Free Vermont Residential Lease Agreement

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A configurable Vermont residential lease agreement that generates a signable multi-page PDF. Built to 9 V.S.A. chapter 137 — no deposit cap but a closed list of four deductions, the 14-day return, 48 hours to enter inside a 9-to-9 window, and the cannabis clause that became unlawful on July 1, 2026.

Vermont 9 V.S.A. ch. 137 14-Day Deposit Return Free PDF 2026 Edition

A Vermont residential lease agreement is the rental agreement governed by the Vermont Residential Rental Agreements Act at 9 V.S.A. chapter 137, sections 4451 through 4475. Vermont looks permissive on the surface — no deposit cap, no late-fee rule, no grace period, no written-lease requirement — and that surface is exactly what misleads. Underneath it, section 4461(b) gives a closed list of four things a deposit may be used for, section 4460 confines entry to a 9:00 A.M. to 9:00 P.M. window on 48 hours’ notice, section 4467 sets seven different termination notice periods rather than the flat sixty days every ranking page prints, and the numbers that decide whether the unit is habitable at all live in a Division of Fire Safety rule, not in the statute. Two things on this page are newer than any template in circulation: since 1 July 2026, section 4468b makes a cannabis-possession clause unlawful in a Vermont lease, and since 17 June 2024, section 4466 has required a FEMA flood hazard notice as its own separate document.

What Is a Vermont Residential Lease Agreement?

A Vermont residential lease agreement is a rental agreement as defined by 9 V.S.A. 4451(8): all agreements, written or oral, embodying terms and conditions concerning the use and occupancy of a dwelling unit and premises. Vermont does not require a residential lease to be in writing, notarized or witnessed. It nonetheless matters enormously whether one exists, because chapter 137 repeatedly treats written and unwritten tenancies differently.

Two structural sections shape everything else. Section 4453 provides that the obligations chapter 137 imposes on landlords and tenants shall be implied in all rental agreements — so a Vermont lease that says nothing still carries the whole Act. Section 4454 then provides that no rental agreement shall contain any provision that attempts to circumvent or circumvents the obligations and remedies the chapter establishes, and that any such provision is unenforceable and void. Vermont does not enumerate prohibited clauses the way many states do; it states one functional test and applies it to whatever the drafter wrote.

Section 4452 lists ten exclusions from the chapter, each subject to the opening words “unless created to avoid the application of this chapter”: institutional occupancy providing medical, geriatric, educational, counselling or religious service; occupancy by a purchaser under a contract of sale; occupancy by a member of a fraternal, social or religious organization in a part of the building operated for it; taxed transient hotel, motel or lodging occupancy; occupancy by a condominium unit owner or a cooperative proprietary lease holder; a mobile home lot governed by a separate title; transient campground residence; transient lodging while receiving General or Emergency Assistance housing help; occupancy without right or permission by a person who is not a tenant; and transient occupancy connected with health care treatment paid for by a hospital or designated agency. Housing provided as a benefit of farm employment has its own termination regime at 9 V.S.A. 4469a.

Finally, 9 V.S.A. 4451(1) is the section a drafter most often overlooks. Every notice period in the chapter runs on actual notice, which means receipt of written notice hand-delivered or mailed to the last known address, with a rebuttable presumption of receipt three days after mailing where the sender proves first-class or certified mailing. That three-day presumption effectively lengthens every deadline on this page.

Build Your Vermont Residential Lease Agreement

Fill in the fields below and the generator produces a multi-page Vermont lease that carries the correct deposit clock for your unit type, the correct termination periods for a written agreement, the entry rule with its statutory hours, the three required disclosures, and a cannabis clause narrowed to what 4468b still permits. Nothing is uploaded — the PDF is produced in your browser.

Can a Vermont Lease Prohibit Cannabis?

Only the lighted kind, and only since 1 July 2026. This is the newest provision in Vermont landlord-tenant law and it appears on no competing template, in no commercial mirror, and not yet in the codified statutes themselves.

9 V.S.A. 4468b, added by 2026 Acts and Resolves No. 176, section 30 — the omnibus cannabis act, signed 18 June 2026 — provides that a rental agreement shall not contain a provision that prohibits a tenant from possessing cannabis or cannabis products within the rental premises or using cannabis or cannabis products within a dwelling unit. The section preserves exactly one restriction: a rental agreement may prohibit the use of lighted cannabis or cannabis products intended for inhalation within the rental premises. It also carves out any rental agreement that federal law requires to prohibit possession or use, which preserves the position in federally assisted housing. The same act amended the possession statute in Title 18 to match, confirming that a landlord may ban lighted or inhaled cannabis in a lease and nothing more.

