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

There is no limit. Minn. Stat. ch. 504B contains no maximum on a residential security deposit anywhere. Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subdivision 1 says only that money deposits securing performance of residential rental agreements, excluding advance rent payments, are governed by the section. What Minnesota regulates is what happens to the money afterwards: 1% simple noncompounded interest, a three-week return deadline, the burden of proof on the landlord, and two separate penalty provisions.

How long does a Minnesota landlord have to return a security deposit?

Three weeks, which is 21 days. Under Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subdivision 3 the landlord must, within three weeks after termination of the tenancy and after receiving the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions, either return the deposit with interest or furnish a written statement showing the specific reason for withholding it. The deadline shortens to five days where the tenant left because the building was legally condemned for reasons not due to the tenant's own wilful, malicious or irresponsible conduct.

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

They stack. Under Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subdivision 4 a landlord who misses the deadline is liable for the amount withheld and its interest as a penalty, in addition to the amount wrongfully withheld and its interest. Under subdivision 7 bad-faith retention adds punitive damages of up to five hundred dollars for each deposit, and retention is presumed to be in bad faith where the deposit is not returned within two weeks after the action is commenced. The landlord bears the burden of proving a withholding was reasonable.

How much notice must a Minnesota landlord give before entering?

At least 24 hours, and only between eight in the morning and eight at night. Minn. Stat. 504B.211 subdivision 2 requires a good faith effort to give reasonable notice under the circumstances of not less than twenty-four hours in advance, for a reasonable business purpose. The tenant may consent to less but may not be required to waive the right to notice as a condition of the lease. Subdivision 6 gives the tenant a rent reduction or rescission, recovery of the damage deposit, a civil penalty of up to five hundred dollars for each violation, and attorney fees.

Does a Minnesota landlord have to give notice before filing an eviction for unpaid rent?

Yes, since the 2023 rewrite. Minn. Stat. 504B.321 subdivision 1a requires a written pre-eviction notice giving the tenant fourteen days from the date of the notice to pay the total amount due or move out. The notice must state the total amount due with an itemized breakdown, the name and address of the person authorized to receive rent, the tenant's right to seek legal assistance and the availability of Legal Aid, information about financial help including county or tribal social services and the 2-1-1 hotline, and the fourteen-day statement itself. A complaint filed without the notice attached is dismissed without prejudice and the case file is expunged.

How much late fee can a Minnesota landlord charge?

No more than 8% of the overdue rent payment, under Minn. Stat. 504B.177, and only where the landlord and tenant have agreed in writing and the agreement specifies when the late fee will be imposed. No written agreement means no late fee at all. The due date does not include any earlier deadline the lease offers for a discount. Where a federal rule governing a subsidized tenancy conflicts with the cap the federal rule governs, and under a housing assistance payment contract the fee applies only to the tenant's portion of the rent.

What must appear on the first page of a Minnesota lease?

Two independent sections regulate page one. Minn. Stat. 504B.120 requires every nonoptional fee to be disclosed in the lease and requires the sum of rent and all nonoptional fees to be described as the Total Monthly Payment and listed on the first page, with treble damages and attorney fees for a breach. Minn. Stat. 504B.146 requires the lease start date, the lease end date and any prorated rent amount to be provided on the first page.

Can a Minnesota lease waive the landlord's repair duties?

No. Minn. Stat. 504B.161 subdivision 1(b) states that the parties to a lease or license of residential premises may not waive or modify the covenants imposed by the section. Those covenants include fitness for the intended use, reasonable repair including extermination of insects, rodents, vermin and other pests, energy efficiency measures, compliance with health and safety laws including rental licensing ordinances, and heat at a minimum of 68 degrees Fahrenheit from October 1 through April 30. Subdivision 3 adds that an opportunity to inspect before signing does not defeat the covenants.

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

One full rental period. Minn. Stat. 504B.135 provides that a tenancy at will may be terminated by either party by written notice, and the time of the notice must be at least as long as the interval between the times rent is due or three months, whichever is less. For a monthly tenancy that is one month; for a weekly tenancy it is 7 days; where the rent interval runs longer than three months the notice is capped at three months. Minn. Stat. 504B.147 separately forbids the landlord to give a shorter notice than the lease demands of the tenant.

Can a Minnesota tenant stop an eviction by paying the rent?

Usually yes. Minn. Stat. 504B.291 subdivision 1 lets the tenant redeem the tenancy at any time before possession is delivered by paying the rent in arrears with interest, the costs of the action, and an attorney's fee not to exceed five dollars, unless the landlord has also alleged a lease violation under Minn. Stat. 504B.285 subdivision 5. Rent paid applies first to arrears from a prior period before current rent unless the court finds the prior claim waived.

What changed in Minnesota landlord-tenant law on August 1, 2026?

