SHERIFF’S NOTICES & ASKING THE COURT TO DELAY AN EVICTION ORDER

If the Court orders an eviction against you, the Sheriff will post a “Notice to Vacate” on your door. That notice will tell you the date the Sheriff will return to remove you from your home. The notice will have a Sheriff’s star on it, like this one:

You can ask the Court to delay the eviction by applying for  “a stay.” You can contact the Court’s Self-Help office for assistance or any legal service provider at the top of this page. 

If no legal assistance is available, you should go to the courthouse and ask for “a stay of execution of judgment.” 

A Court may delay your eviction if you:

1. Will suffer extreme hardship if you’re evicted on the date of the Sheriff’s Notice to Vacate AND 
2. You can pay the rent for each day you want the eviction to be delayed. In other words, if you are requesting a 10-day delay, then you must pay 10 days’ worth of rent. You calculate your daily value of rent by dividing your monthly rent by 30. That number is your daily amount of rent. For example, if your rent is $3,000 a month, then you divide that number by 30 to get your daily value of rent at $100 per day. If you are requesting a 10-day delay, then that 10 days multiplied by $100 per day, equalling $1,000 you’d have to pay to the court. 

If you cannot pay for the delay or explain your extreme hardship, then you should focus on finding shelter and packing your essentials to take with you when the Sheriff arrives. 

How to Apply For a “Stay” on Your Own 

1. Gather the payment you need to pay for the stay. Payment can be made in the form of cash or a cashier’s check made out to the “Alameda County Superior Court.”
2. Fill out a “stay of execution of judgment application” beforehand or ask for one at the court: Use the following guides to complete this Stay Application and then follow the steps below to file it with the Court. Guide in English, Guide in Spanish, Guide in Chinese.

The guides linked below will be available at any OAKLAND PUBLIC LIBRARY and BERKELEY PUBLIC LIBRARY in a printed format. 

1. Notify the landlord or their lawyer the day before you turn in the “Stay” to the court. You should call before 10AM the day before you go to Court to file the application, but just call as soon as you can. 
   1. You should say: “I am applying for a stay of execution of judgment for 40 days” (or whatever number of days you are asking for, generally 40 is the maximum) “I’m applying for the stay in Department 511 tomorrow morning. Please tell me if you will oppose my application.”
2. Go the court with your payment to fill out and file the application for a stay using this guide. There are two courts you can go to:

René C. Davidson Courthouse
1225 Fallon St.
Oakland, CA, 94612
Hours: 8:30am-3pm

OR

Hayward Hall of Justice,
24405 Amador St.,
Hayward, CA 94544
Hours: 8:30am-3pm

Go to the courthouse that is closest to you, but it is generally better to go to the one in Oakland because the Sheriff’s department is in the same building, and you will need to give them proof of your “stay” as explained later. Go as early in the morning as possible.

1. Fill out the “stay of execution of judgment application” application at the courthouse if you haven’t already done that. You can ask a clerk for a form. In the form you should say:
   1. “I told the landlord (or landlord’s attorney) that I was applying for this stay today.” 
   2. “The landlord (or landlord’s attorney) said they would/would not oppose.” (Say whatever the landlord told you they would do, if they didn’t say one way or another, you can explain that.)
   3. “My monthly rent is ________.” (If you have section 8, then say “I have Section 8, my portion of the rent each month is __________.”)
   4. “I am asking to delay the eviction for ______ days.” (State the number of days you are asking the eviction to be paused.)
   5. “I can pay $_____ for the stay.” (State the amount of rent you can pay now for the total number of days you’re requesting to delay the Sheriff.) 
   6. “I will experience extreme hardship if I’m evicted on the original date of eviction. I will experience __________.” (Explain as best you can all the hardships you would experience if the judge does not pause the eviction. Will you be out on the street? Will your health suffer? Will your young children experience trauma? Will you lose all of your belongings? Will you lose access to your medication or any medical equipment? Say all the reasons not pausing the stay would harm you.) 
   7. “I need time to secure legal assistance because legal aid offices are closed for holiday breaks and I am trying to reach them for help.”  
   8. “This is the first time I learned about an eviction against me.” (Only add this if it’s true.)
2. File the application with the Clerk
3. Wait for the court to make a decision at the courthouse. Tell the clerk that you’ll wait for the judge’s decision. Sit in the hallway of the court and wait a few hours, checking back with the clerk occasionally to see if your stay has been approved or not. There is no other way of finding out. 
4. Read the Judge’s Decision
   1. If your stay is approved, the clerk will give you a copy of a court order signed by the judge granting your stay.
   2. If your stay is not approved, read the order the court gives you carefully and make sure you understand why the judge rejected your application. Try to fix the issue and try again to file a stay.
5. Pay for the number of days you asked to stay to the Clerk. Ask for a receipt. 
   1. Keep a copy of the order and the receipt. If the Sheriff makes a mistake and shows up at your door anyway, show them the order and the receipt.
6. Show the Sheriff. Take the signed order from the court and your receipt of payment to the Sheriff’s office, located on the same floor as the Clerks at the Courthouse. The reason for this is to inform them that they should not come to your house because the court gave you permission to pause your eviction. Keep a copy of the order for your records.