Landlord Atlas

What does Florida law require a landlord to repair?

Verified August 30, 2026 All Florida topics →

A Florida landlord must comply with the applicable building, housing, and health codes, and only where no such code applies must instead keep the structure, plumbing, and screens in the condition section 83.51(1) describes.

Cited to F.S. 83.51 (landlord's obligation to maintain premises) (1), (2)(a)-(e), (3), (4) and 15 more cited sources · Verified August 30, 2026

A second set of duties — extermination, locks and keys, clean and safe common areas, garbage removal, and functioning facilities for heat during winter, running water, and hot water — reaches only dwelling units other than single-family homes and duplexes, can be varied by written agreement, and is expressly not a ground for defending an eviction. After a written seven-day notice, a tenant may terminate the tenancy, or may give a different seven-day notice of intent not to pay rent and raise a material breach of the code and structural duty as a complete defense to a nonpayment eviction. Florida gives residential tenants no repair-and-deduct right, no rent-withholding right, and no escrow; the withholding section people cite sits in the chapter's nonresidential part. And any tenant who raises any defense other than payment in a possession action must pay the rent into the court registry within 5 days, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays, after service of process, or absolutely waive every defense but payment. Retaliation is unlawful and is a defense to possession, with no time window stated.

Florida habitability & repairs at a glance

Where the duty comes from Statute — no independent court-created warranty operates alongside it
Duty source details The duty is statutory: section 83.51 of the Florida Statutes, inside Part II of chapter 83, which governs residential tenancies. Florida's courts call what that section creates the statutory warranty of habitability — the phrase is the Supreme Court's own in Mansur v. Eubanks (1981), and the district courts of appeal have repeated it — and no separate court-made warranty operates alongside it in a lease. Part II never uses the words habitable or habitability at all.
Who is covered Statewide — no coverage split
Where the repair standards live More than one source does real work — the details on this page say which
What must be kept in repair Section 83.51(1) is written as an either-or, and the first branch does most of the work: the landlord must comply with the requirements of applicable building, housing, and health codes, or, where there are no applicable codes, must keep the roofs, windows, doors, floors, steps, porches, exterior walls, foundations and all other structural components in good repair and capable of resisting normal forces and loads, keep the plumbing in reasonable working condition, install screens in reasonable condition at the start of the tenancy, and repair damage to screens once annually when necessary. Because almost every Florida city and county has such a code, for most units the state duty is a duty to comply with the local code, whose content chapter 83 does not write. Florida states no free-standing fit-and-habitable standard; the phrase fitness for habitation appears in Part II only inside section 83.43(3)'s definition of what counts as a building, housing, or health code. Section 83.51(2)(a) adds a separate list — extermination of rats, mice, roaches, ants, wood-destroying organisms and bedbugs; locks and keys; the clean and safe condition of common areas; garbage removal and outside receptacles; and functioning facilities for heat during winter, running water, and hot water — but that list reaches only a dwelling unit other than a single-family home or duplex, and it opens with the words unless otherwise agreed in writing. Smoke detection devices must be installed at the start of a single-family home or duplex tenancy under section 83.51(2)(b). Where the subsection (1) duty is the same as or greater than a subsection (2) duty, subsection (1) governs, and the landlord is not responsible for conditions created by the tenant, a member of the tenant's family, or another person on the premises with the tenant's consent.
Heat standard type A duty to provide working heating equipment — capability, not a temperature guarantee
Heat standard details Florida states no temperature and no hours. The duty is framed as equipment: the landlord must make reasonable provisions for functioning facilities for heat during winter, running water, and hot water. Two limits matter more than the wording. That duty sits in section 83.51(2)(a), which by its own terms covers only a dwelling unit other than a single-family home or duplex — a Florida house or duplex rental carries no statutory duty to supply heat, running water, or hot water at all — and even for the housing it does cover, the subsection opens unless otherwise agreed in writing. A failure of heat, running water, or hot water is also expressly outside the eviction defense under section 83.51(2)(c).
Headline repair day count 7 days
Notice and repair-window rules Seven days is the period the landlord has to comply after the tenant's written notice is delivered — but Florida runs two different seven-day tenant notices and they are not interchangeable. To end the tenancy, the notice must specify the noncompliance and state that the tenant intends to terminate the rental agreement because of it; the tenant may then terminate if the landlord materially fails to comply with section 83.51(1) or a material provision of the rental agreement within seven days after delivery. To stop paying rent and defend a later eviction instead, the notice must specify the noncompliance and state that the tenant intends not to pay rent because of it; that defense may be raised once seven days have elapsed after delivery. A tenant who sends the wrong one has not preserved the other remedy. Notice may be mailed, delivered as a true copy, sent by e-mail where the parties have signed an addendum under section 83.505, or left at the residence if the tenant is absent, and the notice requirements may not be waived in the rental agreement. Where the failure is due to causes beyond the landlord's control and the landlord has made and continues to make every reasonable effort to correct it, the tenancy is not terminated: instead the tenant who vacates an untenantable unit owes no rent while it remains uninhabitable, and the tenant who stays in an impaired unit has the rent reduced in proportion to the loss of rental value.
