Landlord Atlas

What does Montana law require a landlord to repair?

Verified August 30, 2026 All Montana topics →

Montana requires a landlord to make repairs and do whatever is necessary to put and keep a rented home in a fit and habitable condition, to keep common areas clean and safe, to maintain the electrical, plumbing, sanitary, heating, ventilating and air-conditioning facilities the landlord supplies, and to supply running water, hot water, and reasonable heat between October 1 and May 1.

Cited to Mont. Code Ann. § 70-24-303 (landlord to maintain premises; agreement that tenant perform duties) (1)-(5) and 11 more cited sources · Verified August 30, 2026

The duty is statutory — the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act of 1977 — and Montana's Supreme Court has said the Act is what brought the doctrine to the state, because the common law here recognized no such warranty. A tenant gives written notice setting a termination date at least 30 days out and giving the landlord 14 days to fix the problem, or 3 working days in an emergency. Repairs costing no more than one month's rent may be made and deducted, with no annual limit and no receipts required, and a failure of heat, water, electricity or gas opens a further set of options: buy the service and deduct it, claim the drop in rental value, or move to substitute housing rent-free. There is no right to withhold rent, though the condition can be raised as a counterclaim if the landlord sues, and retaliation for a code complaint or a written repair complaint is barred by a presumption that runs six months.

