diff --git a/src/axolotl/utils/models.py b/src/axolotl/utils/models.py
index 51c704429..2b8728405 100644
--- a/src/axolotl/utils/models.py
+++ b/src/axolotl/utils/models.py
@@ -637,9 +637,7 @@ def set_quantization_config(self) -> None:
                 self.model_kwargs["quantization_config"] = BitsAndBytesConfig(
                     **self.model_config.quantization_config
                 )
-        elif self.cfg.adapter == "qlora" and (
-            "load_in_4bit" in self.model_kwargs and self.model_kwargs["load_in_4bit"]
-        ):
+        elif self.cfg.adapter == "qlora" and self.model_kwargs["load_in_4bit"]:
             bnb_config = {
                 "load_in_4bit": True,
                 "llm_int8_threshold": 6.0,
@@ -662,9 +660,7 @@ def set_quantization_config(self) -> None:
             self.model_kwargs["quantization_config"] = BitsAndBytesConfig(
                 **bnb_config,
             )
-        elif self.cfg.adapter == "lora" and (
-            "load_in_8bit" in self.model_kwargs and self.model_kwargs["load_in_8bit"]
-        ):
+        elif self.cfg.adapter == "lora" and self.model_kwargs["load_in_8bit"]:
             bnb_config = {
                 "load_in_8bit": True,
             }
@@ -677,10 +673,8 @@ def set_quantization_config(self) -> None:
 
         # no longer needed per https://github.com/huggingface/transformers/pull/26610
         if "quantization_config" in self.model_kwargs or self.cfg.gptq:
-            if "load_in_8bit" in self.model_kwargs:
-                del self.model_kwargs["load_in_8bit"]
-            if "load_in_4bit" in self.model_kwargs:
-                del self.model_kwargs["load_in_4bit"]
+            self.model_kwargs.pop("load_in_8bit", None)
+            self.model_kwargs.pop("load_in_4bit", None)
 
     def set_attention_config(self) -> None:
         """