Repair and deduct No — no statute or decision authorizes it — No section of Florida's residential landlord-tenant law lets a tenant have a repair made and take the cost out of the rent, and none forbids it either — the remedy is absent rather than barred, and Part II has no reserved or repealed slot marking where one would sit. The word deduct appears in the part only in the security-deposit claim provision and the reletting-credit provision, neither of which is a repair remedy. A tenant who deducts anyway is simply short on rent: the landlord may serve the statutory rent demand and sue for possession, and the tenant who then raises any defense other than payment must pay the rent into the court registry under section 83.60(2) or absolutely waive every defense but payment.
Rent withholding or escrow Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues; rent paid into court or a registry as the price of the defense — Residential Florida gives a tenant no affirmative right to withhold rent. What it gives is a defense, and a hard gate in front of it. The defense: after seven days have elapsed from a written notice stating the noncompliance and the tenant's intention not to pay rent because of it, a material noncompliance with section 83.51(1) is a complete defense to an eviction for nonpayment, and on hearing the court or jury determines the amount by which the rent is reduced to reflect the diminution in value of the dwelling during the period of noncompliance. The defense reaches only section 83.51(1); a failure of the section 83.51(2) duties is expressly not a ground of defense to a possession action. The gate: in any action by a landlord for possession of a dwelling unit, a tenant who interposes any defense other than payment must pay into the registry of the court the accrued rent alleged in the complaint or determined by the court and the rent that accrues during the proceeding as it comes due. Failing to do that, or to file a motion to determine the amount of rent to be deposited, within 5 days excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays after the date of service of process is an absolute waiver of every defense other than payment, and the landlord takes an immediate default judgment for removal with a writ of possession issued without further notice or hearing. Section 83.56(5)(b) locks the same rule in from the other side: the court may not set a date for mediation or trial until section 83.60(2) has been met and must enter the default judgment if it has not been. The only softenings are in the text itself — a motion to determine the amount, filed in the same window with supporting documentation, and public housing tenants and tenants receiving rent subsidies deposit only the portion of the rent they are responsible for. There is no hardship or indigency exception. Money in the registry is not frozen for the tenant's benefit: under section 83.61 a landlord in actual danger of losing the premises or facing other personal hardship from the lost rental income may apply for disbursement of some or all of it, or for a prompt final hearing, and the tenant has no matching route to the money.
Termination over habitability failures Yes — a statute states the right — Section 83.56(1) is the termination track: written notice specifying the noncompliance and stating the tenant's intention to terminate, and if the landlord materially fails to comply with section 83.51(1) or a material provision of the rental agreement within seven days after delivery, the tenant may terminate the rental agreement. Where the failure is beyond the landlord's control and the landlord keeps making every reasonable effort to fix it, the tenancy survives and the rent adjusts instead — no rent is owed for the period a vacated unit remains uninhabitable, and rent is reduced in proportion to the lost rental value for a tenant who stays. On termination the deposit is handled under the deposit rules of section 83.49(3). Casualty is separate: where the premises are damaged or destroyed other than by the tenant's wrongful or negligent act so that enjoyment is substantially impaired, section 83.63 lets the tenant terminate and vacate immediately, or vacate only the part made unusable with liability for rent reduced by the fair rental value of the damaged part, and since 2025 the tenant must be given either the chance to collect belongings when it is safe to do so or notice of a date, within a reasonable time, when that will be possible.
Essential-service remedies No distinct treatment beyond the general duty — Florida gives heat, running water, hot water, and electricity no distinct treatment: there is no essential-services section, no faster clock, no substitute-housing right, and no procure-and-deduct provision anywhere in the residential part. Heat during winter, running water, and hot water appear once, in the section 83.51(2)(a) list, which does not reach single-family homes or duplexes and can be varied by written agreement — and a failure of that list is expressly not a defense to an action for possession. The one place the statute does force a landlord to give something up over a service failure is extermination: a tenant who must temporarily vacate for it gets 7 days' written notice, may be required to leave for no more than 4 days, and the landlord must abate the rent for the period. A landlord who deliberately cuts off utilities is a different subject, covered with the eviction rules.
Retaliation protection Protected by a general retaliation statute — Section 83.64 makes it unlawful for a landlord to discriminatorily raise a tenant's rent, cut services, or bring or threaten a possession or other civil action primarily in retaliation, and evidence of retaliatory conduct may be raised as a defense in any action against the tenant for possession. It is a shield rather than a sword: the section creates no cause of action and states no damages of its own, so a tenant seeking money runs through the general damages provision. Florida states no presumption window, no time trigger, and no burden shift — the tenant proves retaliation as the primary motive on the ordinary standard, must have acted in good faith, and must also show discrimination as the statute defines it, meaning treatment different from other tenants in the rent charged, the services rendered, or the action taken. The section does not apply at all if the landlord proves the eviction is for good cause, with nonpayment of rent, violation of the rental agreement or of reasonable rules, and violation of the chapter given as examples. — The statute's list is open — it says the examples include but are not limited to — so Florida's protected acts are extensible by the courts. The six named are complaining to a government agency responsible for enforcing a building, housing, or health code about a suspected violation applicable to the premises; organizing, encouraging, or taking part in a tenant organization; complaining to the landlord under section 83.56(1), which is the habitability notice itself; terminating as a servicemember under section 83.682; paying rent to a condominium, cooperative, or homeowners' association after the association demands it to cover the landlord's obligation; and exercising rights under local, state, or federal fair housing laws.
