Landlord Atlas

What is the eviction process and timeline in Arkansas?

Verified July 24, 2026 All Arkansas topics →

To evict a tenant in Arkansas for unpaid rent, a landlord serves a written three-day notice to quit and demand for possession, then files an unlawful detainer suit in circuit court, where the tenant has five days - excluding Sundays and legal holidays - after service to file a written objection or the clerk issues a writ of possession and the sheriff removes the tenant.

Cited to Ark. Acts 2017, No. 159 (SB25) (enrolled act amending Ark. Code Ann. 18-16-101; approved 02/13/2017) SECTION 2 (and uncodified SECTION 1 findings) and 53 more Arkansas statutes · Verified July 24, 2026

That is the main track (Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-301 to 18-60-312), but Arkansas is unusual in having three parallel routes and a landlord has to pick one. The Arkansas Residential Landlord-Tenant Act of 2007 offers a second, district-court "eviction proceeding" (18-17-901 et seq.) with no written notice for nonpayment at all - being five days late is itself the legal notice - after which the court orders the tenant to vacate or show cause within ten calendar days, and issues a writ of eviction within three days of judgment. For a curable lease violation the Act requires a written fourteen-day notice specifying the acts and omissions, and the tenancy ends on the date stated unless the tenant fixes the problem first. The third route, Ark. Code Ann. 18-16-101, is a criminal "failure to vacate" charge after ten days' written notice; it is still on the books but it produces a misdemeanor fine, not possession, so it does not evict anyone. Arkansas also has a fast no-cure track for nuisance and criminal activity (18-16-501 to 18-16-509). Since November 1, 2021 leases carry implied residential quality standards - running water, electricity, potable water, sewer and plumbing, a functioning roof and envelope, and heat and air where already supplied - but a tenant's only remedy is to give written notice, wait thirty calendar days and terminate; withholding or offsetting rent is expressly forbidden.

Arkansas eviction process at a glance

Nonpayment notice (pay-or-quit) 3 days
Nonpayment notice rules (day counting, cure rights, service)

That 3-day figure belongs to the unlawful-detainer track, where the writing must do two things - give notice to quit and demand possession (Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-304(3)). Arkansas's other eviction track, the district-court proceeding under 18-17-901, requires no written nonpayment notice at all; being five days late is itself the legal notice.

Three days is the unlawful-detainer figure and it is the headline: under Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-304(3) a tenant commits unlawful detainer who fails or refuses to pay rent when due "and after three (3) days' notice to quit and demand made in writing for the possession of the land, tenement, or possession by the person entitled to [it] or his or her agent or attorney, shall refuse to quit possession." The writing must do two things - notice to quit AND demand for possession - and it is a pleading prerequisite, not a formality: 18-60-307(a) requires the plaintiff to file an affidavit stating that the defendant "unlawfully detains [the premises], after lawful demand therefor made in the manner described in this subchapter," before the clerk will issue the summons. The statute prescribes no form, no service method and no recital content for the three-day notice.

Day-unit: 18-60-304(3) does not name one. Ark. R. Civ. P. 6(a) governs "any period of time prescribed or allowed by these rules, by order of the Court or by any applicable statute," excludes the day the period begins to run, and provides that "[w]hen the period of time prescribed or allowed is less than fourteen (14) days, intermediate Saturdays, Sundays, or legal holidays shall be excluded in the computation" - so a three-day notice counted under Rule 6(a) skips weekends and holidays. Whether Rule 6(a) reaches a pre-suit contractual-style notice served before any case exists is not resolved by the text of either provision; a landlord counting three straight calendar days is taking a risk, and the safe count is the weekend/holiday-excluded one.

SECOND TRACK, DIFFERENT ANSWER: on the Arkansas Residential Landlord-Tenant Act's own district-court eviction (18-17-901 et seq.) there is NO written pre-filing notice for nonpayment at all. 18-17-701(b): "If rent is unpaid when due and the tenant fails to pay rent within five (5) days from the date due, the landlord may terminate the rental agreement." 18-17-901(b): "For residential rental agreements, nonpayment of rent within five (5) days of the date due constitutes legal notice to the tenant that the landlord has the right to begin eviction proceedings under this chapter." The lateness is itself the notice; the landlord waits five days and files.

