Missouri · State Breaking a Lease Guide

Missouri Breaking Lease Laws: When a Tenant Can End a Lease Early

Missouri protects servicemembers under federal law, gives an abuse victim an affirmative defense under Mo. Rev. Stat. 441.920, and requires the landlord to mitigate under the common law of Kamada v. RX Group Ltd. Here is how breaking a lease works in 2026.

Breaking a lease early in Missouri sits between two rules. A fixed-term lease is a binding contract, so a tenant cannot simply leave without consequences – but the law carves out a few grounds to terminate, and even when none applies, the landlord’s common-law duty to mitigate limits what the tenant owes. Knowing which rule applies is what decides the bill. This guide covers the statutory and case-law grounds, the servicemember protections, the duty to re-rent, and what a Missouri tenant owes with no justification. If you are filling a unit a tenant left early, our overview of how to screen tenants step by step pairs well with the rules below.

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Video: a plain-language walkthrough of Missouri early lease-termination rules – the legal grounds to break a lease and the landlord’s duty to mitigate.

Key Takeaways: Missouri Breaking Lease Laws

• Servicemembers may terminate under the federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (50 U.S.C. 3955) with active-duty, change-of-station, or qualifying ninety-day-plus deployment orders – the strongest early-out, and it overrides the lease.
• Domestic-violence protection is an affirmative defense, not a clean cancellation, under Mo. Rev. Stat. 441.920 – a victim who gives notice with documentation is relieved of rent after vacating, but the statute also lets the landlord charge a reasonable termination fee and does not provide a lock change.
• The landlord must mitigate under the common law of Kamada v. RX Group Ltd. – a reasonable, good-faith effort to re-rent – so with no statutory ground the tenant owes rent only until a reasonable re-rental, not the full remaining term.
• An uninhabitable unit can ground a constructive eviction under the implied warranty of habitability from Detling v. Edelbrock, and repair-and-deduct is separately available under Mo. Rev. Stat. 441.234 to qualifying tenants.
• The deposit returns within thirty days under Mo. Rev. Stat. 535.300, capped at two months’ rent, and a wrongful withholding exposes the landlord to twice the amount withheld.
• Missouri sets no statutory landlord entry-notice period – Chapter 441 is silent, so reasonable notice is the practical standard rather than a fixed number.

Legal Reasons to Break a Lease in Missouri

Missouri recognizes a handful of grounds to end a lease before the term is up, and they are narrower than in many states – Missouri has no comprehensive residential landlord-tenant act, so several of these rules live in case law rather than a single statute. Each ground has its own clock and proof requirement, and getting those details right is what separates a defensible exit from full contract liability. The grounds below cover military servicemembers, abuse victims under section 441.920, an uninhabitable unit, and landlord misconduct. Our companion guide to Missouri lease termination laws covers the separate mechanics of ending a month-to-month or fixed-term tenancy at its natural end.

Military Servicemembers – SCRA, 50 U.S.C. Section 3955

The strongest early-termination right in Missouri is federal and overrides anything state law or the lease says. Under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, codified at 50 U.S.C. section 3955, a tenant who enters active duty, or who is already on active duty and receives orders for a permanent change of station or a deployment of ninety days or more, may terminate a residential lease. The tenant delivers written notice with a copy of the orders to the landlord by hand, by private business carrier, or by return-receipt mail. The lease then terminates thirty days after the first date on which the next rent payment is due following the date the notice is delivered. The mechanics are covered in depth in the dedicated SCRA section below.

Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault, or Stalking – Mo. Rev. Stat. Section 441.920

This is the ground most often misunderstood. Some states hand a domestic-violence victim a clean statutory right to cancel the lease on short notice with no penalty. Missouri does not. Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.920 is primarily an anti-discrimination statute: no applicant or tenant may be denied tenancy, evicted, or found in violation of a lease on the basis of, or as a direct result of, being a victim – or being in imminent danger of becoming a victim – of domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking, so long as the person otherwise qualifies for the tenancy.

