Free Texas Repair and Deduct Letter

Texas has a real statutory repair-and-deduct remedy, and it is more procedural than most. It gates on a separate liability section, it runs on four different clocks depending on what has failed, it caps the deduction against a formula rather than a flat sum, it makes documentation a statutory step rather than a good idea, and — the point most national summaries get backwards — it does not let the tenant pick up a wrench. This page works through Tex. Prop. Code § 92.0561 and its gateway in § 92.056 in the statute’s own words, including the 2025 amendment that brought cooling inside the rule.

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Texas builds its remedy out of notices, so the letter is doing statutory work rather than merely creating a record. Three separate provisions look back at what the notice said: § 92.056(b)(3) asks whether a subsequent written notice was given or the first went by tracked mail; § 92.0561(d)(2) asks whether at least one notice stated an intention to repair and gave a reasonable description of the intended repair; and § 92.0561(e) measures every waiting period from the delivery of that notice of intent. A letter that complains about a condition without saying what the tenant plans to do about it satisfies the first requirement and fails the second, which is the commonest way a Texas tenant reaches the end of the waiting period and finds the clock never started. The generator above produces a notice that carries the intent language and the description together, dated, so the delivery date the statute keeps referring back to is a fact rather than a recollection.

• The tenant’s name and the address of the dwelling, with the unit number.
• The person or place notice is going to — where rent is normally paid, per § 92.052(a)(1).
• The date, since every § 92.0561(e) clock runs from delivery of the notice of intent.
• A specific description of the condition, and whether it is sewage or flooding, a total loss of potable water, inadequate heat or cooled air, or another health-and-safety condition — because the trigger decides the waiting period.
• A statement that the tenant intends to repair or remedy the condition, which § 92.0561(d)(2) requires in at least one notice.
• A reasonable description of the intended repair, which the same subdivision requires alongside the statement of intent.
• The date of any earlier notice, and how each was delivered.
• Whether the notice is being sent by certified mail, return receipt requested, by registered mail, or by another tracked form — the route that removes the need for a second notice.
• A note that rent is current, since § 92.052(a)(2) and § 92.056(b)(6) both bar a delinquent tenant.
• Where an official has given written notice about the condition, that fact and its date, since two of the four triggers depend on it.
• The tenant’s signature and the date.

• Doing the work yourself. § 92.0561(f) says “repairs may not be made by the tenant, the tenant’s immediate family, the tenant’s employer or employees, or a company in which the tenant has an ownership interest.” The deduction fails even if the repair is perfect.
• Reading that prohibition as absolute. It opens with “Unless the landlord and tenant agree otherwise under Subsection (g),” and (g) lets the parties mutually agree for the tenant to repair at the landlord’s expense. Get it in writing first.
• Using seven days for everything. Sewage and flooding are immediate; a total loss of potable water and inadequate heat or cooled air are three days.
• Treating the cooling trigger as new-fangled or non-existent. “Cooling” and “cooled air” were added by H.B. 2037, effective September 1, 2025. Pre-amendment guides say heat only.
• Sending a complaint instead of a notice of intent. § 92.0561(d)(2) wants a stated intention to repair plus a reasonable description of the intended repair.
• Deducting without the paperwork. § 92.0561(j) makes furnishing the repair bill and the receipt, along with the balance of the rent, a statutory step.
• Contracting for more than the cap. § 92.0561(i) says the tenant “shall not have authority to contract for labor or materials in excess of what the tenant may deduct under this section,” and the landlord is not liable to the repairman.
• Terminating and then deducting. § 92.056(f)(3) makes a tenant who elects to terminate “not entitled to the other repair and deduct remedies under Section 92.0561.” They are alternatives.

It is a statutory remedy under Tex. Prop. Code § 92.0561: where the landlord is liable to the tenant under § 92.056(b), the tenant may have the condition repaired and take the cost off a later rent payment — but the work must be done by an independent contractor, not by the tenant. The section sits in Title 8, Chapter 92 (Residential Tenancies), Subchapter B (Repair or Closing of Leasehold), so nothing in it is a commercial provision.

§ 92.0561(a) states the link: “If the landlord is liable to the tenant under Section 92.056(b), the tenant may have the condition repaired or remedied and may deduct the cost from a subsequent rent payment as provided in this section.” That single cross-reference is why the Texas remedy cannot be described without describing § 92.056 first. It was added by Acts 1989, 71st Leg., ch. 650, amended in 1997, and amended again by Acts 2025, 89th Leg., R.S., Ch. 732 (H.B. 2037), effective September 1, 2025.