ARLTA periods are computed by ARCP - 18-17-303(d): "The time within which an act is to be done shall be computed by reference to the Arkansas Rules of Civil Procedure" - so that five-day wait, being under fourteen days, also excludes intermediate Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays.

THIRD TRACK: the criminal failure-to-vacate statute, 18-16-101(b)(1), uses "ten (10) days' notice in writing" to vacate, but it produces a misdemeanor prosecution, not possession - do not use it as the civil notice period. Rent is payable without demand at the agreed time and place (18-17-401(b)(1)).

Notice delivery under ARLTA: 18-17-303(b)(2)(C) - delivered in hand to the tenant, or mailed by registered or certified mail to the place the tenant holds out or the last known residence, and "[p]roof of mailing pursuant to this subsection constitutes notice without proof of receipt." No statute gives the tenant a right to cure by paying after suit is filed; to defend, the tenant must pay rent that accrues and rent allegedly owed (18-17-706(1), (2)) or produce receipts, and failure to do so requires the court to issue a writ of possession (18-17-706(3)(B)(ii)).
Lease-violation notice period 14 days
Lease-violation notice rules (cure vs. termination)

The written notice must specify the acts and omissions constituting the noncompliance and state that the rental agreement terminates on a date not less than 14 days after receipt, and the tenancy survives if the tenant adequately remedies the breach before that date (Ark. Code Ann. 18-17-701(a)). Those are straight calendar days counted from receipt.

Ark. Code Ann. 18-17-701(a)(1): "Except as provided in this chapter, if there is a noncompliance by the tenant with the rental agreement, the landlord may deliver a written notice to the tenant specifying the acts and omissions constituting the noncompliance and that the rental agreement will terminate upon a date not less than fourteen (14) days after receipt of the notice, if the noncompliance is not remedied in fourteen (14) days." The notice must name the acts and omissions and state the termination date. Cure right: 18-17-701(a)(2) - the agreement "shall terminate as provided in the notice unless the noncompliance is remediable by repairs or otherwise and the tenant adequately remedies the noncompliance before the date specified in the notice." The fourteen days run from RECEIPT, not service.

Day-unit: because fourteen is not "less than fourteen (14) days," the ARCP Rule 6(a) weekend-and-holiday exclusion does NOT apply - this is a straight calendar-day count (the day of receipt excluded), and it is therefore in a different unit from the three- and five-day periods here.

Health and safety: 18-17-702(a)(1) gives the landlord a self-help repair remedy where the tenant's noncompliance with 18-17-601 materially affects health and safety and is fixable by repair, replacement or cleaning, if the tenant fails to comply "as promptly as conditions require in case of emergency or within fourteen (14) days after written notice"; 18-17-702(b) lets the landlord terminate for other health-and-safety noncompliance on the same fourteen-day written notice, or "as promptly as conditions require in case of emergency."

TWO STEPS, NOT ONE: the fourteen-day notice terminates the rental agreement; the eviction is a separate filing afterwards under 18-17-901(a)(3) ("[t]he terms or conditions of the rental agreement have been violated") or 18-17-901(a)(2) (term ended). The two sections sit in the same chapter but do not cross-reference each other, so the statute does not say in terms that the 18-17-701(a) notice must expire before an 18-17-901(a)(3) filing; reading them otherwise would make 18-17-701(a) inoperative, which is why it is treated here as a prerequisite.

Note also that a lease breach is NOT an enumerated unlawful-detainer ground - 18-60-304 lists holdover after the term, holdover after written demand, nonpayment after three days' notice, failure to keep the premises safe/healthy/habitable, and nuisance - so a landlord using the unlawful-detainer track for an ordinary lease violation must terminate first and then sue as a holdover under 18-60-304(1) or (2).

