Free Washington, D.C. Residential Lease Agreement
A configurable Washington, D.C. residential lease agreement that generates a signable multi-page PDF. Built to the Rental Housing Act of 1985 and to Title 14 of the Municipal Regulations — the one-month deposit cap, the 45 + 30 day return clocks, and the clauses 14 DCMR 304 makes void.
A Washington, D.C. residential lease agreement is governed by two bodies of law that both bind, and most free templates read only one of them. The first is the Rental Housing Act of 1985, D.C. Official Code 42-3501.01 and following, which supplies rent stabilization, the just-cause eviction rules in 42-3505.01, the access rule in 42-3505.51, the late-fee rule in 42-3505.31 and the disclosure package in 42-3502.22. The second is Title 14 of the District of Columbia Municipal Regulations — the Housing Regulations — whose chapter 3 carries the security deposit rules at 14 DCMR 308 to 311, the implied warranty of habitability at 301, the duty to give the tenant a signed copy at 303, the compulsory written receipts at 306, and the entire prohibited-provisions list at 304. A page that cites only Title 42 has no deposit cap, no escrow rule, no return deadline and no list of clauses the District will not enforce. Three things then define a District lease. The deposit is capped at the first full month’s rent and may be charged only once. The return runs on two clocks — forty-five days to tender or to give notice of withholding, then a further thirty days to itemize and pay. And the District is a just-cause jurisdiction: under 42-3505.01(a)(1) the expiry of the lease is not a reason to evict anyone.
Washington, D.C. Lease Rules at a Glance
Deposit Cap
1 Month, Once
Deposit Clocks
45 + 30 Days
Access Notice
48 Hours, Written
Rent Increase Notice
60+ Days
Six District Rules That Catch Housing Providers Out
First, the deposit may be charged only once. 14 DCMR 308.2 caps it at the first full month’s rent and says it “shall be charged only once by the owner to the tenant”, so there is no topping it up mid-tenancy and no fresh deposit on renewal. Second, the return has two deadlines: forty-five days under 14 DCMR 309.1 to tender or to give written notice of an intention to withhold, then a further thirty days under 309.2 to deliver the balance with an itemized statement. Third, the late fee is a drafting condition, not just a ceiling. 42-3505.31(b)(1) allows it only if the written lease informs the tenant of the maximum amount, so a silent lease generates no lawful late fee at all. Fourth, the nonpayment notice changed on 31 December 2025: the RENTAL Amendment Act cut it from thirty days to ten, and forbade issuing it where the unpaid rent is under six hundred dollars. Fifth, the rent-increase notice is more than sixty days, not thirty, and runs to a rent day. Sixth, a cleaning fee is unlawful: since 10 October 2025, 14 DCMR 301.4 forbids charging a fee or withholding from the deposit for professional cleaning or for anything arising from ordinary wear and tear.
How Do You Fill Out a Washington, D.C. Lease Agreement?
Start with coverage, because coverage decides which rules apply at all. Everything else in a District lease — whether the rent can be raised, by how much, on what notice — hangs off whether the unit is inside the rent stabilization program or outside it, and whether the exemption was actually filed.
1. Settle the rent stabilization status first
42-3502.05(a)(3) is the exemption most small providers rely on, and it has three cumulative conditions: four or fewer rental units, ownership by not more than four natural persons, and no direct or indirect interest by any of the housing providers in any other rental unit in the District — plus a claim of exemption statement actually filed with the Rent Administrator. An unfiled exemption is not an exemption. Choosing “exempt” in the builder also produces the separate written notice 42-3502.05(d) requires before signing.
2. Record the rental-housing business licence
Two provisions turn on it. 42-3505.01(q) bars an eviction unless the housing provider gives the court documentation of a current business licence for rental housing when it files the writ of restitution. 42-3502.08(a)(1)(C) makes proper licensing a precondition of any rent increase above base rent. If the housing provider is a nonresident, 42-3502.08(a)(1)(G) also requires a registered agent under 14 DCMR 203.
3. State the maximum late fee in the lease itself
This is the single most-missed drafting condition in the District. 42-3505.31(b)(1) permits a late fee only where “the written lease agreement between the housing provider and the tenant informs the tenant of the maximum amount of the late fee that may be charged”. The ceiling is 5% of the full amount of rent due, and the fee cannot be charged until five days, or a longer lease grace period, have passed.
4. Cap the deposit at one month and name the District escrow account
14 DCMR 308.2 caps it at the first full month’s rent and permits it only once. 308.3 requires an interest-bearing escrow account, held in trust, at a financial institution in the District of Columbia, for the sole purpose of holding deposits. 308.6 requires the terms and conditions of the deposit to be stated in the lease or on the receipt, which the builder does for you.
