Does New Hampshire have an implied warranty of habitability?

Statute and a court-recognized implied warranty, each doing independent work. Both limbs do independent work and neither is a fallback for the other. On the statutory side, RSA 48-A:14 sets minimum standards of fitness for health and safety, and RSA 540:13-d bars a possession judgment for nonpayment of rent where the premises are in substantial violation of those standards, or of local codes adopted under the same chapter, and the violation materially affects habitability.

How long does a landlord have to make repairs in New Hampshire?

14 days. Fourteen days is a deadline to correct the violation, not a window to begin work, and it runs from the landlord's receipt of the tenant's written notice. In an emergency the fourteen days give way to a standard rather than a number: the landlord must correct the violation as promptly as conditions require.

Can a tenant repair and deduct in New Hampshire?

No — no statute or decision authorizes it — No New Hampshire statute authorizes a tenant to repair a defect and deduct the cost from rent. The remedy is absent rather than forbidden: nothing in RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A prohibits the arrangement either, and RSA 48-A's enforcement machinery — the enforcement procedure, the court order, the liens and the fines — runs through municipal code officials and the courts rather than through tenants.

Can a tenant withhold rent for repair problems in New Hampshire?

Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues — New Hampshire gives no affirmative right to withhold rent. What it gives is a defense: no action for possession based on nonpayment may be maintained for residential premises, other than those rented for vacation or recreation, where the premises are in substantial violation of the fitness standards and the violation materially affects habitability, provided the four conditions on notice, the fourteen-day cure, tenant fault and access are met.

Can a landlord retaliate against a tenant who complains about repairs in New Hampshire?

Protected by a general retaliation statute — The statute counts the window in months: six months. A rebuttable presumption that a landlord's action was retaliatory arises where the landlord brings a possessory action, increases the rent, or substantially alters the terms of the tenancy within six months after any of four events — the landlord received notice of the alleged violation (the tenant mailed it, gave it in hand or left it at the landlord's abode, or the landlord received notice of the complaint or report from the board, agency or authority); the landlord completed repairs or otherwise successfully remedied the violation; the landlord received notice that the tenant had begun an action under RSA 540-A; or the landlord discovered the tenant meeting or gathering with other tenants.

Can a lease make the tenant responsible for repairs in New Hampshire?

The law says nothing either way. New Hampshire law does not say whether the habitability duty itself may be waived. No provision of RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A makes the duty or the warranty non-waivable.

What does New Hampshire law require a landlord to repair?

Verified August 29, 2026 All New Hampshire topics →

Enacted but not yet in force. This page reflects the law in force today. The following measure has been signed and takes effect on the date shown:

HB 1598 (2026) — Eviction-process overhaul: it caps the discretionary stay of dispossession at 60 days, or 75 days where the tenant proves both that the longer stay will cause the landlord no financial harm, no damage and no ongoing health or safety threat and that the added time is needed for reasons such as age, familial status, disability or limited English proficiency; a tenant in default gets no discretionary stay at all. It also requires a tenant to file an answer stating affirmative defenses and counterclaims not more than five days after the return date, sets a five-day deadline for a discovery continuance and a seven-day continuance for a landlord met with an unnoticed defense, moves the default notice to the day following default, requires a notice of judgment within two days of a contested hearing with the writ issuing seven days after that mailing, and adds a five-day exchange of documents before a hearing on prohibited practices. It amends RSA 540:13, 540:13-c, 540:14, 540-A:2 and 540-A:4, VII, and rewords RSA 540-A:3, V while keeping the entry standard 'notice which is adequate under the circumstances' word for word, so the entry-notice answer does not move. Status: Passed both chambers (Senate May 14, 2026; House concurrence May 21, 2026), enrolled June 4, 2026, and signed by Governor Ayotte on July 10, 2026 as chapter 308 of the 2026 New Hampshire Laws. It takes effect October 8, 2026, ninety days after passage, and until then the current text of each statute it amends governs. (checked September 5, 2026).

What did not become law. None of the following is law; failed bills are sometimes still described as if enacted:

HB 1336 (2026) — Would have created a 'regulated conditional deposit' letting landlords collect up to one additional month's rent beyond the RSA 540-A:6 one-month security-deposit cap from applicants failing standard screening criteria (credit, income, eviction history), with disclosure and re-screening rights. Status: Passed both chambers; VETOED by Gov. Ayotte 2026-07-02 (veto message: would impede access to housing and lacked clarity on how long landlords could hold the funds). Not law; an override attempt is possible at the fall 2026 veto day — re-check then. (checked July 11, 2026).

New Hampshire's habitability duty comes from statute and case law together, and each supplies what the other leaves out.