Periodic tenancies terminate on their own periods, not on 18-17-701: 18-17-704(a) - week-to-week, "written notice given to the other at least seven (7) days before the termination date specified in the notice"; 18-17-704(b) - month-to-month, "at least thirty (30) days." No statutory repeat-violation escalation exists.
Unconditional-quit grounds Arkansas has a dedicated no-cure criminal-activity eviction in Ark. Code Ann. 18-16-501 to 18-16-509. 18-16-501: a tenant who uses or allows another to use the premises "as a common nuisance as defined by 5-74-109(b) or 16-105-402 or for a criminal offense as identified in 18-16-502 may be evicted by the prosecuting attorney of the county, the city attorney of the city, the landlord, the premises owner, or the agent for the premises owner." 18-16-502 supplies the offences: illegal gambling (5-66-107), prostitution (5-70-102), unlawful sale of alcohol (3-3-205). No pre-filing notice and no cure period is prescribed: the complaint is filed (18-16-503), the clerk issues a summons and the statutory notice (18-16-505), and under 18-16-506(a), if within five days excluding Sundays and legal holidays the defendant has not filed a written objection, "the clerk of the court shall immediately issue a writ of possession." On the unlawful-detainer track, 18-60-304(4) makes it unlawful detainer to "[f]ail to maintain the premises in a safe, healthy, or habitable condition" and 18-60-304(5) covers causing or permitting a common or public nuisance - neither carries any statutory notice period, unlike 18-60-304(3). Domestic abuse: 18-16-112(d) - "A landlord is entitled to a court order terminating the residential tenancy agreement of a person or evicting a person, or both, under subdivision (c)(3)(A) or (c)(3)(B) of this section upon proof that the person is a domestic abuse offender under this section" - and 18-16-112(c)(3)(B) permits eviction of the offender "whether or not a residential tenancy agreement between the landlord and domestic abuse offender exists"; the mirror-image protection in 18-16-112(b)(1) bars terminating or refusing to renew against the victim. Under ARLTA, 18-17-603 requires that a tenant "shall not conduct or permit any illegal activities" on the dwelling unit, and 18-17-702 allows termination "as promptly as conditions require in case of emergency" for health-and-safety noncompliance. Public-housing drug cases get an expedited hearing: 18-60-307(d)(2) entitles a housing-authority plaintiff alleging a criminal violation of the Uniform Controlled Substances Act to a hearing "within ten (10) days of the filing of the objection."
Court and action Arkansas runs two civil possession actions in two different courts, and which court you are in depends on which statute you sue under. (1) UNLAWFUL DETAINER / FORCIBLE ENTRY AND DETAINER, Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-301 to 18-60-312, is a CIRCUIT COURT action. 18-60-306(a): "Forcible entries and detainers and unlawful detainers are cognizable before the: (1) Circuit court of any county in which the offenses may be committed; and (2) District court with jurisdiction concurrent with the jurisdiction of the circuit court, if permitted by rule or order of the Supreme Court." That condition has not been met by a grant of original jurisdiction: Arkansas Supreme Court Administrative Order No. 18, section 3, lists the district court's original civil jurisdiction (contract up to $100 exclusive of circuit court, contract up to $5,000 concurrent, recovery of personal property up to $5,000, damage to personal property up to $5,000) and does not include possession of real property; instead, Administrative Order No. 18, section 6(b), lets a STATE district court judge be REFERRED matters already "pending in the circuit court," and item (3) of that list is "Forcible Entry and Detainers and Unlawful Detainer. Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-301-312." A referred case stays a circuit court case. (2) The ARLTA "eviction proceeding," 18-17-901 to 18-17-913, is filed in DISTRICT COURT: 18-17-901(a) - a landlord "may commence eviction proceedings against a tenant in a district court having jurisdiction over the eviction proceeding" - by "a complaint and supporting affidavit of eviction that specifies the grounds for the eviction," signed by a person with personal knowledge (18-17-902(a)(1)). 18-17-701(c)(1) likewise contemplates the landlord obtaining "evictions in circuit court or district court without posting bond." Governing procedure: the Arkansas Rules of Civil Procedure; Arkansas District Court Rule 1(c) applies the ARCP and the Rules of Evidence in district court, and District Court Rule 2(b) provides there are no jury trials in district court and "all appeals from judgment in district court shall be de novo to circuit court." A contested ARLTA case is tried like any other civil case (18-17-905). Separately, the criminal "failure to vacate" charge under 18-16-101 is prosecuted "before any justice of the peace or other court of competent jurisdiction in the county where the premises are situated" and produces a fine, not a writ.
