In a case involving a flea infestation of an Alexandria rental, the Virginia Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday, March 12, that lease agreements can’t override state law requiring that landlords keep their properties “in a fit and habitable condition.”

Under the Virginia Residential Landlord Tenant Act, tenants must “take an active role in keeping the dwelling unit free from pests by promptly notifying the landlord of any infestations,” wrote Judge Doris Henderson Causey in a unanimous decision by a three-judge panel. However, she concluded, the law makes it clear that “it is ultimately the landlord’s duty to keep the premises habitable.”

Tuesday’s ruling stems from a conflict over a lease for a single-family home in Alexandria that Mikeya Vance rented from landlord Christopher Parrish in September 2021. According to court records, Ms. Vance moved into the property Oct. 15, 2021 and immediately observed fleas in her bed. She then left the property Oct. 25 and notified Mr. Parrish of the infestation.

The account of events provided by the appeals court outlines a string of extermination attempts undertaken by both Ms. Vance and Mr. Parrish. Ms. Vance first asked to end her lease Nov. 17, but Mr. Parrish refused. On Jan. 5, 2022, she filed a complaint against her landlord in Fairfax County General District Court seeking to terminate her lease and recover the rent she had paid during the infestation. While the district court ruled against her, the county circuit court later ruled in her favor.

In appealing that decision, Mr. Parrish argued that Ms. Vance was responsible for dealing with the infestation, since the lease the two had signed stated the tenant would have the responsibility of “controlling and eliminating household pests including but not limited to fleas, ticks, bed bugs, roaches, silverfish, ants, crickets, and rodents during occupancy” and would be on the hook for “costs of the elimination of all such pests and vermin.”

Ms. Vance in turn contended that Virginia’s Residential Landlord Tenant Act requires landlords to keep properties habitable and forbids that responsibility from being transferred to tenants.

The appeals court agreed. “When a lease provision purports to waive [a] tenant’s rights or remedies required by law, the law controls and the lease provision is unenforceable,” Judge Causey wrote.

Among the duties of a landlord that can’t be waived are the duty to “keep the premises in a fit and habitable condition,” she concluded. The presence of fleas, she found, “certainly can render the premises uninhabitable” because of the diseases they can carry.

“Here, the lease agreement between Mr. Parrish and Ms. Vance attempted to shift the burden to deal with insect infestations to Vance,” Judge Causey wrote. “However, the lease could not do so because Ms. Vance did not waive the warranty of habitability by signing the lease agreement.”

The appeals court also rejected another argument by Mr. Parrish that the circuit court hadn’t had sufficient evidence to determine the fleas had been there prior to Ms. Vance moving in.

During a hearing on the case this past September, Ms. Vance’s attorney, Karen Leiser, argued that the circuit court hadn’t been unreasonable in its ruling.

“If the tenant had somehow brought the fleas with her or had caused an infestation in some way, it is possible that that burden would shift to her to remediate the problem, but that is not what the trial court found,” Ms. Leiser told the appeals court.

“The trial court found that the fleas must have already been there, and therefore it was the landlord’s obligation under the statute to remedy that problem.”

Judge Causey concluded that even though Mr. Parrish “asserts that Ms. Vance caused the flea infestation, the circuit court was entitled to credit” other testimony

“that the flea activity had been ongoing for months, even before Ms. Vance took possession of the property.”