Damages, penalties, and defenses Damages come from section 83.55, which is bare: an aggrieved party may recover the damages caused by the noncompliance, with no cap, no multiplier, and no stated measure. Defensively, the court or jury sets the reduction in rent reflecting the diminution in value of the dwelling during the period of noncompliance. Attorney fees under section 83.48 go to the prevailing party in any civil action brought to enforce the rental agreement or the part, may not be waived in a lease, and are expressly unavailable in a claim for personal injury damages based on a breach of the section 83.51 duty. Utility shutoffs, lockouts, and removing doors or locks carry their own penalty and belong with the eviction rules. The landlord's defenses: conditions created or caused by the negligent or wrongful act or omission of the tenant, a family member, or another person on the premises with the tenant's consent; causes beyond the landlord's control, which convert the termination right into a rent adjustment; good cause, which defeats a retaliation defense; the section 83.51(2)(c) bar keeping the service duties out of a possession action; and the section 83.60(2) registry rule, which ends most defenses before they are heard. A landlord must also be given an opportunity to cure a deficiency in a notice or in the pleadings before the possession action is dismissed.
Can the duty be waived or shifted Waivable in part, with a stated floor or subject-matter limit
Waiver and delegation rules The answer differs by subsection and by housing type. The section 83.51(2) duties — extermination, locks and keys, common areas, garbage, and heat, running water and hot water — open with unless otherwise agreed in writing, so for the units they cover they can be reallocated in a written lease. The section 83.51(1) code and structural duty carries its own modification clause, added in 2013: the landlord's obligations under that subsection may be altered or modified in writing with respect to a single-family home or duplex. For any other dwelling unit, subsection (1) carries no modification clause. Section 83.47 sits in the same part and voids any lease provision that purports to waive or preclude the rights, remedies, or requirements set forth in the part, or to limit either party's liability arising under law, with actual damages for a party harmed by the inclusion of such a provision. The two provisions have not been squared by a Florida appellate court: no decision construes the 2013 modification clause against section 83.47. The notice requirements of section 83.56 cannot be waived in the rental agreement, and the right to attorney fees in section 83.48 cannot be waived in a lease.
Leading court decisions Mansur v. Eubanks, 401 So. 2d 1328 (Fla. 1981) — Recognized a landlord's common-law duty of reasonable care to deliver a reasonably safe dwelling and to repair dangerous defective conditions on notice, and tied the continuing half of that duty back to the statute, calling section 83.51(1) a statutory warranty of habitability. The Court also said the duty may be waived by the tenant and modified by agreement of the parties. The case is a personal-injury decision, and attorney fees are barred by statute in injury claims premised on a section 83.51 breach. • Grant v. Thornton, 749 So. 2d 529 (Fla. 2d DCA 1999) — Applied section 83.51 to a duplex whose exit doors used double-cylinder deadbolts needing a key from the inside, in violation of the county building and fire codes, and held that ignorance of the law is no defense for either landlord or tenant and that the landlord's failure to comply with the county building code can be evidence of negligence. The decision also states that section 83.51 has been said to create a statutory warranty of habitability, and it shows that subsection (1) reaches duplexes even though subsection (2) does not. • Cruise.com, Inc. v. Eller Drive Properties, Inc., 813 So. 2d 254 (Fla. 4th DCA 2002) — A commercial tenant that withheld rent over a failed air-conditioning system, invoking the rent-withholding section of chapter 83's nonresidential part, lost because the statutory conditions for withholding had not been met. The case is one of the two decisions applying that section, and both are commercial-lease disputes.
Local rules Local law does the substantive work in Florida, because the state duty for most units is a duty to obey the local code. Section 83.43(3) defines building, housing, and health codes as any law, ordinance, or governmental regulation concerning health, safety, sanitation or fitness for habitation, or the construction, maintenance, operation, occupancy, use, or appearance of a dwelling unit — so the city or county code where the property sits is what section 83.51(1)(a) requires compliance with, and it belongs beside the state law on this page. That is not in tension with the 2023 preemption section, but the two are easy to blur: section 83.425 preempts local regulation of residential tenancies and the landlord-tenant relationship to the state, and its examples are tenancy terms — screening, deposits, application fees, lease terms, the parties' rights and responsibilities, disclosures, landlord fees, and notice requirements — not building, housing, and health codes.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Florida Habitability & Repair Laws (verified August 30, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/habitability/florida/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Everything above is cited in the citations section below.