Montana habitability & repairs at a glance

Where the duty comes from Statute — no independent court-created warranty operates alongside it
Duty source details The duty comes from the Montana Residential Landlord and Tenant Act of 1977, and above all from section 70-24-303. Montana's courts did not create a warranty of habitability and have said so: in Blake v. Dick (1895) the Supreme Court held there was no implied warranty that a leased dwelling was in tenantable condition or would be kept in one, and in Corrigan v. Janney (1981) a unanimous court restated that Montana had no implied warranty of habitability in residential leases and located the doctrine's arrival in the legislature — the 1977 Act, the court said, adopts the doctrine of implied warranty of habitability. Every later Montana decision that adjudicates habitability adjudicates it under the Act. That does not make the case law idle. Montana's courts have held that breach of the maintenance section is negligence per se, that the duty reaches third persons foreseeably on the premises including a tenant's overnight guest, and that the Act's written-notice requirement yields to the landlord's actual notice where the purpose behind writing is already served — none of which is in the statute.
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 Two sources do real work. The Act itself sets a general standard and a list: the landlord shall make repairs and do whatever is necessary to put and keep the premises in a fit and habitable condition, except where the tenant is responsible for maintaining the unit; keep all common areas clean and safe; maintain in good and safe working order all electrical, plumbing, sanitary, heating, ventilating, air-conditioning and other facilities and appliances, including elevators, supplied or required to be supplied by the landlord; provide and arrange removal of waste receptacles unless the rental agreement says otherwise; supply running water and reasonable amounts of hot water at all times and reasonable heat between October 1 and May 1; and install an approved carbon monoxide detector and an approved smoke detector in each unit under the landlord's control and verify at the start of the tenancy that they work. Building and housing codes supply the second source, but with two limits that are easy to miss: the landlord must comply with applicable building and housing codes materially affecting health and safety in effect at the time of original construction, and only in dwelling units where construction was completed after July 1, 1977. Where that code duty is greater than any of the Act's own duties, the code duty governs. The Montana Supreme Court has also treated state administrative health rules on water supply, sewage systems and solid waste as instructive on whether premises are habitable.
Heat standard type A duty to supply heat or maintain temperatures while the unit is occupied
Heat standard details Montana states a season rather than a temperature. The landlord must supply running water and reasonable amounts of hot water at all times and reasonable heat between October 1 and May 1 — there is no degree figure and no hours-of-the-day rule. The duty falls away where the building is not required by law to be equipped for that purpose, or where the heat or hot water is generated by an installation in the tenant's exclusive control. Two things sit alongside it: heating and air-conditioning equipment supplied or required to be supplied by the landlord must be maintained in good and safe working order year round, and the heat, hot water and waste duties are the ones Montana allows a tenant to take on by a written agreement made in good faith, on the looser of the Act's two delegation tracks.
Headline repair day count 14 days
Notice and repair-window rules Montana's general track carries two numbers and both belong in the notice. Where there is noncompliance with the maintenance section affecting health and safety, the tenant delivers a written notice specifying the acts and omissions constituting the breach and stating that the rental agreement will terminate on a date not less than 30 days after receipt if the breach is not remedied in 14 days — so 14 days to fix, and a termination date at least 30 days out. If the landlord adequately remedies the breach before the date stated, the agreement does not terminate, and the tenant may not terminate for a condition caused by the tenant, a member of the tenant's family, or another person on the premises with the tenant's consent. An emergency runs on a different unit of time: where the noncompliance results in a case of emergency and the landlord fails to remedy it within 3 working days after written notice of the situation and of the tenant's intention to terminate, the tenant may terminate. Where substantially the same act or omission recurs within 6 months of a notice, the tenant may terminate on at least 14 days' written notice. The repair-and-deduct limb runs on notice and a reasonable time with no day count, and its notice need not be written; the essential-services remedies require written notice plus a reasonable opportunity to correct, again with no day count. One judicial gloss matters throughout: the Montana Supreme Court has held the written-notice requirement satisfied by the landlord's actual notice, on the reasoning that writing exists to assure the landlord was told and given the chance to fix the problem.
Repair and deduct Yes — authorized by statute — Limit: Repairs that do not cost more than one month's rent, with the cost deducted from rent. The cap is per repair. The section states no annual or periodic aggregate, no frequency limit, no receipt or invoice requirement and no dollar floor — which makes Montana's version unusually permissive next to states that cap the total over twelve months. — The tenant may make repairs costing no more than one month's rent and deduct the cost from rent, provided the tenant has given the landlord notice and the landlord has not made the repairs within a reasonable time. Two details are worth pinning. The notice on this limb is not required to be in writing — the statute says written notice for the termination route and only notice here — and there is no stated waiting period, only a reasonable time. Where the repair is required in a case of emergency and the landlord has not made it, the tenant may have the repair made only by a person qualified to make it; outside an emergency the statute names no qualification requirement at all. A tenant who proceeds under the essential-services section may not use this remedy or the minor-violations damages section as to that same breach.