Where the statute touches early exit, it does so through an affirmative defense rather than a self-executing termination. In an action a landlord brings against a tenant, the tenant has an affirmative defense and is not liable for rent for the period after the tenant vacates the premises if the court finds, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the tenant was a victim or was in imminent danger of becoming one, that the tenant notified the landlord, and that the tenant provided any requested documentation. In plain terms: the protection is something the tenant raises if the landlord sues for the unpaid rent, not a notice that instantly ends the lease the day it is delivered.

Two further points matter and are easy to get wrong. First, section 441.920 expressly allows the landlord to impose a reasonable termination fee on a tenant who terminates under the section – so even a qualifying victim is not guaranteed a cost-free exit the way a California abuse victim is. Second, the statute contains no lock-change command: it does not, in this section, require the landlord to re-key the unit, which is a protection some other states add separately. A victim who needs the locks changed should negotiate it or rely on a protective order.

Uninhabitable Unit and Constructive Eviction

An uninhabitable unit can supply grounds to leave, but Missouri ties this to case law and a specific procedure rather than a free walk-away. The Missouri Supreme Court recognized an implied warranty of habitability in Detling v. Edelbrock, 671 S.W.2d 265 (Mo. banc 1984): a landlord warrants that the dwelling is fit for living at the start of the lease and will remain so, providing the facilities and services vital to the life, health, and safety of the tenant. When the landlord fails to repair a serious defect, the tenant’s remedies are detailed in the habitability section below, and a defect so severe and persistently uncured that it drives the tenant out can amount to a constructive eviction. Our guide to Missouri habitability laws covers the repair standards in full.

Landlord Harassment or Unlawful Entry

Landlord misconduct is its own ground. Missouri has no statute that fixes a landlord entry-notice period – Chapter 441 is silent on the time, place, and manner of entry – so the standard is reasonable notice absent consent or an emergency. A landlord who repeatedly enters without reasonable notice, shuts off utilities, or otherwise tries to force a tenant out can make the unit unfit for its intended use, which Missouri treats as a constructive eviction and a ground for the tenant to leave. For periodic tenancies, a month-to-month tenant generally ends the arrangement on one month’s written notice under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.060, and our look at Missouri eviction notice laws covers the separate process if the tenancy instead ends in nonpayment.

Uninhabitable Units and Repair Remedies in Missouri

Missouri habitability law gives a tenant facing a serious defect two distinct paths, and they are not interchangeable – choosing the wrong one can leave the tenant owing rent or facing eviction. The implied warranty of habitability under Detling v. Edelbrock requires the landlord to keep the unit fit for occupancy and to maintain the facilities vital to health and safety. Unlike states with a single statutory habitability code, Missouri leans on this common-law warranty, so documentation of the defect and of the landlord’s notice is doubly important.

The first path is repair-and-deduct under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.234. A tenant who has lived in the unit lawfully for at least six consecutive months, is current on rent, and has no uncured lease-violation notices may, after written notice to the landlord and the statutory cure window, arrange a repair of a condition that violates a local housing or building code and detrimentally affects habitability, sanitation, or security – then deduct the documented cost from rent. The deduction is capped per the statute and limited to one month’s rent in any twelve-month period, and the tenant cannot deduct for damage the tenant caused. Critically, section 441.234 does not by itself end the lease; it is a repair tool, not an exit.

The second path is constructive eviction, which is what actually breaks the lease. When a habitability defect is so serious and so persistently uncured that the unit becomes unusable for its intended purpose, a tenant who gives the landlord notice and then vacates within a reasonable time may treat the lease as terminated, because the landlord’s failure has effectively evicted them. The distinction from repair-and-deduct is the move: section 441.234 lets a tenant stay and fix the problem at the landlord’s expense, while constructive eviction requires the tenant to leave to claim the lease is over – so a tenant who wants out should carefully document the defect, the dated written notice, the landlord’s non-response, and the move-out date.

The Landlord’s Duty to Mitigate in Missouri

Missouri imposes a duty to mitigate by case law rather than statute, and the leading authority is Kamada v. RX Group Ltd., 639 S.W.2d 146 (Mo. App. 1982). Under Kamada, when a tenant breaks the lease and leaves, the landlord must make reasonable efforts to re-rent the unit at fair market rent using the landlord’s normal screening standards, and the landlord’s recoverable damages are limited to what a diligent re-rental could not have avoided. In plain terms, the landlord cannot let the unit sit empty and bill the departed tenant for the whole remaining term.

