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DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS

No. 13-CV-1158

CHARLES MINES, APPELLANT,

V.

CATHIE GILL, INC., APPELLEE.

Appeal from the Superior Court

of the District of Columbia

(LTB-16989-13)

(Hon. Anthony C. Epstein, Trial Judge)

(Submitted October 16, 2014 Decided May 7, 2015)

Charles Mines, pro se.

Carol S. Blumenthal, was on the brief for appellee.

Before FISHER and EASTERLY, Associate Judges, and BELSON, Senior Judge.

EASTERLY, Associate Judge: The issue presented in this case is whether a 

trial court may grant a landlord (or his agent) judgment of possession and an award 

of back rent based on a rent increase which the tenant has objected to and refused 

to pay. A landlord of a non-rent-controlled property, who is unconstrained by 

lease terms, may certainly seek to rent his property for any amount he thinks the 

market will bear; and if the tenant in occupancy refuses to pay the rent a landlord 
2

wishes to charge, the landlord may direct the tenant to vacate the apartment so the 

landlord may rent to someone else. But, as this court’s precedent makes clear, a

landlord may not unilaterally raise the rent over a tenant’s objection and then 

obtain a back rent award for the amount the tenant has refused to pay. Because 

Cathie Gill, Inc., improperly received such an award, we now reverse and remand 

for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I. Facts

The tenants in this case, Charles Mines and his wife, initially rented the 

property in question, an apartment, in June 2011. They signed a one-year lease

setting their rent at $3,000/month. Shortly before the lease expired in 2012, the 

two owners of the apartment (“the landlords”) asked the tenants to sign a new oneyear lease with a 3% rent increase. The tenants ultimately declined to sign a new 

lease but remained in the apartment; it was their understanding that their expired 

lease terms remained in effect. As to the landlord’s understanding of the situation 

the record is silent, but there is no indication in the record that the landlords 

objected or asked the tenants to leave. Instead, this arrangement continued, 

apparently without incident, for seven months. Then, at the end of 2012, Cathie 
3

Gill, a management company hired by the landlords, contacted the tenants. Cathie 

Gill informed the tenants that, going forward, it would collect the rent on the 

landlords’ behalf, and it gave the tenants notice of a 6% rent increase ($3,180), 

effective February 1, 2013. The tenants again declined to pay an increase in rent 

and continued to pay $3,000/month, apparently still to the landlord.1 Again, there 

is no indication in the record that Cathie Gill (or the landlords) objected to the 

tenants’ failure to pay the rent increase or asked the tenants to leave. Five months 

later, on June 28, 2013, Cathie Gill filed suit for a judgment of possession and an 

award of back rent based on the unpaid rent increase.

At trial, Mr. Mines proceeded pro se; Cathie Gill was represented by 

counsel. The proceedings were informal and took the form of a conversation 

between the court, counsel for Cathie Gill, and Mr. Mines. Neither party disputed 

the history of their relationship detailed above. Mr. Mines argued that he and his 

wife had never agreed to pay more for their apartment and thus they were only 

obligated to pay the landlords the $3,000/month as negotiated in the (expired) June 

 

1

 Cathie Gill presented as an exhibit on appeal a letter from the landlords 

sent after the date of the desired rent increase reminding the tenants to send their 

payments to Cathie Gill. This is the last communication in the record between the 

tenants and the landlords (or Cathie Gill as the landlords’ agent) before Cathie Gill

filed suit.
4

2011 lease.

2

 To support this argument, Mr. Mines attempted to rely on paragraph 

24 of his expired lease addressing “termination/hold-over,” which provided, inter 

alia, that “[i]f Tenant shall hold over after the expiration of the term of this Lease, 

tenant shall, in the absence of any written agreement to the contrary, be a Tenant 

from month to month at the monthly rate in effect during the last month of the 

expiring term.”

3

 Meanwhile, Cathie Gill acknowledged the tenants’ continued 

payment of $3,000/month, but argued that the tenants were responsible for paying 

the demanded rent increase.

The trial court ruled for Cathie Gill, explaining to Mr. Mines that once the 

lease expired, the landlords, with reasonable notice, were free to raise the rent in 

any amount they chose (since the apartment was not rent-controlled) and that Mr. 

 

2

 Mr. Mines also argued that the landlords could not engage a property 

manager not identified in the (expired) June 2011 lease and that they had not 

properly registered with the District of Columbia. He has not pursued these 

arguments on appeal.

3

 The gravamen of Mr. Mines’s argument was that he and his wife had not 

agreed to the rent increase, and thus this issue was adequately presented in the trial 

court and preserved for our review. That said, we have no doubt that the manner in 

which this case was litigated by a pro se litigant, and in particular, that Mr. 

Mines’s focus on his expired lease and his arguments why he thought the landlords 

were not authorized to raise the rent, see supra note 2, obscured the central issue 

before the trial court: i.e., whether Cathie Gill, as the landlords’ agent, could 

obtain a back rent award based on a rent increase to which the tenants had 

objected.
5

Mines and his wife, if they remained in the apartment, were obligated to pay that 

amount. The trial court accordingly awarded $1,586 in back rent, late fees, and 

court costs to Cathie Gill.

