026–Jul 2027) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles–Long Beach–Anaheim | LA, Orange | 3.7% | 8.7% |
| Riverside–San Bernardino | Riverside, San Bernardino | 3.1% | 8.1% |
| San Diego | San Diego | 3.2% | 8.2% |
| SF–Oakland–Hayward (Bay Area) | Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, SF, San Mateo | 3.8% | 8.8% |
| All Other California Counties | Statewide average | 3.6% | 8.6% |
Source: Apartment Association California Southern Cities (AACSC), June 2026. Always confirm the applicable CPI index for your county — regional CPI figures for major metro counties are published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, and that data is then used by the California Department of Industrial Relations to calculate the statewide California CPI used for all other counties.
Decision Tree: Does the AB 1482 Cap Apply to Your Property?
Maria's building clearly falls under AB 1482. But not every California rental does. The exemptions are real — and so are the traps. Use this decision tree before you calculate your maximum increase.
Properties with certificates of occupancy issued within the previous 15 years are exempt — this is a rolling exemption, so in 2026 the cutoff moves to buildings built in 2011. Single-family homes are exempt only if owned by a natural person (individual), not a corporation or LLC, AND the tenant received written notice that the property is exempt from AB 1482. Owner-occupied duplexes where the owner occupies one unit as their primary residence are also exempt.
The Exemption Disclosure Trap Small Landlords Miss
If you own a single-family home or condo and rent it out, you may assume you're automatically exempt from AB 1482. You're not. While many landlords know that certain single-family homes and condominiums are exempt, far fewer realize that an otherwise exempt property can lose its exemption if the required statutory notice is not properly provided to the tenant. Failure to provide this disclosure can have serious consequences, including subjecting the property to statewide rent control and just cause eviction requirements.
The AB 1482 exemption notice is a legally required written disclosure that a landlord must include in the lease at the time of signing. The exemption notice is a prerequisite for exempt status — it cannot be added to an existing tenancy retroactively. Without a valid notice in the lease at signing, an otherwise qualifying property is treated as covered under AB 1482. The relevant statutes are Cal. Civ. Code §§ 1947.12(d) and 1946.2(e).
Local rent control ordinances may impose lower limits than AB 1482. Cities such as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, and Santa Monica may have stricter rent increase rules for certain rental units. Landlords must comply with whichever law provides greater tenant protection. In Maria's case, Los Angeles's Rent Stabilization Ordinance (LARSO) covers pre-1978 buildings — her 1992 building likely falls under AB 1482 only, not LARSO, but she should verify with the LA Housing Department.
Scenario Walkthrough: Maria Serves the Notice
Back to Maria. She decides to raise David's rent by 8% (within the 8.7% AB 1482 cap for LA) — from $2,000 to $2,160. Because 8% is under 10%, she needs 30 days' written notice under Cal. Civ. Code § 827. She plans to mail it, so she adds 5 days and serves the notice 35 days before the effective date. The notice states the tenant's name, unit address, current rent, new rent amount, and the date the increase takes effect.
Common landlord errors include serving notice by email without an explicit electronic notice provision in the lease, calculating the notice period from the date of signing rather than the date of delivery, and not accounting for the 5-day mailing addition when serving by mail. Serving a second increase within 12 months without calculating the cumulative impact correctly is another common mistake — and each error means starting over, potentially owing a refund if the tenant paid the invalid increase.
One more scenario: suppose Maria had given David a 5% increase in January 2026 and now wants another 4% in August 2026 — a combined 9% over 12 months. The combined total is under 10%, so 30 days' notice is still sufficient. But if she wanted a combined total above 10%, she must give 90 days written notice even if the latest increase alone is under 10%. And because AB 1482 caps increases at 10%, many landlords imposing maximum allowable increases now trigger the 90-day requirement.
Under Civil Code § 1942.5, if a landlord serves a rent increase within 180 days of a tenant filing a complaint or exercising a legal right, the law presumes the increase is retaliatory. The burden shifts to the landlord to prove it wasn't. That window is longer than most landlords realize, so document your business rationale for any increase when a tenant has recently requested repairs or filed a complaint.
About LeaseHelper: LeaseHelper builds AI-powered lease, eviction, and rental document generators for small landlords and property managers, and publishes guides on landlord-tenant law, security deposits, and evictions.
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Create your California rent increase notice — $19 →Frequently asked questions
What happens if I forget to give the correct notice period — can I just re-serve the notice?
Yes, you can re-serve a corrected notice, but the clock restarts from the new delivery date. The original defective notice does not count. If a tenant has already paid the increased rent under an invalid notice, that payment may not be legally owed and could need to be refunded. Getting the notice right the first time — correct period, correct delivery method, correct content — avoids this reset entirely. Confirm delivery with a signed acknowledgment, certified mail receipt, or photo if you use posting-and-mailing service.
My tenant has been month-to-month for five years. Does a longer tenancy mean I need more notice?
Under Cal. Civ. Code § 827, the notice period for rent increases is determined by the size of the increase — not by how long the tenant has lived there. Thirty days applies to increases of 10% or less in any 12-month period; 90 days applies to anything above 10%. That said, long-term tenants in AB 1482-covered units are also protected by just-cause eviction requirements under Cal. Civ. Code § 1946.2, which kicks in after 12 months of occupancy — so a rent increase that causes a tenant to vacate can have just-cause implications. Always consider both statutes together when dealing with long-tenured residents.
I own a single-family house I rent out. Am I exempt from the AB 1482 rent cap?
Potentially, but only if two conditions are both met: you are a natural person (not an LLC, corporation, or REIT), and your tenant received the specific written exemption disclosure required by Cal. Civ. Code §§ 1947.12(d) and 1946.2(e) in the lease at the time of signing. If either condition is missing — especially if the disclosure was never added to the lease — your property may be treated as fully covered by AB 1482, including the rent cap and just-cause eviction requirements. The exemption notice cannot be added retroactively to an existing tenancy, so if it was omitted at signing, consult a landlord-tenant attorney before raising rent above the cap.
Can I raise rent twice in a 12-month period?
Yes, AB 1482 allows up to two rent increases per 12-month period for covered properties, but the combined total of both increases cannot exceed the 5% + CPI cap (maximum 10%). More importantly, the notice period under Cal. Civ. Code § 827 is based on the combined percentage increase over the prior 12 months — not each increase individually. If a first increase of 6% and a second increase of 5% combine to 11% over 12 months, the second notice must be 90 days, even though the second increase standing alone is only 5%. Always calculate the trailing 12-month cumulative total before deciding which notice period to use.