So a Missouri tenant who leaves early generally owes rent only for the time the unit sits vacant before a reasonable re-rental would have filled it, plus the landlord’s actual re-rental costs such as advertising – not the rest of the lease. A landlord who makes no genuine effort to re-rent forfeits the rent that effort would have replaced, which is why the documented re-rental record – the listing date, asking rent, showings, and applications – is what decides the tenant’s real exposure.

What a Tenant Actually Owes – A Worked Example

Put real numbers on it. Suppose the rent is one thousand two hundred dollars a month, the tenant leaves with six months left, and a diligent landlord would re-rent in about two months. The remaining rent is six months at one thousand two hundred dollars, or seven thousand two hundred dollars. From that, subtract what a reasonable re-rental recovers – the four months a diligent landlord could have filled, or four thousand eight hundred dollars – because the Kamada duty reduces liability by the loss a good-faith re-rental could have avoided. The tenant’s real exposure is the two-month vacancy gap of two thousand four hundred dollars, plus the landlord’s actual re-rental costs such as advertising – not the full seven thousand two hundred dollars.

The arithmetic flips against the landlord who does nothing. If that same landlord never lists the unit and lets it sit all six months, Kamada still measures damages by what a reasonable re-rental would have avoided – that four thousand eight hundred dollars – so the landlord cannot recover it. The failure to try erases most of the claim, which is why the documented listing date, asking rent, showings, and applications are the evidence that decides the bill.

Military Servicemembers and the SCRA – 50 U.S.C. Section 3955

The Servicemembers Civil Relief Act is federal law, so it preempts state landlord protections and any lease clause that tries to waive it is void. Section 3955 of Title 50 covers residential leases, and its mechanics are precise.

The right is triggered in two ways. First, a person who signs a lease and then enters military service may terminate it. Second, a servicemember already in service who receives orders for a permanent change of station, or for a deployment of ninety days or more, may terminate. In either case the servicemember delivers written notice with a copy of the orders to the landlord – by hand, by private business carrier, or by return-receipt mail.

The effective date is the part most people miss. For a lease that pays rent monthly, termination takes effect thirty days after the first date on which the next rent payment is due after the notice is delivered – not the day the notice landed. Rent is owed only through that effective date and is prorated; any rent paid in advance beyond it is refunded, and the security deposit is returned under the normal Missouri rules in section 535.300.

A Missouri landlord may not charge an early-termination fee, impose a penalty, or hold the servicemember liable for the unpaid balance of the term, and may not refuse to return the deposit on that basis. The SCRA also blocks a landlord from evicting a servicemember or dependents from a modest-rent home during service without a court order.

Early-Termination Fees and Liquidated Damages in Missouri

Many Missouri leases include a flat early-termination or buyout fee – one month’s rent, two months’ rent, or a fixed dollar figure – that the landlord treats as the price of leaving early. Whether it is enforceable turns on Missouri’s liquidated-damages rule: a pre-set damages clause is enforced only when the actual damages were genuinely difficult to estimate at the time of contracting and the stated amount is a reasonable forecast of the probable loss, not a penalty meant to punish the tenant. A clause that operates as a penalty is unenforceable, and the landlord is left to prove actual damages.

Because the Kamada duty to mitigate makes the landlord’s real loss – the mitigated rent gap – readily calculable, a flat fee that exceeds that mitigated loss is vulnerable to being struck down as an unenforceable penalty. The practical consequence runs both ways. A tenant who signed a lease with a flat fee is not automatically bound to pay it if the landlord re-rents quickly and the true loss is smaller. Conversely, a genuine, mutually negotiated buyout – the tenant and landlord agreeing at the exit on a sum to release the tenant – is a settlement, not a pre-set penalty, and is generally enforceable. The line is between a penalty written into the lease in advance (suspect) and a freely bargained release signed at the exit (valid).

When There Is No Legal Justification in Missouri

If no servicemember protection, no section 441.920 defense, and no habitability ground applies, a Missouri tenant who breaks the lease is responsible for the rent – but not automatically for the entire remaining term. Because the landlord must mitigate under Kamada, the tenant’s liability runs only until the unit is re-rented or the lease ends, less the rent a reasonable re-rental would recover, and a flat penalty in the lease does not change that if it operates as a penalty. The tenant’s best move here is to manage the mitigation directly: give written notice, present a qualified replacement, and document everything – a tenant who hands the landlord an approved replacement effectively performs the mitigation and cuts the vacancy to near zero.