Rent withholding or escrow Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues — No Montana statute lets a tenant withhold rent over the condition of the premises, and the Act contains no escrow section — no court registry, no agency program, no private account. What it contains is a counterclaim. In an action for possession based on nonpayment, or an action for rent where the tenant is in possession, the tenant may counterclaim for any amount recoverable under the rental agreement or the chapter; the court may from time to time order the tenant to pay into court all or part of the rent accrued and rent accruing after that, and shall determine what is due to each party. The party owed a net amount is paid first out of the money deposited and the balance by the other party, the court may release money to either party at any time by agreement or on finding a party entitled to it, and if no rent remains due after the accounting, judgment on possession must be entered for the tenant. A tenant not in possession may counterclaim without paying any rent into court. A tenant who simply stops paying, outside that structure, is in ordinary nonpayment.
Termination over habitability failures Yes — a statute states the right — After written notice specifying the breach and setting a termination date not less than 30 days after receipt, the rental agreement terminates as the notice provides if the landlord has not remedied the breach within 14 days — unless the landlord adequately remedies it before the stated date, or the condition was caused by the tenant's household or a person on the premises with the tenant's consent. An emergency shortens the sequence to 3 working days after written notice that states both the situation and the tenant's intention to terminate. A repeat of substantially the same act or omission within 6 months lets the tenant terminate on at least 14 days' written notice. On termination the landlord must return all security recoverable under Montana's deposit law.
Essential-service remedies Yes — distinct statutory remedies for essential-service failures — Where the landlord purposefully or negligently fails to supply heat, running water, hot water, electric, gas or other essential services, contrary to the rental agreement or the maintenance section, the tenant gives written notice specifying the breach and may then take one of three routes: procure reasonable amounts of heat, hot water, running water, electricity, gas and other essential services during the failure and deduct their actual and reasonable cost from rent; recover damages based on the reduction in the unit's fair rental value; or procure reasonable substitute housing during the failure, in which case the tenant is excused from paying rent for that period. Two limits ride with it. The rights do not arise until the tenant has given notice and the landlord has had a reasonable opportunity to correct the conditions — no day count is stated — and they do not arise at all where the condition was caused by the tenant, the tenant's family, or another person on the premises with the tenant's consent. And a tenant who proceeds under this section may not proceed under the general repair remedies or the minor-violations damages section as to that breach. The trigger is worth noting: purposefully or negligently, which is broader than the willful standard some states use and narrower than no fault standard at all. Deliberate interruption of services is a separate matter, carrying possession or termination plus not more than three months' periodic rent or treble damages, whichever is greater.
Retaliation protection Protected by a general retaliation statute — Evidence of a complaint within 6 months before the alleged act of retaliation creates a rebuttable presumption that the landlord's conduct was retaliatory. The window counts backward from the landlord's act and works as a presumption rather than a deadline for suing. It does not arise if the tenant made the complaint after notice of a proposed rent increase or diminution of services. — A landlord may not retaliate by increasing rent, decreasing services, or bringing or threatening to bring an action for possession after a protected complaint. A tenant facing retaliation gets the remedies of the unlawful-ouster section — possession or termination plus not more than three months' periodic rent or treble damages, whichever is greater — and also has a defense in any retaliatory possession action. The presumption is defined inside the statute and it is mandatory until met: the trier of fact is required to find the existence of the fact presumed unless and until evidence is introduced that would support a finding of its nonexistence. Four things the landlord may still do are listed: bring a possession action where the code violation was caused primarily by the lack of reasonable care of the tenant, the tenant's family or a person on the premises with the tenant's consent; where the tenant is in default in rent; or where compliance with the code requires alteration, remodeling or demolition that would effectively deprive the tenant of use of the unit — and maintaining such an action does not release the landlord from the Act's own damages liability. — Three acts, and the form each must take differs. Complaining of a violation applicable to the premises materially affecting health and safety to a governmental agency charged with enforcing a building or housing code — which the statute does not require to be in writing. Complaining to the landlord in writing of a violation of the maintenance section — this one must be written, and must be about that section specifically. And organizing or becoming a member of a tenants' union or similar organization.