II. Analysis

We review de novo the following question of law: whether, based on the 

facts undisputed by the parties, the tenants had an obligation to pay the demanded 

rent increase.

4 Mr. Mines, proceeding pro se, argued that he and his wife were

entitled to remain in the apartment, paying the same amount of rent set by the

expired lease. The trial court determined, however, that Cathie Gill, as the 

landlords’ agent, was entitled to raise the rent with reasonable notice, and that the 

tenants would be obligated to pay if they remained in possession. In other words, 

the trial court adopted Cathie Gill’s argument that the landlord could unilaterally 

determine the amount of rent to be paid. As with any type of contract, however, 

 

4

 See Hart v. Vermont Inv. Ltd. P’ship, 667 A.2d 578, 582 (D.C. 1995)

(reviewing the “substantive rules of contract law” relating to a lease de novo, 

specifically whether there was a “meeting of the minds”); cf. Sarete, Inc. v. 1344 U 

St. Ltd. P’ship, 871 A.2d 480, 490 (D.C. 2005) (acknowledging that whether 

appellants had status of tenant was a legal question properly reviewed de novo).
6

there must be both an offer and acceptance before there is an enforceable 

agreement. The record before us establishes that there was no agreement, express 

or implied, for the tenants to pay a 6% rent increase for a month-to-month tenancy 

after their lease expired in June 2012. And in the absence of such an agreement, 

the court could not award the landlords back rent, although it could award the 

landlords damages based on fair use and occupancy value (if Cathie Gill presented 

such evidence).

We begin our analysis by clarifying what, if any, agreement the landlords

and the tenants had vis-a-vis the payment of rent at the time that Cathie Gill, as an 

agent for the landlord, sought to increase the tenants’ rent in February 2013. Mr. 

Mines argued at trial, as he does on appeal, not only that he and his wife did not 

agree to pay a 6% rent increase, but also that the June 2011 lease, in particular 

paragraph 24 (addressing termination/holdovers), was still operative in February 

2013, and froze their rent to the amount bargained for in the lease. But the lease 

was only for one year, and it had expired by the time Cathie Gill sought to raise the 

rent. 
7

This does not mean, however, that the landlords and the tenants had no 

legally recognized agreement with respect to the tenants’ continued occupancy of 

the apartment. At the end of a contractual lease term, if a new lease is not signed

but the tenant remains, a landlord has two choices: the landlord may refuse to 

allow the tenant to remain in the property5or the landlord may implicitly agree to 

the tenant’s continued occupation of the property and a holdover tenancy may 

commence.

6

 The creation of such a tenancy is a function of statute in the District.7 

This is a periodic, month-to-month tenancy, whereby the tenant is bound to the

original lease’s terms, including the amount of rent.

8

 Each party to this implicit 

 

5

 See D.C. Code § 42-3201 (2012 Repl.) (“When real estate is leased for a 

certain term no notice to quit shall be necessary, but the landlord shall be entitled 

to the possession, without such notice, immediately upon the expiration of the 

term.”).

6

See D.C. Code § 42-520 (2012 Repl.) (“All estates which by construction 

of the courts were estates from year to year at common law, as where a tenant goes 

into possession and pays rent without an agreement for a term, or where a tenant 

for years, after the expiration of his term, continues in possession and pays rent and 

the like, and all verbal hirings by the month or at any specified rate per month, 

shall be deemed estates by sufferance.”).

7

 Id.

8

 See, e.g., Sanchez v. Eleven Fourteen, Inc., 623 A.2d 1179, 1181 (D.C. 

1993) (“A holdover tenant is bound by the terms and conditions of the original 

lease and is liable to the landlord at least for rent or its equivalent.”); Estate of 

Wells v. Estate of Smith, 576 A.2d 707, 712 (D.C. 1990) (“[W]here a tenant holds 

over, there is an implied continuation of all the terms of the previous agreement, 

including covenants to maintain.”); Friedman v. Sherman, 74 A.2d 57, 58 (D.C. 

1950) (“A tenant continuing in possession and paying rent under an expired lease 

becomes a tenant at sufferance and such tenancy is impliedly subject to the 

(continued . . .)
8

agreement is entitled to a 30-day notice to end this tenancy.

9

 The landlords in this 

case opted not to evict the tenants and thus a holdover tenancy commenced in June 

2012. 

The question is what happened to this holdover agreement when, seven 

months into the holdover tenancy, Cathie Gill notified the tenants that, in a 

month’s time, the rent would increase by 6%. Cathie Gill took the position at trial

that, the tenants’ objection to the rent increase notwithstanding, the fact that the 

tenants had remained in the apartment meant that they were obligated to pay the 

increased rental amount. Put another way, Cathie Gill argued that the terms of the 

holdover tenancy were unilaterally altered by the landlords and that the tenants 

were bound by this change. This is not the law.

 

(. . . continued)

provisions of the expired lease.”); Hampton v. Mott Motors, 32 A.2d 247, 248 

(D.C. 1943) (“We think the reasonable construction of Section 820 is that [it] . . . 

does not have the effect of releasing either the landlord or the tenant from the 

implied obligation that the holding over is subject to all the covenants and terms of 

the original lease applicable to the new situation.”).