Note also the direction of the deduction. It comes off “a subsequent rent payment” — the tenant pays the balance of the rent and hands over the paperwork with it, rather than paying nothing and explaining later.

Six elements, all of which must hold. § 92.056(b) provides that a landlord is liable if: “(1) the tenant has given the landlord notice to repair or remedy a condition by giving that notice to the person to whom or to the place where the tenant’s rent is normally paid; (2) the condition materially affects the physical health or safety of an ordinary tenant; (3) the tenant has given the landlord a subsequent written notice to repair or remedy the condition after a reasonable time to repair or remedy the condition following the notice given under Subdivision (1) or the tenant has given the notice under Subdivision (1) by sending that notice by certified mail, return receipt requested, by registered mail, or by another form of mail that allows tracking of delivery from the United States Postal Service or a private delivery service; (4) the landlord has had a reasonable time to repair or remedy the condition after the landlord received the tenant’s notice under Subdivision (1) and, if applicable, the tenant’s subsequent notice under Subdivision (3); (5) the landlord has not made a diligent effort to repair or remedy the condition after the landlord received the tenant’s notice under Subdivision (1) and, if applicable, the tenant’s notice under Subdivision (3); and (6) the tenant was not delinquent in the payment of rent at the time any notice required by this subsection was given.”

Subdivision (3) is the one competitors most often flatten. It is an either/or: either the tenant gives two notices with the second in writing, or the tenant sends the first notice by tracked mail and no second notice is needed. Choosing the tracked-mail route at the outset removes a whole step from the process, which is worth knowing before the first notice goes out rather than after.

Receipt has its own rule. § 92.056(c) provides that a landlord “is considered to have received the tenant’s notice when the landlord or the landlord’s agent or employee has actually received the notice or when the United States Postal Service has attempted to deliver the notice to the landlord.” Attempted delivery counts, so a landlord who does not collect tracked mail has still received it.

Two layers, and both have to hold.

Layer one is the landlord’s duty. § 92.052(a) provides that a landlord “shall make a diligent effort to repair or remedy a condition if: (1) the tenant specifies the condition in a notice to the person to whom or to the place where rent is normally paid; (2) the tenant is not delinquent in the payment of rent at the time notice is given; and (3) the condition: (A) materially affects the physical health or safety of an ordinary tenant; or (B) arises from the landlord’s failure to provide and maintain in good operating condition a device to supply hot water of a minimum temperature of 120 degrees Fahrenheit.” The hot-water limb is a specific, checkable standard, and it is the only temperature Chapter 92 names.

Layer two is one of four triggering events under § 92.0561(d)(3): “(A) The landlord has failed to remedy the backup or overflow of raw sewage inside the tenant’s dwelling or the flooding from broken pipes or natural drainage inside the dwelling. (B) The landlord has expressly or impliedly agreed in the lease to furnish potable water to the tenant’s dwelling and the water service to the dwelling has totally ceased. (C) The landlord has expressly or impliedly agreed in the lease to furnish heating or cooling equipment; the equipment is producing inadequate heat or cooled air; and the landlord has been notified in writing by the appropriate local housing, building, or health official or other official having jurisdiction that the lack of heat or cooling materially affects the health or safety of an ordinary tenant. (D) The landlord has been notified in writing by the appropriate local housing, building, or health official or other official having jurisdiction that the condition materially affects the health or safety of an ordinary tenant.”

Two features of that list decide most real cases. First, cooling is new: the words covering cooling equipment and cooled air were added by H.B. 2037 (Acts 2025, 89th Leg., R.S., Ch. 732), effective September 1, 2025, so any guide describing paragraph (C) as heat-only is describing the pre-amendment statute. Second, paragraphs (C) and (D) are not self-executing. Each requires written notice from a local housing, building, or health official before the tenant may act. Only the sewage-and-flooding trigger in (A) and the total loss of potable water in (B) run on the tenant’s own notice alone. A tenant with a broken air conditioner and no official’s letter has not yet reached the remedy, however plainly the condition affects health.