Cited to NH RSA 540:13-d (defenses to violations of fitness) and 9 more cited sources · Verified August 29, 2026

RSA 48-A:14 lists twelve minimum conditions a landlord may not maintain — but only in municipalities that have not adopted their own housing code, and the heat standard is an average of 65 degrees Fahrenheit rather than a per-room floor. RSA 540:13-d then bars a possession judgment for nonpayment where the premises substantially violate those standards or the local code and the violation materially affects habitability, provided the tenant was not in arrears when notice was given, gave notice to the person who collects the rent, and the landlord failed to correct the violation within 14 days of receiving it, or as promptly as an emergency required. New Hampshire gives tenants no repair-and-deduct right, and no affirmative right to withhold rent: withholding works only as that defense, and once the court continues the case to let the landlord fix the problem it must order the withheld rent paid into court. The implied warranty the Supreme Court created in Kline v. Burns (1971) supplies the damages, which two statutes then make recoverable by name. Retaliation is a defense with a six-month rebuttable presumption that can run from the completion of repairs, but it is unavailable to a tenant who owes a week's rent or more.

New Hampshire habitability & repairs at a glance

Where the duty comes from	Statute and a court-recognized implied warranty, each doing independent work
Duty source details	Both limbs do independent work and neither is a fallback for the other. On the statutory side, RSA 48-A:14 sets minimum standards of fitness for health and safety, and RSA 540:13-d bars a possession judgment for nonpayment of rent where the premises are in substantial violation of those standards, or of local codes adopted under the same chapter, and the violation materially affects habitability. On the judicial side, Kline v. Burns (1971) held that a rental of an apartment as a dwelling unit, written or oral, carries an implied warranty of habitability imposed by law on grounds of public policy, and it supplied what the statutes never state: the breach standard, the contract remedies of damages, reformation and rescission, and the measure of damages. Two statutes then name that judicial warranty without defining it — RSA 540:13-d, II awards a tenant part of the deposited rent as damages for the landlord's breach of his warranty of habitability, and RSA 540-A:4, VII(b) lets a court award damages for breach of warranty of habitability in a tenant's petition. The statutes are not readable without the decision.
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	Three sources do real work, and which one governs depends on the town. RSA 48-A:14 lists twelve conditions a landlord may not maintain, but its opening words limit it to a landlord renting in a municipality that has not adopted ordinances, codes or bylaws under that chapter: insect and rodent infestation where the landlord runs no periodic inspection and eradication program; bed-bug infestation with no periodic inspection and remediation program, where remediation means action that substantially reduces the presence of bed bugs for at least 60 days; defective internal plumbing or sewage backup from a faulty septic or sewage system; exposed wires, improper connectors or defective switches or outlets creating a danger of shock or fire; roofs or walls that leak consistently; plaster falling from walls or ceilings; substantial holes in floors, walls or ceilings that seriously reduce their function or make them dangerous; porches, stairs or railings that are not structurally sound; garbage or rubbish accumulating in common areas because the landlord did not remove it or supply enough receptacles, unless the tenant agreed in the rental agreement to handle removal and the landlord cleared all garbage at the start of the tenancy; an inadequate water supply or water-heating equipment that is not operating properly; leaks in gas lines or leaking or defective pilot lights in landlord-furnished appliances; and heating facilities that fail the temperature standard below. In a municipality that has adopted its own housing code, that ordinance sets the standards instead. Either way RSA 540:13-d's defense reaches both, because it refers to the standards in RSA 48-A or in local codes, ordinances or bylaws established under it. And Kline supplies the judicial breach standard: the defect must be of a nature and kind that renders the premises unsafe, or unsanitary and so unfit for living, judged on the nature of the deficiency, its effect on habitability, how long it persisted, the age of the structure, the rent, the area, whether the tenant waived the defects, and whether they resulted from malicious, abnormal or unusual use by the tenant.
Heat standard type	A duty to supply heat or maintain temperatures while the unit is occupied
Heat standard details	The figure is 65 degrees Fahrenheit and it is an average, not a per-room floor — New Hampshire states it that way in both limbs of the duty. Every covered landlord must have heating facilities that are properly installed, safely maintained and in good working condition, and capable of safely and adequately heating all habitable rooms, bathrooms and toilet rooms to at least an average of 65 degrees. Where the landlord supplies heat in consideration for the rent, a second and stricter duty attaches: those rooms must actually be maintained at a minimum average room temperature of 65 degrees. The statute sets no seasonal window and no separate night figure. Like the rest of RSA 48-A:14, the standard binds only in municipalities that have not adopted their own housing code; where a town has one, its ordinance supplies the temperature rule.
Headline repair day count	14 days