Three practical consequences follow. First, the ordinary “no drugs of any kind” or “no marijuana” clause carried by most templates is now a prohibited provision in Vermont, void under 4454 as well as under 4468b itself. Second, edibles and other non-inhaled products cannot be restricted inside the dwelling unit at all. Third, because the section is a possession-and-use rule rather than a nuisance rule, a landlord who wants to control smoke has to say so in those terms — which is what the option in the builder above generates.

Is There a Maximum Security Deposit in Vermont?

No. Nothing in 9 V.S.A. 4461, or anywhere in chapter 137, caps a Vermont residential security deposit. That is a genuine absence, established by reading all ten subsections rather than by inference.

What matters far more than the missing cap is 4461(a), which defines a security deposit as any advance, deposit or prepaid rent, however named, which is refundable to the tenant at the termination or expiration of the tenancy, whose function is to secure performance of the tenant’s obligations to pay rent and to maintain the dwelling unit. The words “however named” do the work: a refundable pet deposit, cleaning deposit, key deposit or last month’s rent held refundably is a security deposit and is governed by the whole of 4461. A charge that is not refundable is not a deposit — it is rent, because 4451(7) defines rent as all consideration to be made to or for the benefit of the landlord, not including security deposits.

Two limits do exist, and neither appears on any ranking page:

• Municipal ordinances (4461(g)). A town or municipality may adopt an ordinance governing security deposits that is supplemental to and not inconsistent with the minimum protections of 4461. It may not limit how a deposit is held, but it may authorise the payment of interest, and it may provide that a local housing board of review hears deposit disputes on request by either party, with its actions reviewable in the usual way. So “Vermont has no deposit rules beyond the statute” is wrong at town level, and a landlord should check the ordinance where the unit sits.
• Disability modifications (9 V.S.A. 4503(a)(9)). A landlord must permit reasonable modifications of the premises at the expense of a person with a disability where necessary to afford full enjoyment, may if reasonable require restoration on departure with reasonable wear and tear excepted, and may not require an additional security deposit for that purpose.

What may a Vermont landlord deduct from the deposit?

Four things, and no others. Section 4461(b) permits retention only for:

1. Nonpayment of rent.
2. Damage to the landlord’s property — but not where the damage is the result of normal wear and tear, and not where it is the result of actions or events beyond the tenant’s control. That second exclusion is unusually broad and is omitted by every ranking page.
3. Nonpayment of utility or other charges that the tenant was required to pay directly to the landlord or to a utility.
4. Expenses required to remove articles the tenant abandoned in the rental unit.

Routine cleaning, repainting, carpet replacement on a normal cycle, re-letting costs and advertising are not on that list. “Normal wear and tear” is defined at 4451(5) as the deterioration that occurs, based on the reasonable use for which the unit is intended, without negligence, carelessness, accident or abuse of the premises, equipment or chattels by the tenant, members of the tenant’s household, or their invitees or guests.

How Long Does a Vermont Landlord Have to Return the Deposit?

Fourteen days — unless the unit is a seasonal rental that is not a primary residence, in which case it is sixty. The seasonal exception sits in the second sentence of 4461(c) and is missing from every competing Vermont template.

Two features of the Vermont clock are worth naming because they differ from most states. First, 4461(d) makes the landlord’s obligation run to the tenant’s last known address. Vermont places no duty on the tenant to supply a forwarding address and contains no provision suspending the deadline until one arrives, so the fourteen days run whether or not the tenant writes in. Second, the two sanctions in 4461(e) are sequential rather than alternative: the forfeiture of the right to withhold is automatic on lateness, and double damages plus fees are added only on wilfulness. Summaries that mention only the doubling understate the risk considerably.

If you need to produce the statement itself, the Vermont security deposit itemization form and the Vermont deposit return letter are built to the same section.

What Disclosures Does a Vermont Lease Require?

Three — and only one of them is the familiar federal lead disclosure. The ranking Vermont template pages list the federal lead rule alone, or the federal lead rule plus an invented second item. Here is the real set.