5. Set access at forty-eight hours in writing
42-3505.51 is a real statute and it has three limbs. Written notice at least forty-eight hours ahead, with email or mobile text permitted so long as a paper notice follows where the tenant does not acknowledge. Entry only between nine in the morning and five in the afternoon, and never on a Sunday or a federal holiday. And only for one of six enumerated purposes.
6. Assemble the disclosure package
42-3502.22(b)(1) lists twelve items and (1B) adds the voter registration packet. Four more duties sit outside it: the exempt-unit notice in 42-3502.05(d), the three-year rent history in 42-3502.13(d), the lead plumbing form in 42-3271 and the District lead-paint disclosure in 8-231.04, plus the copy of the Housing Regulations required by 14 DCMR 300.1. The penalty for getting the main package wrong is unusual and expensive: under 42-3502.22(c) the rent may not be increased.
7. Download, sign, and diarise both deposit clocks
Generate the PDF and sign it. Then diarise forty-five days from termination and thirty days from any withholding notice. Under 14 DCMR 309.3 missing them is prima facie evidence that the tenant is entitled to the whole deposit back, and under 309.5 a bad-faith refusal carries treble damages. Under 14 DCMR 303.1 the tenant must also receive an exact, legible, completed copy on execution or within seven days.
Build Your Washington, D.C. Residential Lease Agreement
Complete the fields below to generate a District of Columbia residential lease agreement as a signable multi-page PDF. Every field you fill is written into the document, including the rent stabilization coverage that changes what the lease says about rent adjustments, the utility allocations, the access notice period and each disclosure you check, and the generated lease cites the controlling section or regulation at every point. Before handing over keys, run proper tenant screening — but read Washington DC tenant screening laws first, because 42-3541.02 restricts what a District housing provider may ask and when. Pair the signed lease with a Washington DC move-in / move-out checklist, which is how a housing provider proves the difference between damage and the ordinary wear and tear that 42-3502.17(c)(1) forbids withholding for.
Washington, D.C. Residential Lease Agreement Builder
1. Parties
District law calls the landlord a housing provider, and this Lease uses that term because every penalty in the Rental Housing Act is written against it. If the housing provider is a nonresident of the District, D.C. Official Code 42-3502.08(a)(1)(G) makes appointing and maintaining a registered agent under 14 DCMR 203 a precondition of ever raising the rent.
2. Premises
The District has no counties. Wards are the District’s own subdivision and the field below records one. D.C. Official Code 42-3505.01(q) bars an eviction unless the housing provider gives the court documentation of a current rental-housing business licence when it files the writ of restitution, so the licence number belongs in the lease.
3. Rent Stabilization Coverage — Decide This Before Anything Else
Coverage decides which rules even apply. Under 42-3502.05(a)(3) the small-provider exemption has three conditions, not one: the accommodation has four or fewer rental units, it is owned by not more than four natural persons, none of the housing providers holds a direct or indirect interest in any other rental unit in the District, and a claim of exemption is actually filed with the Rent Administrator. An unfiled exemption is not an exemption. Choosing “exempt” also triggers the separate written notice required by 42-3502.05(d).
4. Term
The District is a just-cause jurisdiction. Under 42-3505.01(a)(1) a tenant may not be evicted notwithstanding the expiration of the lease so long as the rent is paid, so a fixed term does not end the tenancy by itself. 42-3502.08(e) is the quiet advantage of a fixed term: rent may not be adjusted for a unit with a valid written lease establishing the rent for the term.
5. Rent & the Late Fee
42-3505.31(b)(1) makes the late fee lawful only if this written lease states the maximum amount that may be charged. A District lease that is silent generates no lawful late fee at all. The ceiling is 5% of the full amount of rent due, the fee may be imposed only once per late payment, and 42-3505.31(c)(4) forbids evicting on the basis of nonpayment of a late fee.
6. Security Deposit
14 DCMR 308.2 caps the deposit at the first full month’s rent and allows it to be charged only once, and 308.1 pulls every payment taken as security — however it is labelled — inside that cap. 308.3 requires an interest-bearing escrow account held in trust at a financial institution in the District of Columbia, for the sole purpose of holding deposits.
7. Utilities & Services
Assign each utility. Allocating an account to the Tenant does not move the implied warranty in 14 DCMR 301.1, and since 10 October 2025 14 DCMR 301.3 forbids charging any fee for services required of the landlord to maintain the habitation.
8. Housing Provider Access
42-3505.51 sets a real statutory rule and templates keep only the first half of it: written notice at least 48 hours ahead, entry only between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., never on a Sunday or a federal holiday, and only for one of six enumerated purposes. Email or text counts as written notice, but if the Tenant does not acknowledge it a paper notice must follow.