Damages, penalties, and defenses Beyond terminating, the tenant may recover actual damages and obtain injunctive relief for any noncompliance with the rental agreement or the maintenance section, and that right is expressly in addition to the termination right. Where the reasonable cost of compliance is less than one month's rent, the tenant recovers damages on the same footing. Unlawful ouster, exclusion, or purposeful interruption of heat, running water, hot water, electricity, gas or other essential services lets the tenant recover possession or terminate and, either way, recover not more than three months' periodic rent or treble damages, whichever is greater — the same measure the retaliation section imports. A purposefully used prohibited lease provision costs actual damages plus up to three months' rent. Fees run both ways and cannot be contracted away: in an action on a rental agreement or arising under the chapter, reasonable attorney fees together with costs and necessary disbursements may be awarded to the prevailing party notwithstanding an agreement to the contrary, with prevailing party defined as the party in whose favor final judgment is rendered — so the fee motion comes after judgment, and the award stays discretionary even once entitlement is established. The case law adds three things the statute does not. A landlord's failure to comply with the maintenance section is negligence per se, because the section was plainly intended for the benefit and safety of tenants. The Act's remedies reach an aggrieved party, and that includes third persons foreseeably on the property such as a tenant's overnight guest, so liability is not limited to the tenant. And fees under the chapter are available to a personal-injury plaintiff suing on the Act. The landlord's defenses are conditions caused by the tenant's household or a person there with the tenant's consent; the tenant's own maintenance duties, which the fit-and-habitable duty expressly yields to for the part of the premises the tenant occupies and uses — though the Supreme Court has held those tenant duties do not reach common areas, where the duty sits solely on the landlord; the tenant's refusal of access; and the two limits on the building-code duty. The landlord is also not liable for damages caused by the failure of a required smoke or carbon monoxide detector.
Can the duty be waived or shifted Repairs may be delegated only within uniform-act-style limits
Waiver and delegation rules A rental agreement may not provide that a party waives or forgoes rights or remedies under the chapter, and a prohibited provision is unenforceable; a party who purposefully uses a rental agreement containing provisions known to be prohibited owes the other party actual damages plus up to three months' periodic rent. What can be shifted is shifted through two delegation tracks, and they are not the same. On the looser one, landlord and tenant may agree in writing that the tenant will perform the waste-removal and water-heat duties and specified repairs, maintenance tasks, alterations and remodeling, on the single condition that the agreement is made in good faith and not to evade the landlord's obligations. On the stricter one, covering specified repairs, maintenance, alterations or remodeling, the agreement must be in good faith and not evasive, set out in a separate writing signed by the parties and supported by adequate consideration, the work must not be necessary to cure a failure of the building-code duty, and the agreement must not diminish the landlord's obligation to other tenants. Montana keeps the uniform act's code-cure and other-tenants limits but drops the single-family-dwelling gate that several states use — and it is the core utility duties, heat and water and waste, that ride the looser track.
Leading court decisions Corrigan v. Janney, 192 Mont. 99, 626 P.2d 838 (1981) — A unanimous court stated that Montana had previously maintained there is no implied warranty of habitability in residential leases, and that in enacting the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act in 1977 the legislature adopted the doctrine of implied warranty of habitability, allowing recovery of damages where a tenant is injured by dangerous latent defects in rental property. Because the tenancy predated the Act, the case itself was decided on tort principles: the court overruled its older rule that the repair-and-deduct statute was a tenant's exclusive remedy and held that the owner of premises owes a duty to exercise ordinary care in managing them so as not to expose people there to an unreasonable risk of harm. The statement about the Act is the court's own account of where Montana's habitability duty comes from, and it was relied on as such eleven years later in Mathes v. Adams. • Mathes v. Adams, 254 Mont. 347, 838 P.2d 390 (1992) — Montana's one appellate decision finding a warranty of habitability breached and reversing for the tenants. On facts of septic overflows and raw sewage on the ground, uncapped sewer risers, a boil order after a contaminated water sample and inadequate garbage collection, the unanimous court held the landlords failed to keep the property in a habitable manner and breached the warranty, locating that warranty in the 1977 Act by way of Corrigan v. Janney. It also held the Act's written-notice requirement satisfied by the landlord's actual notice: the writing requirement exists to deter false claims of notice and to assure the landlord was told and given the chance to correct the problem, and where an agent had actual knowledge of the conditions the landlords could not escape responsibility by claiming they were never notified. A lease recital that the tenant had examined the premises and found them in good order and tenantable condition did not defeat the claim. • Calder v. Anderson, 275 Mont. 273, 911 P.2d 1157 (1996) — Montana's adoption of the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act changed and added to the duties property owners owe their tenants, and because the maintenance section was plainly intended for the benefit and safety of tenants, a landlord's failure to comply with it is negligence per se. The court also drew the common-area line: the tenant's own maintenance duty covers the part of the premises the tenant occupies and uses and does not reach common areas, which the Act addresses separately and places solely on the landlord. The decision carried five to one, with the Chief Justice dissenting, and its rule was applied by a unanimous court two years later. • Kunst