The flood hazard notice must be its own document

Section 4466 requires the landlord to disclose, in advance of entering a rental agreement, whether any portion of the premises offered for rent is located in a Federal Emergency Management Agency mapped special flood hazard area. The notice must be provided at or before execution in a separate written document substantially in the form the Department of Housing and Community Development prescribes under 4466(b). A lease paragraph does not satisfy it. Vermont’s flooding history since 2023 makes this the most practically important disclosure on the list, and no ranking page names it.

There is a second trap in the citation itself. The section number was reused. The official statute page prints “4466. Repealed. 1987, No. 74” immediately above the current section, so an older secondary source citing 9 V.S.A. 4466 may be citing a dead provision on an entirely different subject. Always read the section’s own title.

Why the Vermont Lead Statement Is Not an “EMP” Statement Any More

Vermont’s state lead duty is separate from the federal one and is missed by every competing page. Under 18 V.S.A. 1759(c), an owner of rental target housing or a child care facility must file an RRPM compliance statement with the Department of Health and abide by the Commissioner’s rules on maintaining lead-based paint and giving notice to tenants. Under 1759(d)(1), prior to entering into a lease agreement the owner must provide approved tenants with written materials approved by the Department regarding lead hazards and a copy of the owner’s most recent RRPM compliance statement — materials that must state that lead is highly toxic to humans, particularly young children, and may cause permanent neurological damage even at low exposure levels. Under 1759(d)(2) the owner must fully inform a tenant who intends to operate a child care facility of the section’s requirements.

The name changed and the secondary sources did not. What Vermont landlords and older templates still call an EMP or Essential Maintenance Practices statement was renamed RRPM — lead-safe Renovation, Repair, Painting and Maintenance — by 2017 Acts and Resolves No. 149, section 2, effective 21 October 2022, which rewrote the definitions section and sections 1759 and 1760 together. The phrase “essential maintenance practices” no longer appears in the definitions at 18 V.S.A. 1751. A Vermont lead addendum naming an EMP statement is naming a form that no longer exists under that name.

Two further points a Vermont landlord needs. Target housing is defined at 1751 as any dwelling constructed before 1978, except a studio dwelling or one in a building or project reserved for the exclusive use of elders or persons with disabilities, unless a child six or younger resides or is expected to reside there. And under 18 V.S.A. 1760 all paint in target housing is presumed lead-based unless a component is exempted by a licensed inspector’s written report, with a list of prohibited unsafe work practices that binds ordinary maintenance and not just renovation: open-flame burning or torching, heat guns above eleven hundred degrees Fahrenheit, dry scraping or dry sanding, powered tools, hydro-blasting or high-pressure washing, abrasive blasting or sandblasting, and chemical stripping. The Vermont lead-based paint disclosure form covers the federal side.

How Much Notice Must a Vermont Landlord Give Before Entering?

At least forty-eight hours, and only between 9:00 A.M. and 9:00 P.M. Rankers report the forty-eight hours and omit the window, which is half the rule.

Section 4460 sets three routes and no others:

• 4460(a) — with consent. The landlord may enter with the tenant’s consent, which shall not be unreasonably withheld. No notice period attaches to a consented entry, and the reasonableness limit means a tenant cannot simply refuse a proper request.
• 4460(b) — without consent, four purposes only. When necessary to inspect the premises; to make necessary or agreed repairs, alterations or improvements; to supply agreed services; or to exhibit the unit to prospective or actual purchasers, mortgagees, tenants, workers or contractors. The entry requires no less than 48 hours’ notice and must fall between 9:00 A.M. and 9:00 P.M. An entry on proper notice at 8:00 A.M. is not authorised, and neither is an entry inside the window for a purpose outside the four.
• 4460(c) — neither consent nor notice. Only where the landlord has a reasonable belief of imminent danger to any person or to property.

Where the Division of Fire Safety has ordered repairs, 20 V.S.A. 2677 requires the inspection report to give notice in plain language that the landlord or the landlord’s agents must have access to make those repairs consistent with the access provisions in 9 V.S.A. 4460. The order does not displace the notice and the hours; it makes withholding consent to a compliant request unreasonable. One further carve-out arrived in 2026: under 4452(b)(3), as rewritten by that year’s recovery-residence act, a recovery residence employee may enter at reasonable times as necessary to carry out functions related to the operation of the residence, notwithstanding 4460.