9. Required District Disclosures
42-3502.22(b)(1) lists the applicant disclosure package item by item and the penalty for getting it wrong is unusual: under 42-3502.22(c) the rent may not be increased. Several further duties sit outside that section — in 42-3502.05(d), 42-3502.13(d), 42-3271, 8-231.04 and 14 DCMR 300. The boxes for those required items start checked. Where a paragraph turns on a fact about this unit — whether a document is attached, or whether any mold, petition, violation report or conversion is known — the lease prints a blank or a tick-box for the Housing Provider to complete, unless the answer is typed in below. The lead-based paint paragraph prints automatically when the year built, or the lead status, shows construction before 1978.
10. Other Provisions
Why Does a District Lease Need Two Bodies of Law?
Because a large share of the landlord’s duties live in the regulations, not the statute. This is the single most consequential fact about drafting in the District, and it is why so many free templates are thin here. The D.C. Official Code gives you the Rental Housing Act of 1985 at 42-3501.01 and following: rent stabilization, just-cause eviction, access, late fees, retaliation, disclosure. But if you look in the Code for the security deposit cap, you will not find one. 42-3502.17(a) simply says that “Security deposits shall be collected pursuant to the Security Deposit Act, effective February 20, 1976 (D.C. Law 1-48; 14 DCMR 308 et seq.)”, and 42-3502.17(b) gives the Office of Administrative Hearings jurisdiction over deposit complaints “pursuant to section 2908 of the Housing Regulations of the District of Columbia (14 DCMR 308 through 311)”. The Code points at the regulations and stops.
Title 14 of the District of Columbia Municipal Regulations is the Housing Regulations of the District of Columbia, originally issued as Commissioners’ Order 55-1503 in August 1955 and amended many times since. Its chapter 3, “Landlord and Tenant”, is a compact but dense set of rules that reads much more like a landlord-tenant act than like a regulation. It contains the implied warranty of habitability (301), the rule that voids a lease of an unsafe habitation (302), the duty to give the tenant a signed copy (303), the prohibited-provisions list (304), the re-letting certificate (305), compulsory written receipts (306), a regulatory retaliation ban (307), and the whole security deposit regime (308 to 311). Three of those — the deposit rules, the prohibited-provisions rule and the implied warranty — are load-bearing for every District lease, and none of them is in the Code.
The practical consequence is a checking discipline. When you read a claim about District landlord-tenant law, ask which body of law it comes from. A remarkable number of secondary summaries cite the deposit rules as “DC Code 14-308.2” and the return deadline as “DC Code 14-309.1”. Those are not Code sections. D.C. Official Code Title 14 is Proof — the District’s evidence title; 14-310 is the domestic violence counselor privilege, which is why the early-termination statute at 42-3505.07 cites it for the definition of a counselor. The deposit rules are 14 DCMR 308 and 309, sections of the Municipal Regulations. The section number is real and the body of law is wrong, which is the commonest citation error in this whole family of pages.
Is My Washington, D.C. Rental Covered by Rent Control?
Only if it is not exempt under 42-3502.05(a), and an exemption you have not filed is not an exemption. Coverage is the first question in a District lease because it changes what the lease can say about money. 42-3502.05(a) applies subsection (f) through 42-3502.19 to each rental unit in the District, then exempts certain units from subsections (g) and (h)(2) and from 42-3502.06 through 42-3502.16, 42-3502.18 and 42-3502.19. That block of sections is what people mean by rent control.
The route most small housing providers rely on is 42-3502.05(a)(3), and it is routinely reported as a simple unit count. It is not. The subsection reaches “any rental unit in any housing accommodation of 4 or fewer rental units, including any aggregate of 4 rental units whether within the same structure or not” — and then imposes three conditions, all of which must hold:
- the housing accommodation is owned by not more than four natural persons, so an ordinary limited liability company does not qualify, subject to the decedent’s-estate and testamentary-trust carve-out in (a)(3)(D);
- none of the housing providers has an interest, “either directly or indirectly, in any other rental unit in the District of Columbia” — one other rented condominium anywhere in the city defeats the exemption for all of them; and
- a claim of exemption statement is filed with the Rent Administrator, signed by each person with a direct or indirect interest, with any invalidating change of ownership or interest reported in writing within thirty days.
