How much can a Georgia landlord charge for a security deposit?

No more than two months' rent. O.C.G.A. 44-7-30.1 provides that no landlord shall demand or receive a security deposit in an amount that exceeds the equivalent of two months' rent. That section was created by the Safe at Home Act, House Bill 404, which took effect on July 1, 2024 and applies to residential lease agreements entered into or renewed on or after that date. Before that date Georgia had no cap at all.

Does a Georgia landlord have to give the tenant a move-in list before taking a deposit?

Yes. O.C.G.A. 44-7-33 provides that prior to tendering a security deposit the tenant shall be presented with a comprehensive list of any existing damage to the premises, which is for the tenant's permanent retention. The tenant may inspect the premises to check the list before taking occupancy, both parties sign it, and a tenant who refuses to sign must state the disputed items specifically in writing. Georgia is one of very few states in which a written document is a precondition of taking a deposit at all.

How long does a Georgia landlord have to return the security deposit?

Thirty days after obtaining possession as provided in O.C.G.A. 44-7-33, under O.C.G.A. 44-7-34. Nothing may be retained for ordinary wear and tear. Where there is actual cause to retain a portion, the landlord must deliver a written statement identifying the exact reasons, including the damage list, together with payment of the balance. Mailing to the tenant's last known address by first-class mail is compliance.

Which Georgia landlords are exempt from the security deposit rules?

O.C.G.A. 44-7-36 disapplies Code Sections 44-7-31, 44-7-32, 44-7-33 and 44-7-35 to rental units owned by a natural person where that person, their spouse and their minor children collectively own ten or fewer rental units - unless management, including rent collection, is performed for a fee by third persons. The exemption does not reach the thirty-day return duty in 44-7-34 or the two-month cap in 44-7-30.1, because 44-7-36 does not name those sections.

What are the penalties if a Georgia landlord wrongly keeps a deposit?

Three stacked consequences under O.C.G.A. 44-7-35. The landlord may retain nothing where the money was not escrowed or bonded and the damage lists were not made. Late lists and statements work a forfeiture of all rights to withhold any portion and of the right to sue the tenant for damage to the premises. And a landlord who fails to return a part required to be returned is liable for three times the sum improperly withheld plus reasonable attorney's fees, unless the withholding was unintentional and resulted from a bona fide error.

How much notice must a Georgia landlord give before entering?

None, by statute. O.C.G.A. Title 44, Chapter 7 contains no landlord access or entry provision anywhere in Article 1, Article 2 or Article 3. Georgia therefore sets no notice period before entry, and any right of entry and any notice before it exist only because the lease creates them. The commonly quoted twenty-four hours is a lease term or nothing. The only entry-adjacent section, 44-7-4, lets local governments set minimum security standards against unauthorized entry by third parties.

How much notice ends a Georgia month-to-month tenancy?

Sixty days from the landlord, thirty days from the tenant. O.C.G.A. 44-7-7 reads in full that sixty days' notice from the landlord or thirty days' notice from the tenant is necessary to terminate a tenancy at will, and under 44-7-6 a tenancy with no specified termination is construed to be a tenancy at will. The asymmetry is the whole rule and it is frequently reported as thirty days for both sides.

What notice comes before an eviction in Georgia?

For money owed, a notice to vacate or pay within three business days under O.C.G.A. 44-7-50, added by the Safe at Home Act. It covers rent, late fees, utilities and other charges owed to the landlord, not lease violations generally. That notice, and the ordinary demand for possession, must be posted in a sealed envelope conspicuously on the door and delivered by any additional method agreed upon in the rental agreement.

Is a Georgia lease deemed to include a warranty of habitability?

Yes, since July 1, 2024. O.C.G.A. 44-7-13 now provides that any agreement for the use or rental of real property as a dwelling place is deemed to include a provision that the premises is fit for human habitation. Because 44-7-2 forbids waiving rights under 44-7-13 and 44-7-14, that provision cannot be waived. The version of House Bill 404 as introduced would have allowed a waiver on leases longer than five years; the enacted Act dropped that exception.

Can a Georgia lease make the tenant pay the landlord's attorney fees?

Only if the clause runs both ways. O.C.G.A. 44-7-2 makes a provision for the tenant to pay the landlord's attorney's fees on the tenant's breach void unless the provision also requires the landlord to pay the tenant's attorney's fees on the landlord's breach. Georgia neither bans a fee clause nor blesses a one-sided one - it voids the one-sided version by operation of statute, so a clause copied from an out-of-state template is usually unenforceable here.

Can a Georgia landlord shut off utilities during an eviction?