2026 Minn. Laws ch. 81 took effect. It rewrote Minn. Stat. 504B.118 into a Payment of Rent section requiring a fee-free alternative to any digital payment platform and giving the tenant an affirmative defence to eviction where both the platform and the alternative fail; created Minn. Stat. 504B.2136, barring a landlord from naming a tenant's minor child as a defendant in an eviction complaint with actual damages or three hundred dollars for a breach; added Minn. Stat. 504B.216 subdivision 7a on estimated final utility bills; and amended Minn. Stat. 504B.321 subdivision 2 to cover assault on the landlord or the landlord's employees or contractors and to raise the abuse penalty from five hundred to seven hundred fifty dollars.

Does a Minnesota lease need a radon or bed bug disclosure?

Neither. The Minnesota Radon Awareness Act at Minn. Stat. 144.496 and the disclosure duty at Minn. Stat. 513.61 both govern the sale of residential real property, not a lease. Minnesota has no bed bug statute at all, and Minn. Stat. 504B.245, which is sometimes cited for one, is actually the remedies provision for a violation of the tenant screening report rules in Minn. Stat. 504B.241. Infestations reach Minnesota law through the non-waivable extermination covenant in Minn. Stat. 504B.161 and through serious infestation as an emergency ground under Minn. Stat. 504B.381.

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

It can, but it will not stay one-sided. Minn. Stat. 504B.172 provides that if a residential lease specifies an action, circumstances, or an extent to which a landlord may recover attorney fees, directly or through additional rent, the tenant is entitled to attorney fees if the tenant prevails in the same type of action, under the same circumstances, or is entitled to costs under Minn. Stat. 549.02, and to the same extent the lease specifies for the landlord. Minnesota converts the clause rather than voiding it.

What inspection rights does a Minnesota tenant have at move-in and move-out?

Minn. Stat. 504B.182, created in 2023, requires the landlord to notify the tenant at the commencement of the tenancy or within fourteen days of occupancy of the option to request an initial inspection identifying existing deficiencies, and to notify the tenant in writing of the option to request a move-out inspection held no earlier than five days before the end so the tenant can remedy what it finds. As an alternative the landlord may, with the tenant's agreement, provide written acknowledgment of photographs or video. Subdivision 4 voids any waiver as contrary to public policy.

Is a written lease required in Minnesota?

Only for larger buildings. Minn. Stat. 504B.111 requires a landlord of a residential building with twelve or more residential units to have a written lease for each unit, identifying the specific unit before the tenant signs, on pain of a petty misdemeanor. Below twelve units Minnesota compels no written lease. But Minn. Stat. 504B.120, 504B.146 and 504B.216 all dictate what a lease must contain if there is one, so an oral Minnesota tenancy leaves both sides without the protections those sections build into the document.

What happens if a Minnesota landlord shuts off the utilities or changes the locks?

Two separate remedies apply. Minn. Stat. 504B.221 makes a landlord who interrupts electricity, heat, gas or water liable for treble damages or five hundred dollars, whichever is greater, plus reasonable attorney fees, subject only to narrow defences, and voids any waiver. Minn. Stat. 504B.375 lets a tenant unlawfully excluded or removed — expressly including by the termination of utilities or the removal of doors, windows or locks — file a verified petition, and the court may immediately order possession restored, with the sheriff executing the order.

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Free Minnesota Residential Lease Agreement

Minnesota residential lease agreement walk-through

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A configurable Minnesota residential lease agreement that generates a signable multi-page PDF. Built to current Minn. Stat. ch. 504B — the Total Monthly Payment that must sit on page one, the three-week deposit return, and the 14-day pre-eviction notice no template page mentions.

Minnesota Minn. Stat. ch. 504B 21-Day Return Free PDF 2026 Edition

Updated Q3 2026 By Tenant Screening Background Check Editorial Team Scope Minnesota ~16 min read

A Minnesota residential lease agreement is the written contract between a landlord and a residential tenant, governed by a single chapter of the statute book: Minn. Stat. ch. 504B, which runs from leasing and rent through the landlord’s covenants, the tenant’s remedies and the whole of eviction procedure. Minnesota never adopted the Uniform Residential Landlord and Tenant Act, so nothing carries over from a uniform-act neighbour, and the chapter has been rewritten harder than almost any other state’s in the last three sessions. The 2023 omnibus housing article created the Total Monthly Payment rule in Minn. Stat. 504B.120, the move-in and move-out inspection rights in Minn. Stat. 504B.182, and the fourteen-day pre-eviction notice in Minn. Stat. 504B.321. Then 2026 Minn. Laws ch. 81 took effect on August 1, 2026 — five days before this page was verified — and on that day the codified text of Minn. Stat. 504B.118 on the revisor’s own site still showed the pre-amendment section under its pre-amendment title. A lease copied from a template last refreshed in 2024 is wrong on all of it.

Minnesota Lease Rules at a Glance

Security Deposit Maximum

None

Deposit Return

21 Days

Entry Notice

24 Hours

Pre-Eviction Notice

14 Days

The change no Minnesota template page has caught up with: since the 2023 rewrite, Minn. Stat. 504B.321, subd. 1a requires a landlord to serve a written fourteen-day pre-eviction notice with five prescribed contents before filing for nonpayment. File without it and the case is dismissed without prejudice and the file expunged.

