What are the reasons a tenant can be evicted?

A tenant can only be evicted for three reasons:

1. A failure to pay rent when due or demanded. 
   
   1. You are required to pay rent on your due date.  Most written leases have a grace period of at least 5 days, but review your lease to see if your lease has one.  You still might have a late fee charged to you if you pay after your due date but within five days thereafter. 
   2. Your due date should be written down in your lease.  If no due date is written, then by law you are required to pay monthly and your due date is the beginning of each calendar month or rental term if the rental term is less than one month.
   3. If your rental agreement does not say what rent you must pay, then the law says you must pay the fair-market rental value for using and occupying the property.  Determining the fair-market rental value may not be easy, but you will want to look at what other similar properties are renting for.
       
2. The lease term has ended
   
   1. If you have no lease agreement that says how long you can rent the property for, then your lease ends and renews at the end of each month until one party gives the other party written notice that the lease will not be renewed.  If you rent a room by the week, then your lease ends and renews at the end of each week.
   2. If your lease agreement has a set term, such as one year, then your lease ends when it says it ends in the lease.  The landlord does not have to give you an additional notice that it is ending.
   3. If your lease agreement has a set term, such as one year, but you keep paying and the landlord keeps accepting your rent after the year is up, then your lease term converts to month to month.
       
3. The tenant has commited what the law calls a "material" breach of the lease.
   
   1. Not all breaches of the lease can justify the landlord in terminating the lease and filing for eviction. 
   2. Only those breaches where the tenant breaks some important obligation to the landlord are considered "material" enough to call off the lease agreement entirely.
   3. For example, assume the lease says that the tenant will replace all burned out lightbulbs in the unit.  The landlord inspects and finds a single burned out lightbulb. This is probably not a material breach of the lease, although the tenant will have to pay for the cost of the lightbulb.