No. O.C.G.A. 44-7-14.1 makes it unlawful for a landlord knowingly and willfully to suspend the furnishing of utilities to a tenant until after the final disposition of any dispossessory proceeding against that tenant, with a fine on conviction of up to five hundred dollars. The Safe at Home Act rewrote the definition so that utilities now means cooling, heat, light and water service.

Does rent stop if a Georgia rental burns down?

Not by statute. O.C.G.A. 44-7-15 provides that the destruction of a tenement by fire, or the loss of possession by any casualty not caused by the landlord or arising from a defect of the landlord's title, shall not abate the rent contracted to be paid. Georgia's default runs against the tenant, so a lease that promises abatement or termination on a casualty is changing Georgia law rather than restating it.

What is retaliation under Georgia landlord-tenant law?

O.C.G.A. 44-7-24 gives the tenant a prima-facie case where a protected act about a life, health, safety or habitability concern is followed within three months by the landlord filing a dispossessory, depriving the tenant of use, decreasing services, increasing rent, terminating, or materially interfering with lease rights. The remedy is a defense to the dispossessory plus one month's rent plus five hundred dollars, costs, fees where conduct is willful, wanton or malicious, and declaratory relief. A code-compliance inspection within the prior twelve months is a rebuttable defense.

Are local rent control ordinances allowed in Georgia?

No. O.C.G.A. 44-7-19 provides that no county or municipal corporation may enact, maintain or enforce any ordinance or resolution regulating in any way the amount of rent to be charged for privately owned single-family or multiple-unit residential rental property. Local rent regulation is preempted statewide, with a narrow carve-out for property the local government itself owns.

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Free Georgia Residential Lease Agreement

Georgia residential lease agreement walk-through

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A configurable Georgia residential lease agreement that generates a signable multi-page PDF. Built to O.C.G.A. Title 44, Chapter 7 as amended by the Safe at Home Act — the two-month deposit cap, the move-in damage list Georgia requires before the deposit is tendered, and the 30-day return backed by treble damages.

Georgia O.C.G.A. 44-7-1 2-Month Cap Free PDF 2026 Edition

Updated Q3 2026 By Tenant Screening Background Check Editorial Team Scope Georgia ~14 min read

A Georgia residential lease agreement is the written contract governed by O.C.G.A. Title 44, Chapter 7, beginning at 44-7-1. Georgia never adopted the uniform residential landlord and tenant act, so its chapter is short, old in places, and unusually specific in others — and in 2024 it changed more than it had in decades. The Safe at Home Act, House Bill 404, took effect on July 1, 2024 and applies to leases entered into or renewed on or after that date. It capped the security deposit at two months’ rent in a brand-new section, 44-7-30.1; it deemed every residential agreement to include a provision that the premises is fit for human habitation under 44-7-13; it added cooling to the utilities a landlord may not cut off during an eviction under 44-7-14.1; and it built a three-business-day notice to vacate or pay into 44-7-50. Two older rules still catch out more Georgia landlords than any of that: the written list of existing damage that 44-7-33 requires before a deposit may be tendered, and the ten-or-fewer-unit exemption in 44-7-36, which switches off four Code sections for small owners but not the two that matter most.

Georgia Lease Rules at a Glance

Security Deposit Cap

2 Months

Deposit Return

30 Days

Entry Notice

No Statute

Tenancy-at-Will Notice

60 / 30 Days

The Georgia rule imported templates never carry: O.C.G.A. 44-7-33(a) requires the tenant to be presented with a comprehensive written list of existing damage prior to tendering a security deposit, for the tenant’s permanent retention. It is not a best practice in Georgia. It is a precondition, and O.C.G.A. 44-7-35(a) ties the landlord’s right to retain anything at all to having done it.

Four Georgia Rules That Catch Landlords Out

First, the notice periods are not symmetrical. O.C.G.A. 44-7-7 reads, in its entirety, that sixty days’ notice from the landlord or thirty days’ notice from the tenant is necessary to end a tenancy at will — and O.C.G.A. 44-7-6 turns any tenancy with no specified termination into a tenancy at will. Second, the move-in list comes before the money. Under O.C.G.A. 44-7-33(a) the list of existing damage must be presented prior to tendering the deposit; a landlord who takes the deposit first has already lost ground under 44-7-35. Third, the small-landlord exemption is narrower than it sounds. O.C.G.A. 44-7-36 switches off 44-7-31, 44-7-32, 44-7-33 and 44-7-35 for a natural person whose household owns ten or fewer units — but it does not name 44-7-34 or 44-7-30.1, so the thirty-day return and the two-month cap still bind, and hiring a manager for a fee cancels the exemption entirely. Fourth, Georgia has no entry statute. The twenty-four-hour figure repeated across the internet is not Georgia law; if your lease does not create a notice period, none exists.