Denying access in the other direction is unlawful. Section 4463 bars a landlord from wilfully causing, directly or indirectly, the interruption or termination of any utility service supplied to the tenant except for temporary interruptions for emergency repairs; from denying the tenant access to and possession of the premises except through proper judicial process; and — a third limb most summaries drop — from denying the tenant access to and possession of the tenant’s property. Under 4464(a) a tenant injured by an illegal eviction may bring an action for injunctive relief, damages, costs and reasonable attorney fees; under 4464(b) the court may award the landlord fees where the action was not brought in good faith and was frivolous or intended for harassment only. The Vermont notice to enter form is built to the same section.

What Makes a Vermont Rental Habitable?

Section 4457(a) implies into every residential rental agreement a covenant and warranty by the landlord to deliver over and maintain, throughout the period of the tenancy, premises that are safe, clean and fit for human habitation and that comply with the requirements of applicable building, housing and health regulations. Under 4457(b) no rental agreement may contain any provision by which the tenant waives that warranty, and any such waiver is contrary to public policy, unenforceable and void. Section 4457(c) adds heat and water specifically: heating facilities capable of safely providing a reasonable amount of heat, a reasonable amount of heat at all times where the landlord supplies it, and an adequate amount of water properly connected with hot and cold water lines fed by adequate water-heating facilities. That subsection expressly does not apply to a unit intended and rented for summer occupancy or as a hunting camp.

The operative numbers, though, are in a regulation. Section 4451(2) defines “building, housing, and health regulations” to mean any law, ordinance, or governmental regulation concerning health, safety, sanitation or fitness for habitation. That definition imports the Vermont Residential Rental Housing Health and Safety Code — effective 31 December 2023, adopted by the Department of Public Safety’s Division of Fire Safety under 20 V.S.A. 2677 — into every Vermont lease, where it becomes unwaivable through 4457(b). Responsibility for rental housing health and safety moved from local health officers to the Division of Fire Safety in 2022. No ranking Vermont page cites the rule at all.

Who is responsible for pests and bed bugs in a Vermont rental?

The rule allocates it precisely, which is why it should not be left to lease boilerplate. Under rule 6.1 the owner must keep all common spaces free from infestation and is responsible for extermination there. The owner is also responsible for exterminating an infestation inside a dwelling unit in two situations: where the infestation was caused by the owner’s failure to maintain the dwelling, or where infestation exists in two or more of the dwelling units in the dwelling. That two-or-more test is the operative trigger and appears nowhere in the SERP. The occupant is responsible only for the part they exclusively occupy, and only where their own failure to maintain caused it, subject always to the owner’s duty. Rule 4.7 defines infestation as the presence of any pest or bed bug creating a health hazard or other risk to the preservation of public health, and rule 6.3 requires extermination by eliminating harborage, removing food and breeding material, and treatments including poisoning, spraying, fumigating, heat treating or trapping.

How the code is enforced

Enforcement under 20 V.S.A. 2677(b) is complaint-driven. On inspection the Commissioner must issue a written report containing findings of fact, specifying the requirements and timelines to correct each violation, giving notice that the landlord is prohibited from renting the affected unit to a new tenant until the violation is corrected, and giving notice about access for repairs. Copies go to the landlord, to the person who requested the inspection and to affected tenants, electronically or by first-class mail; where a whole building is affected, notice goes to individual tenants and may be posted in a common area. The report is a public record. Under 2677(c), failure to comply with the requirements and timelines allows an administrative penalty reasonably related to the severity of the violation, up to one thousand dollars per violation. Short-term rentals have their own duty under 20 V.S.A. 2678: the operator must physically post the Division’s guidance conspicuously in the rental and provide it as part of any listing.

Can a Vermont Tenant Withhold Rent or Repair and Deduct?

Both, and Vermont is a genuine rent-withholding state — a fact most templates in circulation do not mention.

Section 4458(a) gives the tenant four cumulative remedies once a three-part trigger is met: the landlord fails to comply with the habitability obligations; the landlord receives actual notice of the noncompliance from the tenant, a governmental entity or a qualified independent inspector; the landlord fails to make repairs within a reasonable time; and the noncompliance materially affects health and safety. The tenant may then

1. withhold the payment of rent for the period of the noncompliance;
2. obtain injunctive relief;
3. recover damages, costs and reasonable attorney fees; and
4. terminate the rental agreement on reasonable notice.

Note the breadth of the notice limb — a Division of Fire Safety inspection report or a town health officer’s notice starts the clock as effectively as a letter from the tenant. Under 4458(b) none of the four remedies is available where the noncompliance was caused by the negligent or deliberate act or omission of the tenant or of a person on the premises with the tenant’s consent.