Notes and caveats

Common questions: Florida habitability & repairs

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

Does Florida have an implied warranty of habitability?
Statute — no independent court-created warranty operates alongside it. The duty is statutory: section 83.51 of the Florida Statutes, inside Part II of chapter 83, which governs residential tenancies. Florida's courts call what that section creates the statutory warranty of habitability — the phrase is the Supreme Court's own in Mansur v. Eubanks (1981), and the district courts of appeal have repeated it — and no separate court-made warranty operates alongside it in a lease.
How long does a landlord have to make repairs in Florida?
7 days. Seven days is the period the landlord has to comply after the tenant's written notice is delivered — but Florida runs two different seven-day tenant notices and they are not interchangeable. To end the tenancy, the notice must specify the noncompliance and state that the tenant intends to terminate the rental agreement because of it; the tenant may then terminate if the landlord materially fails to comply with section 83.51(1) or a material provision of the rental agreement within seven days after delivery.
Can a tenant repair and deduct in Florida?
No — no statute or decision authorizes it — No section of Florida's residential landlord-tenant law lets a tenant have a repair made and take the cost out of the rent, and none forbids it either — the remedy is absent rather than barred, and Part II has no reserved or repealed slot marking where one would sit. The word deduct appears in the part only in the security-deposit claim provision and the reletting-credit provision, neither of which is a repair remedy.
Can a tenant withhold rent for repair problems in Florida?
Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues; rent paid into court or a registry as the price of the defense — Residential Florida gives a tenant no affirmative right to withhold rent. What it gives is a defense, and a hard gate in front of it.
Can a landlord retaliate against a tenant who complains about repairs in Florida?
Protected by a general retaliation statute — Section 83.64 makes it unlawful for a landlord to discriminatorily raise a tenant's rent, cut services, or bring or threaten a possession or other civil action primarily in retaliation, and evidence of retaliatory conduct may be raised as a defense in any action against the tenant for possession. It is a shield rather than a sword: the section creates no cause of action and states no damages of its own, so a tenant seeking money runs through the general damages provision.
Can a lease make the tenant responsible for repairs in Florida?
Waivable in part, with a stated floor or subject-matter limit. The answer differs by subsection and by housing type. The section 83.51(2) duties — extermination, locks and keys, common areas, garbage, and heat, running water and hot water — open with unless otherwise agreed in writing, so for the units they cover they can be reallocated in a written lease.

Citations

How this record was verified: Chapter 83 of the Florida Statutes read on the Legislature's official statutes service as a whole chapter, so that each section's part membership and history line were read with its text: every section of Part II (residential tenancies, sections 83.40 through 83.684) read in full, together with the Part I sections that bracket section 83.201. The enrolled Laws of Florida chapters 2013-136, 2025-16, 2025-166, 2025-190, 2026-125 and 2026-179 read on the state's session-law service. The Florida Senate's own bill records for the 2025 and 2026 regular sessions, all six 2025 and 2026 special sessions and the 2027 filings to date, listed by the statute section each bill cites. And the official reporter texts of Mansur v. Eubanks, Paterson v. Deeb, Grant v. Thornton, Cruise.com, Inc. v. Eller Drive Properties, Inc. and Legakis v. Loumpos, each read in full.