Q: Landlord served a 24-hr inspect affixed to my door with an entry time of 12am midnight...Is that reasonable?

A: Unless your landlord had some reason to believe that in your particular case 12 a.m. was a reasonable time (such as you work 2nd shift and just get home at midnight, etc.), I strongly doubt a Judge would find midnight to be a reasonable time for them to enter - and if they did, that could be a month's rent to you, plus your court costs and attorneys fees. Then, if the Judge believes they entered without truly giving you 24 hrs advance notice, that too could be worth the same amount to you. Lastly, if you notified him not to come in and he did anyway, that also has the same penalty so all told, if the Judge believes you over whatever story the landlord comes up with, it could be worth up to 3 month's rent, plus court costs and attorney's fees to you.

If they want to evict you for unapproved occupants, then the burden of proof will be on them to show that it was not just a temporary guest. Many leases specify how many nights a guest can stay before needing to be added to the lease. Regardless, as long as the guest is gone within 14 days of your being served the notice, everything should be fine. You can only be evicted if you are found to have an unapproved occupant after that 14 days, again with the burden of proof being on the landlord to establish both violations. If your lease does not specify how many days a guest can stay before needing to be added to the lease, then your landlord has an added burden of convincing the court that this particular guest stayed an unreasonable amount of time and that could be difficult to do. If the landlord can prove the first violation but not a second after the 14 days, then you get to stay just as nothing happened except that a repeat violation (assuming it can be proved) within 6 months can get you a 10 day notice of termination and there is no grace or cure period then though still, if you don't vacate the landlord would have to go to court to have you evicted and would have to prove both the first and the second violations, as well as that all his notices were legally worded correctly and lawfully served.

All in all, consider reviewing everything with a local landlord-tenant attorney to see what claims you may have. If, after interviewing you and inspecting the evidence, the attorney believes your case is as strong as you make it sound in this posting, it is the type of case where the attorney might well take it on a contingency meaning you would not have to pay them anything more for attorney's fees but rather they would rely upon collecting their fees from the landlord after winning. If somehow you did not win, you still would not owe them their attorney's fees (but you might owe the landlord's since winner gets a judgment against the loser for their costs and attorney's fees.). Good luck.