Filing to hearing On the unlawful-detainer track there is normally NO hearing at all - the tenant must affirmatively object to get one. The clerk issues a summons plus a statutory "Notice of Intention to Issue Writ of Possession" (18-60-307(a)), and 18-60-307(b) provides: "If, within five (5) days, excluding Sundays and legal holidays, following service of this summons, complaint, and notice seeking a writ of possession against the defendants named therein, the defendant or defendants have not filed a written objection to the claim for possession made by the plaintiff in his or her complaint, the clerk of the court, upon order of the court, shall immediately issue a writ of possession." If the tenant does file a written objection within that window, 18-60-307(c) sets no window for the hearing: the plaintiff "shall obtain a date for the hearing of the plaintiff's demand for possession of the property described in the complaint at any time thereafter when the matter may be heard by the court," with notice by certified mail. The only statutory hearing deadline in the subchapter is for housing authorities in controlled-substance cases - an expedited hearing "within ten (10) days of the filing of the objection" (18-60-307(d)(2)). On the ARLTA district-court track the deadline is the show-cause period: 18-17-902(b) - on the filing of the complaint and supporting affidavit "the district court shall issue an order requiring the tenant to vacate the occupied premises or to show cause why he or she should not be evicted by the court within ten (10) calendar days after the date of service of a copy of the order upon the tenant" - and note that the statute says CALENDAR days in terms, so ARCP Rule 6(a)'s weekend exclusion does not shorten it. Service of the ARLTA order follows district-court summons practice, and if service is attempted unsuccessfully and no one is in possession, the order may be served "by leaving it affixed to the most conspicuous part of the premises" (18-17-903).
Writ of possession and lockout The possession writ is a "writ of possession" (the ARLTA also calls it a "writ of eviction") and the sheriff executes it. UNLAWFUL DETAINER: the writ issues immediately, on the court's order, if no written objection is filed within five days excluding Sundays and legal holidays after service (18-60-307(b)); after a prima facie hearing if the court finds the plaintiff "likely to succeed on the merits at a full hearing" (18-60-307(d)(1)(B)(i)); or on judgment for the plaintiff (18-60-309(c)(2)). A defendant may keep possession only "upon motion and good cause shown" and only by posting, "within five (5) days of issuance of the writ of possession, adequate security as determined by the court in any event not less than the amount of any delinquent rent and rent to accrue" (18-60-307(e)). Execution is governed by 18-60-310: the sheriff "shall immediately proceed to execute the writ" and first notifies the defendant by delivering a copy; "If, within eight (8) hours of receipt of the writ of possession, the sheriff shall not find any such person at their normal place of residence, he or she may serve the writ of possession by placing a copy conspicuously upon the front door" (18-60-310(b)(2)); then "If, at the expiration of twenty-four (24) hours from the service of the writ of possession ... the defendants ... shall be and remain in possession," the sheriff notifies the plaintiff and removes the defendant's possessions to storage at the plaintiff's direction (18-60-310(c)(1)). The sheriff may forcibly remove locks and physically restrain the defendant (18-60-310(d)), and the plaintiff posts no bond unless the court orders one (18-60-310(e)). ARLTA: on failure to show cause within the ten calendar days the court "shall enter judgment in favor of the plaintiff and direct the clerk to issue a writ of possession, and the tenant shall be evicted by the sheriff of the county" (18-17-904); on judgment for the plaintiff "the district court shall within three (3) days issue a writ of eviction" (18-17-907); and the sheriff executes it "in accordance with the provisions of 18-60-310" (18-17-913). The criminal-activity track mirrors this with its own writ (18-16-507), same eight-hour posting and twenty-four-hour removal mechanics, and gives the evicted tenant seven business days to reclaim stored property on paying storage costs (18-16-507(c)(1)(B)).
Appeal window No eviction-specific deadline — the standard civil appeal window applies (see notes)
Best-case uncontested timeline (derived from statutory minimums — contested cases run longer)