Security Deposit at an Early Exit – Mo. Rev. Stat. Section 535.300

The deposit is handled separately from the rent claim, and its rules are strict. Under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 535.300, a Missouri landlord may not demand or receive a security deposit greater than two months’ rent, and must hold it in an insured bank, credit union, or depository institution. Within thirty days after the tenancy ends, the landlord must return the deposit, or the balance after lawful deductions, together with an itemized written list of any amounts withheld. The deposit may be applied to a default in rent, to restoring the unit to its move-in condition (ordinary wear and tear excepted), and to actual damages from the tenant’s failure to give adequate notice – but not to the full remaining term as a substitute for the mitigation analysis.

At a lease break the two interact directly: the landlord may apply the deposit to the rent the tenant owes after mitigation, plus documented damage and cleaning, but cannot inflate the deduction to the full remaining term, because the underlying rent claim is still capped by the Kamada duty. The penalty for getting it wrong is sharp – a landlord who wrongfully withholds all or any portion of the deposit is liable to the tenant for twice the amount wrongfully withheld. Our overview of Missouri security deposit laws covers the deduction rules and the double-damages exposure in full.

Subletting, Assignment, and the No-Sublet Clause

Subletting or assigning the lease is often the cleanest way to leave early, and it interacts with the duty to mitigate in the tenant’s favor. In a sublet, the original tenant stays on the hook to the landlord but installs a new occupant who pays the rent; in an assignment, the new tenant steps fully into the lease. Most Missouri leases require the landlord’s written consent before either, and that consent requirement is enforceable – a tenant who sublets in violation of a no-sublet clause has breached the lease.

But the no-sublet clause does not let the landlord ignore mitigation. When a departing tenant presents a qualified, creditworthy replacement in writing and the landlord unreasonably refuses, that refusal works against the landlord: by rejecting a tenant who would have filled the unit, the landlord undercuts the good-faith re-rental effort Kamada requires, and the rent the replacement would have paid becomes loss the landlord could have avoided – powerful evidence that the resulting vacancy was the landlord’s choice, not the tenant’s debt.

Early Termination, Retaliation, and Fair Housing in Missouri

How a landlord responds to an early-termination request is governed by fair housing and anti-retaliation principles. A Missouri landlord may not refuse to honor the section 441.920 protections, evict or penalize a tenant on the basis of victim status, or apply a harsher early-exit standard because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status, or disability under the federal Fair Housing Act. The safeguard is a uniform policy: honor the grounds the law recognizes, mitigate in every case, and treat comparable tenants the same. For the federal baseline on protected characteristics, see our Fair Housing Act guide for landlords.

Screening the Replacement Tenant

When a tenant leaves early, filling the unit is itself the duty to mitigate – and screening is what makes the replacement reliable. Screen every applicant to the same standard: get written consent, pull a consumer report for a permissible purpose under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act, and send an adverse action notice if the report drives a denial. Our Missouri tenant screening laws page and the broader tenant screening laws by state guide cover the screening half of the picture.

Step-by-Step: Breaking a Lease in Missouri

Whether you are the tenant invoking a ground or the landlord responding to a request, the order of operations is the same, and following it is what keeps the exit defensible.

1. Identify the legal ground first. Check whether a recognized exit applies – a servicemember order under the SCRA, a section 441.920 domestic-violence defense, or an uninhabitable unit under Detling and section 441.234. The ground decides the procedure and whether any rent is owed.
2. Match the procedure to the ground. The SCRA terminates thirty days after the next rent due date following notice; a section 441.920 defense is raised against a rent claim, not delivered as a self-executing cancellation; a no-cause month-to-month exit needs one month’s notice under section 441.060.
3. Gather the documentation the ground requires. A copy of military orders for the SCRA; a victim-service or mental-health statement, police report, or order of protection for a section 441.920 claim; dated written repair notices for a habitability claim.
4. Deliver written notice with proof. Put the ground, the effective date, and a forwarding address in writing, and deliver it by a method that creates a record – personal delivery with a signed receipt or return-receipt mail.
5. Mitigate, or help the landlord mitigate. With no statutory ground, the Kamada duty to re-rent caps the bill; a tenant who presents a qualified replacement effectively performs the mitigation and cuts the vacancy.
6. Close out the deposit. Within thirty days under section 535.300, the landlord delivers an itemized statement and returns the balance, deducting only the mitigated rent owed and damage beyond ordinary wear.