The other exemptions have their own precision. 42-3502.05(a)(2) is widely described as covering buildings “built after 1975”. What it actually turns on is the date the building permit was issued — after 31 December 1975 — or, for a newly created unit added to an existing structure, a certificate of occupancy for housing use issued after 1 January 1980. And it is disapplied where the construction required demolishing a housing accommodation that was itself subject to the chapter, unless the number of new units exceeds the number demolished. (a)(1) covers federally or District owned or subsidised units including those receiving Low-Income Housing Tax Credit; (a)(4) covers accommodations continuously vacant since 1 January 1985; (a)(5) mirrors (a)(3) for cooperatives; (a)(7) covers units under an executed building improvement plan.
Separately, 42-3502.05(e) removes four categories from the chapter altogether rather than merely from rent stabilization: a unit operated by a foreign government as a residence for diplomatic personnel; a unit in an establishment whose primary purpose is diagnostic care and treatment of diseases; any dormitory; and, on a determination by the Rent Administrator, certain non-profit long-term temporary family housing meeting three tests.
Being exempt does not mean being unregulated. An exempt unit is still inside the Rental Housing Act. The just-cause eviction rules in 42-3505.01, the forty-eight-hour access rule in 42-3505.51, the five-percent late-fee rule in 42-3505.31, the retaliation presumption in 42-3505.02 and the whole of the Housing Regulations continue to apply. And under 42-3502.05(d), an exempt unit carries its own disclosure: “Prior to the execution of a lease or other rental agreement after July 17, 1985, a prospective tenant of any unit exempted under subsection (a) of this section shall receive a notice in writing advising the prospective tenant that rent increases for the accommodation are not regulated by the rent stabilization program.” No ranking page carries that duty, and it falls on exactly the small housing providers most likely to be using a free template.
Registration is a separate obligation from coverage. Under 42-3502.05(f) every housing provider must file a registration statement and, where applicable, a claim of exemption through the online housing provider portal, with a new provider filing within thirty days. Under (f)(4)(B)(i) failure carries a penalty of one hundred dollars per unit, and under (f)(4)(B)(ii) a non-exempt provider that has not timely registered may not institute a rent increase until it registers and pays. Under (h)(2) a duplicate of the registration statement must be posted in a public place on the premises, or mailed to the tenant where the accommodation is a single rental unit. One currency note: 42-3502.05 currently carries amendments made by temporary legislation that expires on 22 January 2027, so the registration mechanics should be re-read against the permanent version after that date.
How Much Can a Washington, D.C. Landlord Charge for a Security Deposit?
One month’s rent, and only once. 14 DCMR 308.2 provides that “any security deposit or other payment required by an owner as security for performance of the tenant’s obligations in a lease or rental of a dwelling unit shall not exceed an amount equivalent to the first full month’s rent charged that tenant for the dwelling unit, and shall be charged only once by the owner to the tenant.”
The second limb is the one templates lose. “Charged only once” means the deposit cannot be topped up part-way through a tenancy after a deduction, and cannot be charged again when the lease renews. A District housing provider who takes a fresh deposit on a renewal has breached 308.2 even though the total never exceeded a month’s rent at any one moment.
The definition in 308.1 is what makes the cap hard to work around: the term means “all monies paid to the owner by the tenant as a deposit or other payment made as security for performance of the tenant’s obligations in a lease or rental of the property.” A move-in payment, a refundable key payment, a decorating payment or a refundable pet payment is part of the deposit and counts toward the one-month ceiling whatever the lease calls it. 14 DCMR 308.8 disapplies the section only to Federal or District agency units and to units for which rents are federally subsidised.
On pets specifically, there is a widely circulated claim that the District now caps pet fees and deposits. It rests on D.C. Law 25-308, the Pets in Housing Amendment Act of 2024, which added a new 42-3502.17(d). That act was passed, signed and cleared congressional review — and it is still not law. The Code prints subsection (d) as the two words “Not Funded.” and carries an applicability note recording that section 4 of the act made the amendment subject to the inclusion of its fiscal effect in an approved budget and financial plan, “therefore that amendment has not been implemented.” What binds a pet charge today is 14 DCMR 308.1 and 308.2: money taken as security for a pet is part of the deposit and counts against the one-month cap.
Where Must a Washington, D.C. Landlord Hold the Deposit?
In an interest-bearing escrow account, held in trust, at a financial institution inside the District of Columbia. 14 DCMR 308.3 sets five requirements in a single sentence: all deposit monies “shall be deposited by the owner in an interest bearing escrow account established and held in trust in a financial institution in the District of Columbia insured by a federal or state agency for the sole purposes of holding such deposits or payments.”
Two of those requirements are unusual. The account must be in the District — a Maryland or Virginia bank does not satisfy it, which matters in a metropolitan area where most housing providers bank across the line. And it must exist for the sole purpose of holding deposits, so a general operating account with the deposits notionally set aside is not compliance. 308.5 permits an owner of more than one residential buil