I verbally, nothing in writing, (I know I know) agreed with a friend that I would stay at a home he inherited to watch the place. I paid him rent monthly and have for over 2 years.

Sparing the boring details I'll cut to the chase. He now wants to give a 3-day notice for late rent and go to court.

My question is if there was never a rental agreement, contract or even receipts of previous payments made how can he give a formal notice or how can he prove how much is owed. I could say that the rent was only $10 a month - how could he prove otherwise?

Since our relationship wasn’t the formal "landlord-tenant" type, I would do a lot of repairs out of my pocket so he wouldn’t have to travel or worry about a thing and in turn he would work with us on our late, very late rent payments. Again this was a verbal agreement between us; we were fine with this arrangement. Never a problem between us.

Without a written lease, you're a month to month tenant. He has your previous payments as proof of the rent amount. You have the same.

You chose to do the repairs. They have nothing to do with your late rent payment.

You're suggesting that he should just forgive the late payments. He's ready, apparently, to find someone who will pay rent on time.