Repair and deduct is separate and much narrower. Under section 4459, if within thirty days of notice the landlord fails to repair a minor defect in order to comply with chapter 137 or a material provision of the rental agreement, the tenant may repair it and deduct from the rent the actual and reasonable cost of the work, not to exceed one-half of one month’s rent, and must give the landlord actual notice of the cost when it is deducted. Three limits therefore apply at once: the defect must be minor, the thirty days must have run, and the half-month ceiling is absolute. A material defect affecting health and safety runs through 4458 instead, where there is no cap. Rankers describe repair and deduct without any of the three.

The tenant’s own duties are at section 4456: not to create or contribute to the unit’s noncompliance with building, housing and health regulations; to conduct themselves and require others there with their consent to conduct themselves so as not to disturb other tenants’ peaceful enjoyment; and not to deliberately or negligently destroy, deface, damage or remove any part of the premises, its fixtures, mechanical systems or furnishings. Under 4456(e) a violation entitles the landlord to damages, costs and reasonable attorney fees by statute and is grounds for termination.

How Much Notice Ends a Vermont Tenancy?

Vermont sets seven different periods, not one. Every ranking page prints a flat sixty days. Section 4467 makes the answer depend on the ground for termination, on whether a written rental agreement exists, on how long the tenancy has run, and on whether rent is payable weekly or monthly.

Four procedural rules sit alongside the table and are worth more than most of what the SERP contains:

• The reinstatement right is broader than paying the arrears. Under 4467(a) the agreement does not terminate if the tenant pays or tenders rent due through the end of the rental period in which payment is made or tendered. Acceptance of a partial payment is expressly not a waiver of the landlord’s remedies and not an accord and satisfaction. The Vermont 14-day notice to pay rent or quit is built to this subsection.
• The termination date must be stated. Under 4467(f), in all cases the termination date shall be specifically stated in the notice. A Vermont notice without one is bad on its face.
• A notice has a shelf life. Under 4467(k), a notice to terminate is insufficient to support a judgment of eviction unless the proceeding is commenced not later than sixty days from the termination date set out in the notice.
• Notices stack, and post-termination rent does not waive. Under 4467(i) compliant notices do not invalidate one another and may rest on different or unrelated grounds and dates; a landlord may plead as many grounds as law allows at any time during the eviction. Under 4467(j) accepting full or partial rent after a termination for a reason other than nonpayment, or at any point during the ejectment action, neither dismisses the action nor waives the landlord’s remedies.

Related forms: the Vermont notice to cure or quit, the Vermont unconditional quit notice and the Vermont notice of non-renewal.

What Notice Does a Vermont Rent Increase Need?

At least sixty days’ actual notice, and the increase can only take effect on the first day of the following rental period. Section 4455(b) is short and both halves matter: an increase in rent shall take effect on the first day of the rental period following no less than sixty days’ actual notice to the tenant. A landlord who gives seventy days’ notice still cannot make the increase bite mid-period, and because the notice must satisfy 4451(1), mailing it adds the three-day presumption to the count.

Vermont has no rent control and no statewide rent cap. It does have one rent-increase rule almost nobody carries. Under 9 V.S.A. 4468a, in force since 17 June 2024, an owner of privately owned age-restricted residential property that is not licensed as a care facility must give written notification, on a form provided by the Department of Housing and Community Development, to both the Department and all affected residents, not later than sixty days before the effective date of a proposed increase. The notice must state the amount, the effective date, a copy of the resident’s rights under the section, and the percentage of increase from the current base rent. If the owner fails to notify either the residents or the Department, the proposed increase is ineffective and unenforceable. Publicly subsidised affordable housing monitored by a State or federal agency for rent limitations is excluded. The Vermont rent increase notice and the Vermont rent increase laws guide go further into both.

Does Vermont Cap Late Fees or Give a Grace Period?

Neither, and this is a negative finding established by reading rather than assumed. A word-by-word sweep of every section of 9 V.S.A. chapter 137, of 20 V.S.A. chapter 172 and of the Vermont Residential Rental Housing Health and Safety Code returns no occurrence of “late fee”, “late charge”, “grace period”, or any returned-cheque, dishonoured-instrument or insufficient-funds charge for a residential landlord. Vermont neither caps such a charge nor authorises one.