Four Minnesota Rules That Catch Landlords Out

First, Minnesota regulates the first page of the lease. Minn. Stat. 504B.120 requires every nonoptional fee to be disclosed and requires rent plus all nonoptional fees to be described as the Total Monthly Payment and listed on page one, on pain of treble damages; Minn. Stat. 504B.146 independently requires the start date, the end date and any prorated rent there too. Second, there is no deposit cap but the penalties stack — Minn. Stat. 504B.178, subd. 4 makes the withheld amount and its interest a penalty on top of the amount wrongfully withheld, and subd. 7 adds punitive damages for bad faith. Third, the habitability covenants cannot be waived at all under Minn. Stat. 504B.161, subd. 1(b), and they include heat at a minimum of 68 degrees from October 1 through April 30. Fourth, a one-sided attorney-fee clause does not stay one-sided: Minn. Stat. 504B.172 hands the tenant the mirror-image entitlement by operation of law.

How to Fill Out This Minnesota Lease Agreement

The Seven-Step Minnesota Sequence

1. Name the manager and the agent for service of process

Minn. Stat. 504B.181 requires the landlord to disclose in writing two people: the person authorized to manage the premises, and the landlord or an agent authorized to accept service of process. Subdivision 4 gives that duty teeth — no action to recover rent or possession may be maintained unless the information was disclosed, or was known to the tenant thirty days before the action began.

2. Describe the premises and record the building size

Minn. Stat. 504B.111 requires a written lease for every unit in a building of twelve or more residential units, and requires that lease to identify the specific unit before the tenant signs. Failing to provide one is a petty misdemeanor. The form records the building size because the answer changes whether the lease is compulsory or merely sensible.

3. Set the term, the renewal position and the notice period

Minn. Stat. 504B.146 puts the start and end dates on page one. Minn. Stat. 504B.145 makes an automatic renewal clause unenforceable unless the landlord sends a warning notice by certified mail between fifteen and thirty days before the tenant’s own notice deadline. And Minn. Stat. 504B.147 caps the landlord’s notice from the other end: it may never be shorter than the notice the lease demands of the tenant.

4. List every nonoptional fee and total the monthly payment

This is the field competitors do not have. Minn. Stat. 504B.120 requires all nonoptional fees to be disclosed in the lease and the sum of rent plus those fees to be described as the Total Monthly Payment on the first page. The generator performs the arithmetic, applies the statutory label, and puts the result where the section requires it.

5. Set the deposit and the late fee

Minnesota sets no maximum deposit, so the number is a commercial decision. What is not optional is Minn. Stat. 504B.178: 1% simple noncompounded interest, and return or a written statement of the specific reason for withholding within three weeks. The late fee is capped by Minn. Stat. 504B.177 at 8% of the overdue rent payment, and only where the written agreement says when the fee is imposed.

6. Check the disclosures Minnesota requires

Landlord and agent identification, the Total Monthly Payment, the lease duration notice, outstanding inspection and condemnation orders under Minn. Stat. 504B.195, any pending foreclosure under Minn. Stat. 504B.151, the shared-metered UTILITY BILLS attachment under Minn. Stat. 504B.216, the service animal no-fee statement under Minn. Stat. 504B.113, and the attorney general’s statement notice under Minn. Stat. 504B.275. Lead paint is federal.

7. Generate, sign, and hand every signing tenant a copy

Download the multi-page PDF and sign. No witnesses and no notary are needed. Minn. Stat. 504B.115 does require the landlord to give a copy of a written lease to every tenant occupying the unit whose signature appears on it, and lets the landlord take a signed receipt as prima facie evidence of delivery.

Build Your Minnesota Residential Lease Agreement

Complete the fields below to generate a Minnesota residential lease agreement as a signable multi-page PDF. Every field you fill is written into the document, including the utility allocations, the nonoptional fee total, the metering arrangement, the entry window and each disclosure you check, and the generated lease cites the controlling Minnesota section at each point. Before handing over keys, run proper tenant screening — and note that Minnesota regulates the screening stage too, from what an application fee may cover to which court records a landlord may not consider. Pair the signed lease with a Minnesota move-in / move-out checklist, because the inspection rights in Minn. Stat. 504B.182 are only as useful as the record they produce.

Minnesota Residential Lease Agreement Builder

1. Parties

Minn. Stat. 504B.181 makes this section jurisdictional, not cosmetic: unless the landlord has disclosed in writing the person authorized to manage the premises and the landlord or an agent authorized to accept service of process, no action to recover rent or possession may be maintained.

Landlord (owner) full legal name

Landlord phone

Landlord address for notices

Person authorized to MANAGE the premises (Minn. Stat. 504B.181, subd. 1(1))

Landlord or agent authorized to ACCEPT SERVICE OF PROCESS (subd. 1(2))

Address of the agent for service of process

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

Building size — drives the written-lease duty in Minn. Stat. 504B.111