Borsuk v. Appellate Division of Superior Court, 242 Cal. App. 4th 607 (2015)

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      By contrast, in the instant case, there is no dispute that the unlawful detainer
complaint is valid on its face. The complaint is a Judicial Council form, and the
boxes are checked indicating that the requisite three-day notice was served in
compliance with the statutory scheme. Thus, even if the specific holding of Delta
were supportable (it is not), it would not govern here. For the foregoing reasons,
we disagree with Delta and hold that a motion to quash service of summons is not
the proper remedy to test whether a complaint states a cause of action for unlawful
detainer or service of a notice to pay or quit.
      To avoid this conclusion, and contend that service of the notice to pay or
quit is jurisdictional, petitioner refers to cases describing service of the three-day
notice as “an essential prerequisite to a judgment declaring a lessor’s right to
possession under section 1161, subdivision 2. [Citations.]” (Liebovich, supra, 56
Cal.App.4th at p. 513; see also Lacrabere, supra, 141 Cal. at p. 556 [“It is an
essential prerequisite to the maintenance of an action for unlawful detainer, under
section 1161 of the Code of Civil Procedure, that a three days’ notice . . . should be
served upon the defendants, as subdivision 2 of that section requires.”]; Palm
Property, supra, 194 Cal.App.4th at p. 1425 [quoting Liebovich’s language that
proper service of the three-day notice is an essential prerequisite to a judgment for
possession].) We do not disagree with these statements: service of the three-day
notice is an essential prerequisite to an unlawful detainer action. But that is
because it is an element, not because it confers personal jurisdiction over the
tenant.6 In other words, the fact that the three-day notice must be “allege[d] . . . in