Two consequences. First, a late charge in a Vermont lease is purely contractual, and its enforceability turns on the general common-law rule against penalties and on 4454, which voids anything that circumvents a chapter 137 obligation or remedy. Second, rent is late the day after it is due, because 4455(a) makes it payable without demand or notice at the time and place agreed. What does the work a grace period does elsewhere is the fourteen-day nonpayment notice in 4467(a) together with its reinstatement right.

Several ranking pages publish a “Rent Grace Period in Vermont” heading or a “Late Fees and Grace Periods” section with no Vermont source under it, and one lists “NSF Fees” among Vermont’s rental rules. There is no such rule. See the Vermont late fee laws guide and the Vermont late rent notice.

Can a Vermont Landlord Charge a Rental Application Fee?

No. Section 4456a(a) provides that a landlord or a landlord’s agent shall not charge an application fee to any individual in order to apply to enter into a rental agreement for a residential dwelling unit, and expressly says the subsection is not to be read as prohibiting a fee to apply to rent commercial or nonresidential property. There is no ceiling, no cost-recovery exception and no ninety-day-report exception. One ranking page publishes a heading titled “Maximum Application Fees In Vermont” as though there were a cap.

The section also carries a screening rule that took effect on 1 July 2025 and appears on no competing page. Under 4456a(b), in order to conduct a background or credit check the landlord shall accept any of: an original or a copy of any unexpired form of government-issued identification; an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number; or a Social Security number. And the landlord shall not require a Social Security number for the completion of a residential rental application, or refuse to accept an application because one was not supplied.

For a Vermont landlord the practical effect is that the cost of screening cannot be passed to the applicant at all, and the identifier the applicant offers is the applicant’s choice among the three. More at the Vermont tenant screening laws guide.

Can a Vermont Lease Make the Tenant Pay Attorney Fees?

Yes — and Vermont is unusual in making the written clause the statutory trigger rather than a mere permission. Under 12 V.S.A. 4854, if the court finds the plaintiff entitled to possession, the plaintiff has judgment for possession and rents due, damages and costs, and when a written rental agreement so provides, the court may award reasonable attorney fees. A Vermont lease that omits a fee clause has given the remedy away before the dispute starts.

Vermont neither prohibits the clause, nor requires it to be reciprocal, nor attaches any penalty to a one-sided one. The builder above nonetheless generates a prevailing-party clause, for two reasons: it satisfies 4854’s precondition, and it takes nothing from the tenant, so there is nothing for 4454 to strike. That matters because the tenant’s fee entitlements do not depend on the lease and cannot be drafted away — they are awarded by statute under 4458 for a habitability breach, under 4461(e) for a wilfully withheld deposit, under 4464(a) for an illegal eviction and under 4465(b) for retaliation. The landlord likewise holds fee rights independent of the lease under 4456(e) for a tenant’s breach of the tenant-obligations section, and under 4464(b) against an illegal-eviction claim that was frivolous or brought for harassment.

The same section was amended in 2025 in two other respects worth knowing: the writ of possession now issues on the date judgment is entered unless the court for good cause orders a stay, and any sheriff may serve it rather than the sheriff of the county. The sheriff may not put the landlord into possession earlier than fourteen days after the writ is served.

What Provisions Does Vermont Prohibit in a Lease?

Vermont does not publish a numbered list of forbidden clauses. It uses one general rule plus four specific overrides, and a fifth that lives in the rental housing code.

Vermont attaches no bounty. Unlike a number of states in this family, Vermont provides no damages award, no multiple of the rent and no statutory penalty for including a prohibited clause. The clause is simply void and the underlying statutory remedy survives untouched. That is a reason to draft accurately rather than a reason to relax: a void clause gives the landlord nothing and can mislead a tenant into not asserting a right they still hold.

What Rights Does Vermont Give a Tenant Who Is a Victim of Abuse, Sexual Assault or Stalking?

Subchapter 4 of chapter 137 — sections 4471 through 4475 — creates a set of rights that override the lease. A protected tenant is defined at 4471 as a victim of abuse, sexual assault or stalking, or a parent, foster parent, legal guardian or caretaker with at least partial physical custody of such a victim.