Missouri Lease-Break Documentation Checklist

Keep this file from the day the tenant first raises an early exit. It is the record that answers a disputed balance or a fair housing inquiry.

• The written termination request and the legal ground claimed.
• The supporting documentation – military orders, or a victim-service statement, police report, or order of protection for a section 441.920 claim.
• The written notice itself, with its delivery date and proof of service.
• For a habitability exit, the dated repair notices, the landlord’s response or silence, and any local code citation.
• The re-rental record: the listing date, the asking rent, showings, and applications received – the Kamada mitigation evidence.
• The date the unit was actually re-rented and the new rent.
• The deposit accounting and itemized statement delivered within thirty days under section 535.300.

Common Mistakes That Create Liability in Missouri

The recurring Missouri errors are treating section 441.920 as a clean cancellation when it is an affirmative defense, refusing a valid servicemember termination, billing a departed tenant for the full remaining term without trying to re-rent, mishandling the deposit at an early exit, and failing to document the re-rental effort. Almost every one turns on the recognized grounds and the duty to mitigate – so the records that prove honored grounds and a diligent re-rental are the landlord’s strongest rebuttal to a disputed balance, while documentation of victim status and notice is the tenant’s strongest support for the section 441.920 defense. Our guide to verifying tenant income rounds out the financial side of managing a tenancy.

Missouri Breaking Lease Laws: FAQ

Can a Missouri tenant break a lease for domestic violence?

Missouri does not give a domestic-violence victim a clean, automatic right to cancel the lease the way some states do. Under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.920 a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking cannot be denied tenancy, evicted, or found in lease violation because of the abuse, and a tenant who gives notice with documentation has an affirmative defense that relieves them of rent for the period after they vacate. The statute also lets a landlord charge a reasonable termination fee, so it works as a defense to liability rather than a no-cost early-out.

Does Mo. Rev. Stat. 441.920 let a victim change the locks?

No. Section 441.920 contains no lock-change provision. It is an anti-discrimination statute paired with an affirmative defense to rent owed after the tenant vacates. A tenant who wants the locks changed should negotiate that with the landlord or rely on a protective order, because Missouri law does not, in this section, command the landlord to re-key the unit.

What documentation supports a Missouri abuse-victim termination?

Under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.920 a tenant qualifies by giving the landlord a statement of the domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking. In practice that means a signed statement from a qualified victim-service provider or a mental-health professional, or law-enforcement or court records such as a police report or an order of protection. The tenant must notify the landlord and provide any documentation the landlord reasonably requests.

Does a Missouri landlord have to mitigate damages?

Yes. Missouri follows the common-law duty to mitigate recognized in Kamada v. RX Group Ltd., 639 S.W.2d 146 (Mo. App. 1982): a landlord whose tenant leaves early must make reasonable efforts to re-rent at fair market rent using normal screening standards, and damages are limited to what a diligent re-rental could not have avoided. The landlord cannot let the unit sit empty and bill the departed tenant for the full remaining term.

What does a Missouri tenant owe for breaking a lease without cause?

Rent for the time the unit sits vacant until a reasonable re-rental would have filled it, plus the landlord’s actual re-rental costs such as advertising. Because Kamada v. RX Group Ltd. imposes a duty to mitigate, the tenant does not automatically owe the entire remaining term – only the vacancy gap a diligent landlord could not avoid.

Can a Missouri tenant break a lease if the unit is uninhabitable?

Possibly. Missouri recognizes an implied warranty of habitability under Detling v. Edelbrock, 671 S.W.2d 265 (Mo. banc 1984). A tenant who gives written notice of a serious defect that materially affects health or safety, and whose landlord then fails to repair it within a reasonable time, may treat the failure as a constructive eviction and vacate. Repair-and-deduct is separately available under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.234 for tenants who meet its conditions.