§ 92.0561(d)(1) adds the last precondition: the landlord must have a duty to repair under § 92.052 “and the duty has not been waived in a written lease by the tenant under Subsection (e) or (f) of Section 92.006.” We did not read § 92.006 for this page and state nothing about what it permits; check the lease and that section before assuming the duty is intact. The general duty picture is set out in our guide to Texas habitability laws.

The cap is a formula, and it is a greater-of formula. § 92.0561(b), in its own words: the tenant’s deduction for the cost of the repair or remedy “may not exceed the amount of one month’s rent under the lease or $500, whichever is greater.” It is not simply a month’s rent, and it is not simply $500: for a tenant whose rent exceeds $500 the cap is a month’s rent, and for a tenant paying less than that the $500 floor applies. A page that prints only half of that formula is wrong for roughly half of Texas tenants, which is why both halves are printed here.

Where the rent is subsidised the measure changes. The same subsection provides that if the tenant’s rent “is subsidized in whole or in part by a governmental agency, the deduction limitation of one month’s rent shall mean the fair market rent for the dwelling and not the rent that the tenant pays. The fair market rent shall be determined by the governmental agency subsidizing the rent, or in the absence of such a determination, it shall be a reasonable amount of rent under the circumstances.” A subsidised tenant is therefore not confined to the small sum they personally pay.

Texas puts no limit on how many times the remedy is used. § 92.0561(c) allows repairs and deductions “as often as necessary so long as the total repairs and deductions in any one month do not exceed one month’s rent or $500, whichever is greater.” Note that this is the same greater-of formula as § 92.0561(b), applied to a monthly total rather than to a single job. The ceiling is a rolling monthly total rather than a count of uses — the opposite shape from states that cap the number of times a tenant may invoke the remedy in a year. Two jobs in the same month are counted together against the one figure; the same two jobs in consecutive months are not.

The cap also binds what the tenant may agree to. § 92.0561(i) provides: “The tenant shall not have authority to contract for labor or materials in excess of what the tenant may deduct under this section. The landlord is not liable to repairmen, contractors, or material suppliers who furnish labor or materials to repair or remedy the condition. A repairman or supplier shall not have a lien for materials or services arising out of repairs contracted for by the tenant under this section.” A tenant who signs a work order above the cap is personally on the hook for the excess, and the contractor has no lien to fall back on.

Not by default, and this is where Texas parts company with states like California, whose statute expressly lets the tenant do the work personally. § 92.0561(f) requires that repairs made pursuant to the tenant’s notice “must be made by an independent company, contractor, or repairman,” and excludes the tenant, the tenant’s immediate family, the tenant’s employer or employees, and a company in which the tenant has an ownership interest. Where the municipality requires the company, contractor, or repairman to be licensed, the person or entity doing the work must be licensed in accordance with those requirements.

Two boundaries around that rule are worth stating separately. The prohibition is a default the parties can displace. It opens with “Unless the landlord and tenant agree otherwise under Subsection (g),” and (g) permits a landlord and tenant to “mutually agree for the tenant to repair or remedy, at the landlord’s expense, any condition of the dwelling regardless of whether it materially affects the health or safety of an ordinary tenant.” The same subsection is careful to add that the landlord’s duty to repair conditions covered by the subchapter “may not be waived except as provided by Subsection (e) or (f) of Section 92.006.” So the parties may reallocate the labour; they may not use that agreement to erase the duty.

The structural bar is not displaceable in the same way. Its sentence stands on its own: “Repairs may not be made to the foundation or load-bearing structural elements of the building if it contains two or more dwelling units.” No tenant-arranged repair reaches those elements in a duplex or an apartment block, however the parties have agreed to divide the work.

§ 92.0561(h) closes the loop on quality: repairs made pursuant to the tenant’s notice “must be made in compliance with applicable building codes, including a building permit when required.” An unpermitted repair is not a compliant one, and the deduction rides on the repair being compliant.

Four clocks, all measured from delivery of the notice of intent to repair, all set out in § 92.0561(e). Sewage backup or overflow inside the dwelling, or flooding from broken pipes or natural drainage, lets the tenant have the condition repaired immediately following the notice of intent. A total cessation of potable water, and inadequate heat or cooled air, each give the landlord three days after delivery of the notice of intent. Everything else that affects the physical health or safety of an ordinary tenant gives the landlord seven days.

Those clocks sit alongside, and do not replace, the general presumption in § 92.056(d) that seven days is a reasonable time to repair — a presumption that is rebuttable, with the date of receipt, the severity and nature of the condition, and the reasonable availability of materials, labor and utilities all in the balance. A landlord who cannot get a part during a regional freeze is entitled to argue the presumption; a landlord who did nothing for a week is not helped by it.