About 11 to 14 calendar days at the very fastest on the unlawful-detainer track, and about 19 days plus service time on the Residential Landlord-Tenant Act track. Both are floors built by adding statutory minimums, not observed averages, and contested cases run materially longer.

Derived by adding the statutory minimums, not an observed average.

UNLAWFUL DETAINER (circuit court): 3 days' written notice to quit and demand for possession (18-60-304(3)) + filing, issuance and service of the summons, complaint and notice of intention to issue a writ (18-60-307(a)) + 5 days excluding Sundays and legal holidays for the tenant to file a written objection, after which the clerk issues the writ immediately on the court's order (18-60-307(b)) + the sheriff's service of the writ and the 24 hours that must expire before he removes the tenant's possessions (18-60-310(c)(1)). Adding the statutory minimums: 3 + 5 + 1 = about 9 days of counted time, but because the 5-day objection window excludes Sundays and legal holidays - and, if ARCP Rule 6(a) governs the notice, the 3-day notice excludes intermediate Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays too - the shortest realistic calendar span is nearer 11 to 14 days.

ARLTA (district court): 5 days after rent falls due before the landlord may terminate and file (18-17-701(b), 18-17-901(b)) + filing + 10 calendar days after service of the order to vacate or show cause (18-17-902(b)) + up to 3 days for the court to issue the writ of eviction on judgment (18-17-907) + 24 hours after the sheriff serves the writ (18-60-310(c)(1) via 18-17-913). Adding the statutory minimums: 5 + 10 + 3 + 1 = about 19 days, plus service time.

Neither track bounds the time the clerk takes to issue process or the sheriff takes to serve, so both figures are floors. Contested cases run materially longer: once an unlawful-detainer defendant files a written objection, 18-60-307(c) sets no hearing deadline at all, and an ARLTA case that is contested is heard "as any other civil case" (18-17-905).
Self-help eviction (lockout, utility shutoff) barred No statute squarely on point — the notes explain what this state's law does and does not address
Self-help scope and tenant remedies

Arkansas bars FORCIBLE self-help but says nothing about a peaceable lockout or a utility shutoff, so there is no flat yes or no. A landlord who breaks in, carries the tenant's goods out, or uses threats is statutorily exposed; a landlord who quietly changes the locks or has the power cut is not addressed by any statute.

Arkansas never adopted the URLTA provision forbidding a landlord to exclude a tenant or wilfully diminish services, and no section of the Arkansas Residential Landlord-Tenant Act (18-17-101 et seq.) contains one.

What does exist: 18-60-302 - "No person shall enter into or upon any lands, tenements, or other possessions and detain or hold them except when an entry is given by law, and then only in a peaceable manner" - and 18-60-303, which makes a person guilty of forcible entry and detainer who enters "by breaking open the doors and windows or other parts of the house," who threatens "to kill, maim, or beat the party in possession or use[s] words and actions as have a natural tendency to excite fear or apprehension of danger," who "[p]ut[s] out of doors or carr[ies] away the goods of the party in possession," or who enters peaceably "and then turn[s] out by force or frighten[s] by threats or other circumstances of terror the party to yield possession." A person dispossessed that way can recover damages: 18-60-311 lets the defendant prove "the damage he or she may have sustained in being dispossessed" and requires judgment restoring the property. So a landlord who breaks in, throws the tenant's things out, or uses threats is statutorily exposed.

But nothing in the code reaches a landlord who simply changes the locks while the tenant is out, or who has the power or water shut off, and 18-16-108(a) cuts the other way on belongings: "Upon the voluntary or involuntary termination of any lease agreement, all property left in and about the premises by the lessee shall be considered abandoned and may be disposed of by the lessor as the lessor shall see fit without recourse by the lessee."

