The bill amends existing Washington landlord-tenant law (primarily RCW 59.18.650 and RCW 59.18.370) and adds new sections to chapters 59.18 and 59.20 RCW. It changes the lawful grounds and procedures by which a landlord may end a periodic or specified-term tenancy, prescribes detailed notice timing and content requirements, and adds procedural timelines for court hearings in unlawful detainer actions. It also creates a statewide preemption that generally prohibits cities and towns from regulating private rental agreements covered by those chapters, with limited exceptions for public ownership and certain low-income public-private housing arrangements. Substantive legal changes include a list of enumerated causes that permit a landlord to end a tenancy (for example, nonpayment of rent after notice; substantial nonmonetary lease or program breaches; nuisance, waste, unlawful activity or repeated interference; owner or immediate family occupancy; owner electing to sell a single-family residence; agency-ordered uninhabitability; shared-occupancy and transitional housing situations; refusal to sign a proffered new lease; material application misrepresentations; certain economic or business reasons; and tenant registration as a sex offender or certain unwanted sexual advances or harassment directed at others). The bill specifies multiple advance written-notice periods tied to different causes (examples include 90 days, 60 days, 30 days, 20 days, 10 days, and three days depending on the ground), prescribes content requirements for notices (including specificity and supporting facts), and defines "elects to sell" and rebuttable presumptions related to owner-occupancy and sales. Procedural and remedial changes include requiring landlords to notify co-occupants who lived with a departing tenant for at least six months and allow them 30 days to apply to join the tenancy; creating a private right of action for wrongful eviction with damages equal to the greater of economic and noneconomic damages or three times one month’s rent, plus reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs; requiring courts to set show-cause hearing dates within set time windows (not less than 7 nor more than 30 days) and to expedite certain hearings arising from nuisance or unlawful-activity notices to within three court days of application; and allowing courts to stay a writ of restitution up to an additional 60 days for certain economic/business grounds subject to conditions and award of costs. The bill text provided is incomplete in places. Portions of the repeated-violation rules and the ends of some subsections are cut off, and the full amended text of RCW 59.18.370 and other added sections and any effective or expiration dates for those sections are not fully shown here. The act does state that Section 1 expires January 1, 2028, and Section 2 takes effect January 1, 2028, but other timing and any additional provisions that may appear elsewhere in the bill are not included in the extracted facts.

If enacted, the bill tightly limits when a landlord can end a month-to-month or periodic tenancy by requiring specific, listed reasons and strict notice timelines (commonly 60, 90, 30, 20, 10, or 3 days depending on the reason). Landlords will need to follow detailed warning and notice procedures for repeated violations, provide specific facts in notices, and for owner-occupancy or sale must meet listing and occupancy windows or face rebuttable presumptions of bad faith. Tenants gain stronger notice and cure opportunities, coresidents who lived with a departing tenant have 30 days to apply to take the lease, and tenants wrongfully removed can recover the greater of actual damages or three times one month’s rent plus attorneys’ fees and costs, which raises the financial risk to landlords who improperly evict. The bill also forces courts to speed certain eviction hearings and creates a statewide ban on cities and towns regulating private landlord-tenant rental agreements (with narrow exceptions for publicly owned housing or certain low-income joint public-private properties), which reduces local governments’ tools to shape rental rules. Property owners, managers, and courts are most affected: landlords face higher procedural obligations, evidentiary demands, and potential liability and costs; tenants gain stronger procedural protections and remedies; cities lose some regulatory options. Some important implementation details and the full text of related sections are not included in the extracts, so precise application in some scenarios is unclear. Sections cited note that Section 1 expires January 1, 2028, and Section 2 takes effect January 1, 2028.