Terminating Month-to-Month lease in NJ

[Jesse M.]

Hi BP,

I have a question/confusion about terminating a month to month lease in NJ.  NJ has a restrictive anti-eviction law where the landlord must renew the lease except for good cause.

One of the valid reasons is of course non payment of rent.

Based on my understanding, NJ landlords can immediately file for eviction without notice in the event of non-payment of rent.  However, it looks like if the tenant then pays the rent after the eviction is filed, then the case gets dismissed.

If hypothetically a certain tenant of mine didn't pay the rent, i'd like to use that opportunity to just not renew the lease and issue a 30-day "notice of termination of the lease".

Has anyone done this in NJ? If so, did you have any issue if the tenant later paid up their rent and then failed to move at the end of the lease which you tried to terminate?  I would have thought that if you filed eviction then, it would be for their failure to move at the end of the terminated lease, and no longer for non payment of rent....hence their paying the rent after that shouldn't be a defense right?

Seems a bit technical, perhaps a question I should ask a lawyer? (lawyers bill annoyingly large amounts in my experience : )  Thanks for any comments!