v. Pass, 1998 MT 71, 288 Mont. 264, 957 P.2d 1 — On facts of carbon monoxide poisoning from a leaking furnace, a unanimous court held the landlords had breached their statutory duties to make repairs and keep the premises fit and habitable and to maintain heating facilities in good and safe working order, as a matter of law. Deciding an issue of first impression, it held that a landlord's liability under the Act is not limited to tenants but extends to third persons who may foreseeably be on the premises, because the Act's remedies are administered so that an aggrieved party may recover appropriate damages and a tenant's overnight guest is such a party. It also held that attorney fees under the Act reach a personal-injury plaintiff, on a post-judgment motion with no statutory deadline, and that the award remains within the court's discretion. • Blake v. Dick, 15 Mont. 236, 38 P. 1072 (1895) — Montana's pre-statutory baseline: on an ordinary landlord-and-tenant contract there was no implied warranty that the leased dwelling was in tenantable condition or would be kept in such condition, and no obligation on the landlord to make repairs. The landlord did not warrant the condition of the premises; the tenant inspected them and took the risk of their condition. The decision was never overruled — it was superseded by the 1977 Act.
Local rules Local building and housing codes feed the Montana duty, but through a limb with two hard limits. The landlord must comply with applicable building and housing codes materially affecting health and safety in effect at the time of original construction, and the duty runs only in dwelling units where construction was completed after July 1, 1977. So a landlord is not pulled up to current code by later amendments, and pre-July-1977 housing — a large share of Montana's rental stock — falls outside the code limb entirely, which also takes it outside the rule that the code duty governs wherever it is stricter. What survives for older units is the Act's own general fit-and-habitable duty and its enumerated list. The Montana Supreme Court has separately treated state administrative health rules on water supply, sewage systems and solid waste storage and disposal as instructive on habitability.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Montana Habitability & Repair Laws (verified August 30, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/habitability/montana/" — 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: Montana 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 Montana have an implied warranty of habitability?
Statute — no independent court-created warranty operates alongside it. The duty comes from the Montana Residential Landlord and Tenant Act of 1977, and above all from section 70-24-303. Montana's courts did not create a warranty of habitability and have said so: in Blake v. Dick (1895) the Supreme Court held there was no implied warranty that a leased dwelling was in tenantable condition or would be kept in one, and in Corrigan v. Janney (1981) a unanimous court restated that Montana had no implied warranty of habitability in residential leases and located the doctrine's arrival in the legislature — the 1977 Act, the court said, adopts the doctrine of implied warranty of habitability.
How long does a landlord have to make repairs in Montana?
14 days. Montana's general track carries two numbers and both belong in the notice. Where there is noncompliance with the maintenance section affecting health and safety, the tenant delivers a written notice specifying the acts and omissions constituting the breach and stating that the rental agreement will terminate on a date not less than 30 days after receipt if the breach is not remedied in 14 days — so 14 days to fix, and a termination date at least 30 days out.
Can a tenant repair and deduct in Montana?
Yes — authorized by statute — Limit: Repairs that do not cost more than one month's rent, with the cost deducted from rent. The cap is per repair.
Can a tenant withhold rent for repair problems in Montana?
Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues — No Montana statute lets a tenant withhold rent over the condition of the premises, and the Act contains no escrow section — no court registry, no agency program, no private account. What it contains is a counterclaim.
Can a landlord retaliate against a tenant who complains about repairs in Montana?
Protected by a general retaliation statute — Evidence of a complaint within 6 months before the alleged act of retaliation creates a rebuttable presumption that the landlord's conduct was retaliatory. The window counts backward from the landlord's act and works as a presumption rather than a deadline for suing.
Can a lease make the tenant responsible for repairs in Montana?
Repairs may be delegated only within uniform-act-style limits. A rental agreement may not provide that a party waives or forgoes rights or remedies under the chapter, and a prohibited provision is unenforceable; a party who purposefully uses a rental agreement containing provisions known to be prohibited owes the other party actual damages plus up to three months' periodic rent. What can be shifted is shifted through two delegation tracks, and they are not the same.

Citations

How this record was verified: Direct reading of the Montana Residential Landlord and Tenant Act of 1977 on the Legislature's official code site, in the 2025 edition of the Montana Code Annotated — sections 70-24-104, 70-24-105, 70-24-202, 70-24-303, 70-24-321, 70-24-403, 70-24-405, 70-24-406, 70-24-407, 70-24-408, 70-24-410, 70-24-411, 70-24-421, 70-24-431 and 70-24-442 each read end to end, with the complete section list for all four parts of title 70, chapter 24 taken from the Legislature's own part indexes and each section's amendment history line checked. Section 5-2-103, which fixes when the legislature meets, was read for the pending-measure question. Blake v. Dick, 15 Mont. 236, 38 P. 1072 (1895), Corrigan v. Janney, 192 Mont. 99, 626 P.2d 838 (1981), Busch v. Kammerer, 200 Mont. 130, 649 P.2d 1339 (1982), Mathes v. Adams, 254 Mont. 347, 838 P.2d 390 (1992), Calder v. Anderson, 275 Mont. 273, 911 P.2d 1157 (1996), and Kunst v. Pass, 1998 MT 71, 288 Mont. 264, 957 P.2d 1, were each read end to end in the official reporter text.