One oddity should be reported rather than tidied away. As enacted, § 92.0561(e)(2) cross-refers to “Paragraph (A)” for the potable-water trigger, although potable water is Paragraph (B). All three published sources we read reproduce it identically, so it is the statute’s own text and not a transcription slip. We quote it as written and build no argument on it.

A landlord can also interrupt the process. § 92.0562 provides for an affidavit for delay; we did not read that section and describe none of its contents. What § 92.0561(k) does say is what happens when it lands late: if the landlord repairs the condition or delivers such an affidavit “after the tenant has contacted a repairman but before the repairman commences work, the landlord shall be liable for the cost incurred by the tenant for the repairman’s trip charge, and the tenant may deduct the charge from the tenant’s rent as if it were a repair cost.”

Conditions the tenant’s side caused. § 92.052(b): “Unless the condition was caused by normal wear and tear, the landlord does not have a duty during the lease term or a renewal or extension to repair or remedy a condition caused by: (1) the tenant; (2) a lawful occupant in the tenant’s dwelling; (3) a member of the tenant’s family; or (4) a guest or invitee of the tenant.” Normal wear and tear is the carve-out, and it does real work: an appliance that failed with age was not caused by the tenant.

Delinquent rent. Both § 92.052(a)(2) and § 92.056(b)(6) bar a tenant who was behind on rent when notice was given. This is the quietest way a Texas repair claim dies, because the defect is genuine, the notice is well drafted, and the tenant was simply late that month.

Waiver in a written lease under § 92.006(e) or (f), via § 92.0561(d)(1), and casualty loss, since § 92.056(a) subjects landlord liability to § 92.054. Neither of those sections was read for this page, so we describe what they permit not at all — only that the statute routes through them.

§ 92.056(e) sets out the tenant’s menu: terminate the lease; have the condition repaired or remedied under § 92.0561; deduct the cost of the repair from rent “without necessity of judicial action” under § 92.0561; or obtain judicial remedies under § 92.0563.

They are not a sequence, and one of them is a fork. § 92.056(f)(3) provides that a tenant who elects to terminate is “not entitled to the other repair and deduct remedies under Section 92.0561.” So a tenant who gives notice of termination has chosen; a tenant who wants the repair and the deduction should not describe the tenancy as ended. Ending a Texas tenancy early is covered in our guide to breaking a lease in Texas, and the wider statutory map in Texas landlord tenant laws.

One duty runs the other way and is worth knowing about. § 92.056(g) requires that “a lease must contain language in underlined or bold print that informs the tenant of the remedies available under this section and Section 92.0561.” If a Texas lease says nothing about repair remedies in underlined or bold print, that is a defect in the lease, not evidence that the remedies do not exist.

Every quoted string above was read across three secondary hosts that agree phrase for phrase: Justia’s 2025 Texas Statutes, codes.findlaw.com and texas.public.law. For § 92.0561 the 2025 amendment rests on the first two: Justia’s 2025 capture and FindLaw independently carry the amended “cooling” language, while texas.public.law’s own currency stamp predates that amendment, so it was not relied on for that section’s currency. Each host was tested against a deliberately fabricated section number to confirm it does not simply return something for any URL — a control worth running, because one of those hosts serves its misses at HTTP 200 rather than 404.

The state’s own statutes viewer at capitol.texas.gov was tried first and could not be used: it loads its statute text by script, so a direct fetch returns the site’s navigation chrome and nothing of the chapter, and it does so identically for a chapter that exists and one that does not. That is a limitation on this page’s sourcing and we would rather state it than imply an official reading we did not make. It also means the safest way for a reader to check the current text is a source that serves the words, dated, with its amendment history attached.

Everything above turns on one question — what has to happen before a Texas tenant may spend money on a repair — and the answer is what it is because Texas decides who is allowed to hold the wrench. If the tenancy itself is ending rather than the fixture, the notice that ends it follows separate rules entirely: Texas eviction notice laws.

Money withheld over a repair and money withheld from a deposit are decided under different rules, and treating them as one question is expensive — what a landlord may keep and by when it must come back is Texas security deposit laws. And if the condition makes staying unrealistic, leaving early carries its own exposure: breaking a lease in Texas.

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