Can a Missouri tenant break a lease for military service?

Yes. Under the federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (50 U.S.C. section 3955), a Missouri tenant who enters active duty or receives qualifying permanent-change-of-station or ninety-day-plus deployment orders may terminate with written notice and a copy of the orders. The lease ends thirty days after the first date the next rent payment is due following the notice, and no early-termination penalty applies.

What does Missouri’s repair-and-deduct statute, section 441.234, allow?

Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.234 lets a qualifying tenant fix a condition that violates a local housing or building code and detrimentally affects habitability, sanitation, or security, then deduct the cost from rent. The tenant must have lived there at least six months, be current on rent, have no uncured lease-violation notices, give written notice, and allow the statutory cure window. The deduction is capped, and the remedy does not by itself end the lease.

How much notice must a Missouri landlord give before entering?

Missouri has no statute setting a fixed landlord entry-notice period – Chapter 441 is silent on the time, place, and manner of entry. Courts and practice expect reasonable notice absent an emergency or tenant consent, and most landlords give twenty-four hours as a courtesy. Repeated entry without reasonable notice can support a harassment or constructive-eviction claim, but there is no Missouri statutory entry-notice number to cite.

Is a flat early-termination fee enforceable in Missouri?

It depends. Missouri enforces a liquidated-damages clause only when actual damages were genuinely hard to estimate at signing and the amount is a reasonable forecast, not a penalty. Because the duty to mitigate under Kamada makes actual re-rental damages calculable, a flat one- or two-month fee that exceeds the landlord’s mitigated loss risks being treated as an unenforceable penalty. A freely negotiated buyout signed at the exit is a settlement and is generally enforceable.

When must a Missouri landlord return the security deposit after a lease break?

Within thirty days after the tenancy ends, under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 535.300, the landlord must return the deposit or deliver an itemized list of deductions. The deposit itself is capped at two months’ rent. A landlord who wrongfully withholds any part of the deposit is liable to the tenant for twice the amount wrongfully withheld, so a landlord cannot inflate deductions to cover the full remaining term.

Can a Missouri tenant sublet to get out of a lease?

Often, but most Missouri leases require the landlord’s written consent before a sublet or assignment, and subletting without it breaches the lease. The upside ties to mitigation: if the tenant presents a qualified replacement and the landlord unreasonably refuses, that refusal undercuts the landlord’s mitigation defense under Kamada, because the resulting vacancy was the landlord’s choice rather than the tenant’s debt.

Does Missouri require just cause for a landlord to end a month-to-month tenancy?

No. Missouri does not impose a just-cause requirement on most residential month-to-month terminations. Either party generally ends a month-to-month tenancy on one month’s written notice under Mo. Rev. Stat. section 441.060. A fixed-term lease, by contrast, runs to its end date unless a statutory ground, the SCRA, the section 441.920 defense, or a mutual agreement applies.

Related Missouri Breaking a Lease and Rental Guides

• Breaking lease laws by state – compare Missouri to the rest of the country.
• Missouri lease termination laws – month-to-month notice, non-renewal, and holdover rules.
• Missouri security deposit laws – the two-month cap, deductions, and the thirty-day return deadline.
• Missouri eviction notice laws – notice periods and the unlawful-detainer timeline.
• Missouri habitability laws – the implied warranty and the repair-and-deduct rules.
• Missouri rent increase laws – notice periods and the limits on raising rent.
• Missouri tenant screening laws – what you can check before renting.
• Free Missouri lease agreement form – a configurable, fillable Missouri lease PDF.
• Tenant screening laws by state – screen the replacement tenant.

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About the Author

Published by Tenant Screening Background Check · Editorial Team

Established 2004. Our editorial team has spent two decades helping landlords and property managers run lawful, FCRA-compliant tenant screening across all 50 states. We translate state landlord-tenant codes and federal screening rules into processes you can actually follow.

Updated 2026

Legal Disclaimer

This article is for general informational purposes only and is not legal advice. Missouri and federal laws change, and how they apply depends on your specific facts. Before acting on any screening, fee, deposit, or fair housing question, consult a licensed attorney in Missouri. Reading this page does not create an attorney-client relationship.