The only lock provisions run the other direction: 18-17-602(b) forbids the TENANT to change locks without the landlord's permission, and 18-16-112(b)(2)(A) allows a lock change in the domestic-abuse setting only "[a]t the residential tenant's expense and with the landlord's prior consent."

Retaliation: Arkansas has no general anti-retaliation statute for residential tenants; the two narrow ones are 20-27-608(a) (after notice of lead hazards, no owner "shall engage in retaliatory action against an occupant ... especially as pertains to eviction or threat of eviction") and 18-16-112(b)(1) (no termination, non-renewal or refusal to rent because of documented domestic abuse).

Calling Arkansas a self-help-barred state overstates the statute for peaceable lockouts and utility shutoffs; calling it a state that permits self-help understates 18-60-302 and 18-60-303 for forcible ones.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Arkansas Eviction Process Laws (verified July 24, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/eviction-process/arkansas/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Every figure above is cited to the Arkansas statute in the citations section below.

Notes and caveats

Common questions: Arkansas eviction process

Each answer is the verified value from the table above, restated as a direct answer. Free to quote with a link to this page.

How much notice does a landlord have to give before filing an eviction for unpaid rent in Arkansas?
3 days. That 3-day figure belongs to the unlawful-detainer track, where the writing must do two things - give notice to quit and demand possession (Ark. Code Ann. 18-60-304(3)). Arkansas's other eviction track, the district-court proceeding under 18-17-901, requires no written nonpayment notice at all; being five days late is itself the legal notice.
How much notice is required to evict for a lease violation in Arkansas?
14 days. The written notice must specify the acts and omissions constituting the noncompliance and state that the rental agreement terminates on a date not less than 14 days after receipt, and the tenancy survives if the tenant adequately remedies the breach before that date (Ark. Code Ann. 18-17-701(a)). Those are straight calendar days counted from receipt.
How long does an eviction take in Arkansas?
About 11 to 14 calendar days at the very fastest on the unlawful-detainer track, and about 19 days plus service time on the Residential Landlord-Tenant Act track. Both are floors built by adding statutory minimums, not observed averages, and contested cases run materially longer.
How long does a tenant have to appeal an eviction judgment in Arkansas?
No eviction-specific deadline — the standard civil appeal window applies (see notes).
Can a landlord change the locks or shut off utilities instead of going to court in Arkansas?
No statute squarely on point — the notes explain what this state's law does and does not address. Arkansas bars FORCIBLE self-help but says nothing about a peaceable lockout or a utility shutoff, so there is no flat yes or no. A landlord who breaks in, carries the tenant's goods out, or uses threats is statutorily exposed; a landlord who quietly changes the locks or has the power cut is not addressed by any statute.

Statute citations

How this record was verified: Arkansas's official code is published via a LexisNexis portal without stable deep links (GA/TN-class sourcing), so verification pairs two independent current-code mirrors with official arkleg.state.ar.us session-law PDFs: every section that carries an answer here (A.C.A. 18-16-303, 18-16-304, 18-16-305, 18-16-306, 18-17-201, 18-17-202, 18-17-401, 18-17-602, 18-17-704, 18-17-705, 14-16-601) was read verbatim on FindLaw (current through 2024-03-28) and independently re-read on the Justia 2024 Arkansas Code edition , with all reads matching; chapter 18-17 was additionally read in FULL from a mirrored chapter PDF for negative checks (no late-fee, rent-increase, or entry-notice provision exists). Every amendment was traced to the official act text read from arkleg PDFs: Act 559 of 2009 (deposit return 30->60 days; 18-17-501 rewritten to defer to 18-16-301 et seq.), Act 1052 of 2021 (18-17-502 habitability, context), and Act 459 of 2025 (preemption expanded to application fees and deposits). Corroborated against the Arkansas Attorney General's landlord-tenant page (official state source) and Legal Aid of Arkansas. 2025 regular session swept for landlord-tenant acts (only Act 459 touches a figure shown here; SB 501 died in committee 2025-05-05 per the official arkleg bill page); the 2026 fiscal session was appropriations-only.