Termination (4472). Notwithstanding a contrary provision of the rental agreement, a protected tenant may terminate without penalty or liability where they reasonably believe it necessary to vacate because of a fear of imminent harm to any protected tenant due to abuse, sexual assault or stalking, or where any protected tenant was the victim of a sexual assault that occurred on the premises within the preceding six months. Not less than thirty days before the termination date the tenant must give the landlord written notice of termination together with documentation from one of four sources: a court, law enforcement or other government agency; an abuse, sexual assault or stalking assistance programme; a legal, clerical, medical or other professional who provided counselling or assistance; or a self-certification signed under penalty of perjury on a standard form adopted by a government entity or by a nonprofit organisation providing support services to protected tenants. Section 4472(c) allows the notice to be revoked in two defined situations.

Locks and security (4473). A protected tenant may request that the landlord change the locks within forty-eight hours. Where the perpetrator is also a tenant of the unit, the request must include a copy of a court order requiring the perpetrator to leave. If the landlord changes the locks, a key goes to every tenant except that perpetrator. If the landlord does not, the protected tenant may change them without the landlord’s prior knowledge or permission, provided the new locks and installation equal or exceed the original quality, the landlord is notified within twenty-four hours and is given a key. Unless otherwise agreed the tenant bears the cost. A protected tenant may also request permission to install additional security measures including a security system or camera, on not less than seven days’ notice, at their own cost and liability — and the landlord shall not unreasonably refuse.

Confidentiality and immunity. Under 4474 a landlord holding documentation or information about a protected tenant’s status must keep it confidential, disclosing it only with the tenant’s authorization, under a court order or government audit requirement, or as sealed evidence limited to a 4472 or 4473 claim. Under 4475, except for gross negligence or wilful misconduct, a landlord acting in good-faith reliance on the subchapter or on information a protected tenant supplied is immune from damages to that tenant.

Is There a Presumption of Retaliation in Vermont?

Yes, and no ranking page carries it. Section 4465(a) bars a landlord from retaliating by establishing or changing the terms of a rental agreement, or by bringing or threatening to bring an action, against a tenant who has complained to a government agency charged with enforcing a building, housing or health regulation about a violation materially affecting health and safety; who has complained to the landlord of a chapter 137 violation; or who has organised or become a member of a tenants’ union or similar organisation.

Section 4465(b) gives the tenant damages and reasonable attorney fees and a defence in any retaliatory action for possession. And section 4465(c) is the part that changes outcomes: if the landlord serves a notice of termination on any grounds other than nonpayment of rent within ninety days after notice by any municipal or State governmental entity that the premises are not in compliance with applicable health or safety regulations, there is a rebuttable presumption that the termination is in retaliation for the tenant having reported the noncompliance. Since a Division of Fire Safety inspection report is exactly such a notice, and is a public record, the ninety-day window is easy to establish and hard to overlook.

Who Is Protected by Vermont Fair Housing Law?

Vermont’s list runs well past the federal one. Under 9 V.S.A. 4503 it is an unfair housing practice to refuse to rent, to discriminate in the terms, conditions, privileges and protections of a rental, to advertise a preference, or to misrepresent availability, because of race, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, marital status, religious creed, colour, national origin, citizenship, immigration status or disability, because a person intends to occupy a dwelling with one or more minor children, because a person is a recipient of public assistance, or because a person is a victim of abuse, sexual assault or stalking. Refusing a housing voucher is therefore unlawful in Vermont.

Two subsections bear directly on lease drafting. Under 4503(a)(5) it is an unfair housing practice to disclose information about a tenant’s or occupant’s status as a victim of abuse, sexual assault or stalking for the purpose of harassing or intimidating them, retaliating against them for exercising their rights, influencing or coercing them to vacate, or recovering possession. Under 4503(a)(9) the owner must permit reasonable disability-related modifications at the tenant’s expense, may if reasonable require restoration with reasonable wear and tear excepted, and may not require an additional security deposit for that purpose.

When Is a Vermont Rental Abandoned, and What Happens to Property Left Behind?

Vermont has two entirely different routes, and collapsing them — as most summaries do — produces the wrong answer for the ordinary move-out.

Abandonment has a three-part test (4462(a)). All three must hold: circumstances that would lead a reasonable person to believe the unit is no longer occupied as a full-time residence; rent is not current; and the landlord has made reasonable efforts to ascertain the tenant’s intentions. Under 4462(b) an abandoning tenant remains liable for rent until the agreement expires, but the agreement terminates on the date of a new tenancy if the landlord re-lets sooner — a statutory mitigation rule that rewards prompt re-letting.