How to Fill Out This Georgia Lease Agreement

The Seven-Step Georgia Sequence

1. Name the owner and the manager

O.C.G.A. 44-7-3 requires written disclosure, at or before the commencement of the tenancy, of the names and addresses of the owner of record or a person authorized to act for the owner for service of process, and of the person authorized to manage the premises. Get it wrong and 44-7-3(b) makes whoever signed the lease the owner’s agent for service and for performing the landlord’s obligations.

2. Describe the premises and choose the term

Enter the address, county and property type. Choose the term carefully: under O.C.G.A. 44-7-6 a tenancy with no specified termination is construed as a tenancy at will, which then takes sixty days’ notice from the landlord under 44-7-7.

3. Set rent, the due day and any late fee

Georgia sets no late-fee cap and no grace period. A late fee is a contract term tested as liquidated damages under O.C.G.A. 13-6-7. Since the Safe at Home Act it also has procedural weight, because O.C.G.A. 44-7-50 folds late fees into the three-business-day notice to vacate or pay.

4. Keep the deposit under two months’ rent

O.C.G.A. 44-7-30.1 provides that no landlord shall demand or receive a security deposit exceeding the equivalent of two months’ rent. A pet deposit counts, because O.C.G.A. 44-7-30(3) puts pet deposits inside the definition of a security deposit.

5. Answer the ten-or-fewer-unit question honestly

The form asks how many rental units the landlord’s household owns and whether a third party manages for a fee, because O.C.G.A. 44-7-36 changes which sections apply. The generated lease then states the correct set of duties instead of asserting rules that may not bind this landlord — or omitting rules that do.

6. Create the terms Georgia leaves to the lease

Set the entry notice period, because no statute supplies one. Name the additional delivery methods for a demand for possession, because O.C.G.A. 44-7-50(d) requires delivery by any method agreed upon in the rental agreement and a lease that names none leaves the landlord with only the door posting.

7. Present the move-in list, then take the deposit

Download the PDF and sign. Then, before the deposit changes hands, give the tenant the comprehensive list of existing damage that O.C.G.A. 44-7-33(a) requires, let the tenant inspect, and have both parties sign it or the tenant record a written dissent.

Build Your Georgia Residential Lease Agreement

Complete the fields below to generate a Georgia residential lease agreement as a signable multi-page PDF. Every field you fill is written into the document, including the utility allocations, the deposit-holding method and each disclosure you check, and the generated lease cites the controlling Georgia section at each point. Before handing over keys, run proper tenant screening — the lease governs the relationship, screening decides whether you want it. Pair the signed lease with a Georgia move-in / move-out checklist, which is the document O.C.G.A. 44-7-33 actually demands rather than merely recommends.

Georgia Residential Lease Agreement Builder

1. Parties

Landlord (owner of record) full legal name

Landlord phone

Owner address for service of process and notices (O.C.G.A. 44-7-3)

Person authorized to MANAGE the premises

Manager address

Tenant 1 full legal name

Tenant 2 full legal name (if any)

Additional tenants (comma-separated)

Authorized occupants who are not tenants (minors, etc.)

2. Premises

Rental property address (street, unit, city, ZIP)

County

Property type

Year built (pre-1978 triggers federal lead disclosure)

Bedrooms / bathrooms

Address for Tenant’s written repair notices (O.C.G.A. 44-7-13)

3. Term

Under O.C.G.A. 44-7-6, where no time is specified for termination the law construes the tenancy to be a tenancy at will — and O.C.G.A. 44-7-7 then requires sixty days’ notice from the landlord but only thirty from the tenant.

Lease type

Term length in months (if other)

Lease start date

Lease end date (if fixed)

4. Rent

Monthly rent (dollars)

Rent due day of month

Late fee — Georgia sets no cap; it is tested as liquidated damages (O.C.G.A. 13-6-7)

Grace period in days (Georgia provides none by statute)

Acceptable payment methods (comma-separated)

5. Security Deposit — capped at two months’ rent

O.C.G.A. 44-7-30.1, added by the Safe at Home Act (HB 404, effective July 1, 2024), caps the deposit at two months’ rent. Answer the unit-count question honestly: O.C.G.A. 44-7-36 exempts a natural person whose household owns ten or fewer rental units from the escrow, damage-list and treble-damage sections — but not from the thirty-day return duty and not from the cap.

Total security deposit (dollars)

Additional pet deposit (dollars)

Rental units owned by Landlord’s household (O.C.G.A. 44-7-36)

How the deposit is held

A third party performs management, including rent collection, for a fee — this cancels the ten-or-fewer-unit exemption (O.C.G.A. 44-7-36)

Location of the