9

 D.C. Code § 42-3202 (2012 Repl.) (“A tenancy from month to month, or 

from quarter to quarter, may be terminated by a 30 days notice in writing from the 

landlord to the tenant to quit, or by such a notice from the tenant to the landlord of 

his intention to quit, said notice to expire, in either case, on the day of the month 

from which such tenancy commenced to run.”).
9

“[A] unilateral statement of rent does not per se create a contract.”10 Instead,

all contracts, including contracts to rent property, require offer and acceptance, i.e., 

“a meeting of the minds.”11 The fact that a tenant has remained in an apartment 

after a demanded rent increase does not necessarily indicate that such a meeting of 

the minds has occurred. As the court explained in Groner, “[i]t is generally agreed 

that where a landlord notifies a tenant that he must pay a higher rental if he 

remains in possession and the tenant without objecting continues in possession, the 

tenant will be regarded as having impliedly agreed to the increase and is bound to 

pay it.”12 But “[i]f a landlord insists on one rate of rental and the tenant insists on 

another, there is no meeting of the minds. . . . The law will not, by implication, 

infer an acceptance by the defendant of the terms which he had so persistently 

refused and which plaintiff had so insistently demanded as a condition.”13

 

10

 Double H Hous. Corp. v. David, 947 A.2d 38, 43 n.11 (D.C. 2008) 

(internal quotation marks omitted). We note that neither party cited Double H to 

the trial court.

11

 Groner v. Townhouse Realty, Inc., 235 A.2d 324, 325 (D.C. 1967). We 

note that neither party cited Groner to the trial court. 

12

 Id. at 325 (emphasis added); see Summerbell v. McDonnell, 197 A.2d 

150, 151 (D.C. 1964) (“The general rule is that where a tenant has notice from his 

landlord that if he retains possession he must pay a higher rent, specified as to 

amount, and the tenant remains in possession, he is deemed to have assented to the 

increase.”).

13

 Groner, 235 A.2d at 325 (internal quotation marks omitted); see Double 

H, 947 A.2d 38 (declining to hold that a landlord was entitled to recover the 

(continued . . .)
10

It was undisputed at trial that the tenants in this case refused to pay the rent 

increase. Mr. Mines explained that he had not agreed to a 3% increase requested at 

the end of his lease term and he had not agreed to the 6% rent increase announced 

seven months into his holdover tenancy. And indeed Cathie Gill acknowledged 

that Mr. Mines had objected by letter to the 6% rent increase and had continued to 

pay $3,000 in rent until Cathie Gill filed suit. Under the circumstances, Cathie Gill

could not obtain a judgment for possession or for back rent based on a rent increase

it knew the tenants had refused to pay.14

The only remaining question, then, is whether Cathie Gill, as the landlords’

agent, was entitled to damages based on fair use and occupancy value.15 More 

 

(. . . continued)

amount of a rent increase from a holdover tenant who had objected to the 

demanded rent increase but remained in his apartment paying his old rent). 

This court in Groner was swift to note that our holding did not “mean that 

appellant could occupy [the contested property] free of charge.” 235 A.2d at 325. 

Rather, the court explained he was “liable for the reasonable value of the use and 

occupation of the space.” Id.; see Sanchez, 623 A.2d at 1182 n.5 (explaining that 

the “measure of damages for the unlawful detention of leased premises” generally 

turns on the fair and reasonable rental value, but also may include consequential 

damages).

14 Cathie Gill relies on Molla v. Sanders, 981 A.2d 1197 (D.C. 2009), to 

argue that landlords may unilaterally increase rent on holdover tenants, but Molla

did not pass judgment on that issue. Id. at 1201-02. 

15

 See supra note 13.
11

particularly, the question is whether Cathie Gill is entitled to recover more than the 

$3,000/month the landlords received while the tenants occupied the property. 

Damages not having been recognized as Cathie Gill’s only recourse, no evidence 

was presented to substantiate a damages award. Nor was Mr. Mines given the 

opportunity to fight a damages award, perhaps by demonstrating that the landlords

had received and accepted his payment of $3,000 without reservation, thus 

indicating that there had been accord and satisfaction.16 Remand of the case is thus 

required to allow the parties to litigate these issues. 

For the reasons set forth above, we vacate the award of $1,586 in back rent, 

late fees, and court costs to Cathie Gill and remand the case to the trial court for 

further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

17

 

16

 See Double H, 947 A.2d at 43 (finding that where the landlord had for 

twelve months accepted payments made by the tenant at the lower rent, there was 

accord and satisfaction and that the landlord could not recover for an arrearage 

based on the tenant’s failure to pay a demanded rent increase).

17

 In his brief to this court, Mr. Mines asks us to direct the trial court to

“have the sum total of the rent increase monies I have paid to date returned to me,” 

which he represents as $2,846. This request concerns matters outside the record on 

appeal and beyond the scope of our review of the trial court’s order awarding 

Cathie Gill $1,586 in back rent. Thus we decline to address it.
12

So ordered.