Property left by an abandoning tenant (4462(c)). The landlord must mail written notice to the tenant’s last known address stating an intention to dispose of the property after sixty days, and must place the property in a safe, dry, secured location. Trash, garbage and refuse may be disposed of at once. The tenant reclaims by giving a reasonable written description of the property and paying the fair and reasonable cost of storage and related reasonable expenses within sixty days of the notice date; anything unclaimed then becomes the landlord’s, and anything claimed in time must be made available immediately at a reasonable place and time.

But an ordinary move-out is different (4462(d)). Personal property remaining after the tenant has vacated may be disposed of by the landlord without notice and without liability to the tenant or to the owner of the property, provided either the tenant gave the landlord actual notice that they had vacated, or the tenant vacated at the end of the rental agreement. The sixty-day storage-and-notice procedure applies to abandonment, not to a tenancy that simply ended.

How Does the Vermont Eviction Process Work?

Possession is obtained only through the courts. Section 4468 sends a landlord whose tenant holds over without express consent to an action for possession, damages and costs under the ejectment chapter; 12 V.S.A. 4851 gives the writ where a lessee under a parole or written lease holds possession without right after the lease terminates by its own limitation or after a breach of a stipulation.

Rent into court (12 V.S.A. 4853a). Vermont lets the landlord move for an order that the tenant pay rent into court, filed with the complaint or later and supported by affidavit. A hearing is held after fourteen days’ notice; if the tenant appears and has not been defaulted, no default judgment may enter unless the tenant fails to file a written answer within fourteen days after the hearing, and any escrow order survives a default judgment but ceases on execution of a writ of possession. The court orders payment of rent as it accrues plus rent accrued from the earlier of filing or service. If the tenant fails to pay as ordered, the landlord is entitled to judgment for immediate possession, and the sheriff may put the landlord into possession not earlier than seven days after the writ is served.

Judgment and the writ (12 V.S.A. 4854). On a judgment for possession the writ issues on the date judgment is entered unless the court for good cause orders a stay, any sheriff may serve it, and the sheriff may not put the landlord into possession earlier than fourteen days after service. Attorney fees may be awarded only where a written rental agreement so provides.

Vermont has no holdover multiplier. There is no double-rent or treble-rent provision anywhere in chapter 137, so a landlord’s recovery against a holdover tenant is actual damages and costs, plus fees only if the lease provides for them. More at the Vermont eviction notice laws guide and the Vermont lease termination laws guide.

What the Ranking Vermont Templates Get Wrong

Every figure below was checked against the section’s own text. These are not stylistic quibbles; each one changes what a landlord may lawfully do.

What Vermont Does Not Require

Negative findings are claims too, and each of these was established by reading the primary sources rather than by inference. Vermont has:

• No security deposit cap, no statewide deposit interest requirement (municipal option only) and no statutory escrow or separate-account duty.
• No late fee statute, no grace period and no returned-cheque or insufficient-funds charge for landlords.
• No pet deposit or pet rent rule — refundable pet money is a security deposit under 4461(a), and non-refundable pet money is rent under 4451(7).
• No holdover rent multiplier — no double or treble rent anywhere in chapter 137.
• No mandatory move-in or move-out inspection checklist. One is still the single best evidence a landlord can hold against the closed deduction list in 4461(b); the Vermont move-in and move-out checklist is built for it.
• No requirement that a residential lease be in writing, notarized or witnessed.
• No landlord-identification disclosure of the kind many states impose.
• No radon, mold, bed bug history, asbestos, methamphetamine, offender-registry, demolition, utility-rate or smoking-policy disclosure. Those are requirements of other states.
• No rent control and no statewide just-cause eviction requirement.
• No statutory penalty for using a prohibited lease clause — the clause is void, and nothing more follows.

Because Vermont bans the application fee outright and gives the applicant the choice of identifier, the screening stage is where a Vermont landlord’s risk is actually managed — and it has to be paid for out of the landlord’s own pocket and done correctly. Section 4456a(b) requires acceptance of an unexpired government-issued identification, an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number or a Social Security number, and forbids requiring the last of the three. Section 4503 then bars any decision resting on citizenship, immigration status, receipt of public assistance, an intention to occupy with minor children, or a person’s status as a victim of abuse, sexual assault or stalking. Our Vermont tenant screening laws guide sets out what is permitted, and the tenant screening laws by state comparison shows how far Vermont sits from its neighbours.

Vermont Lease Agreement FAQ

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