Notice and repair-window rules	Fourteen days is a deadline to correct the violation, not a window to begin work, and it runs from the landlord's receipt of the tenant's written notice. In an emergency the fourteen days give way to a standard rather than a number: the landlord must correct the violation as promptly as conditions require. Three preconditions travel with the notice. The tenant must not be in arrears in rent when the notice is given; the notice goes to the person to whom the tenant customarily pays rent; and the tenant must prove that notice element by clear and convincing evidence, which is a heightened standard and sits on the tenant. One drafting wrinkle is worth knowing: the subparagraph stating the notice requirement says only that the tenant provided notice, and the writing requirement enters by back-reference in the next subparagraph, which measures the fourteen days from receipt of the written notice. Written notice is the operative reading, but the statute never says so where a reader would look for it. Two further conditions can defeat the defense: violations caused by the tenant, a household member or another person on the premises with the tenant's consent, and repairs prevented by extreme weather or by the tenant's failure to allow the landlord reasonable access.
Repair and deduct	No — no statute or decision authorizes it — No New Hampshire statute authorizes a tenant to repair a defect and deduct the cost from rent. The remedy is absent rather than forbidden: nothing in RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A prohibits the arrangement either, and RSA 48-A's enforcement machinery — the enforcement procedure, the court order, the liens and the fines — runs through municipal code officials and the courts rather than through tenants. A tenant who repairs and deducts anyway is simply short on rent, with no statutory protection, and the RSA 540:13-d defense is not a substitute because it turns on the violation still existing. Two provisions are regularly mistaken for a repair-and-deduct right. RSA 540:2, VI bars terminating a tenancy for nonpayment where the tenant had to take over utility payments the landlord agreed to make in order to keep service on, the arrears do not exceed what the tenant paid, and the tenant has receipts or other proof — a capped bar on eviction, not a right to repair. And Kline's reference to offsetting damages against a claim the landlord makes is recoupment inside the landlord's own action, not self-help.
Rent withholding or escrow	Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues — New Hampshire gives no affirmative right to withhold rent. What it gives is a defense: no action for possession based on nonpayment may be maintained for residential premises, other than those rented for vacation or recreation, where the premises are in substantial violation of the fitness standards and the violation materially affects habitability, provided the four conditions on notice, the fourteen-day cure, tenant fault and access are met. If the tenant raises that defense, the court may order the action continued for a reasonable time not exceeding one month so the landlord can remedy the violation — and at the time it orders that continuance, the court shall require the tenant to pay into court any rent withheld and any rent becoming due afterwards as it comes due. Read the two verbs in order: the deposit is mandatory, but it is triggered by the continuance, which is discretionary, so a tenant does not have to pay into court merely to raise the defense. If the violation is remedied within the continuance, the court dismisses the possession action and either awards the withheld money to the landlord or apportions it, paying the landlord the fair rental value of the premises while in the substantially defective condition and awarding the remainder to the tenant as damages for breach of the warranty of habitability. If it is not remedied within that period, the court enters judgment for the tenant and refunds all the deposited money to the tenant.
Termination over habitability failures	Yes — supplied by court decisions — No New Hampshire statute gives a tenant a habitability-specific right to end the tenancy, and none states a notice sequence or a move-out procedure for one. Kline v. Burns supplies the route instead: because the warranty is contractual, the basic contract remedies of damages, reformation and rescission are available, and a tenant may either bring an action for breach of warranty or offset the damages against a claim the landlord makes. The older common-law route of constructive eviction, which requires the tenant to leave, remains available on its own terms.
Essential-service remedies	Yes — distinct statutory remedies for essential-service failures — New Hampshire handles essential services in two places, and only one of them is a repair remedy. Inside the habitability defense, an emergency replaces the fourteen-day cure period with a standard: the landlord must correct the violation as promptly as conditions require, so a heat or water failure is measured against the conditions rather than a calendar. The failures themselves are named in the minimum standards — an inadequate supply of water or water-heating equipment that is not operating properly, heating facilities that cannot reach the statutory temperature, gas-line leaks and defective pilot lights in landlord-furnished appliances. Separately, RSA 540-A:3, I makes it a prohibited practice for a landlord to willfully cause, directly or indirectly, the interruption or termination of any utility service being supplied to the tenant — the statute names water, heat, light, electricity, gas, telephone, sewerage, elevator and refrigeration and does not close the list, and it reaches services whether or not they are under the landlord's control, which is what makes it cover a shutoff caused by the landlord's own unpaid account. The only exception is a temporary interruption while actual repairs are in process or during a temporary emergency. That prohibition is enforced through the RSA 540-A:4 petition described with the damages below, and a landlord's deliberate shutoff as a way of removing a tenant belongs with the eviction rules.
Retaliation protection	Protected by a general retaliation statute — The statute counts the window in months: six months. A rebuttable presumption that a landlord's action was retaliatory arises where the landlord brings a possessory action, increases the rent, or substantially alters the terms of the tenancy within six months after any of four events — the landlord received notice of the alleged violation (the tenant mailed it, gave it in hand or left it at the landlord's abode, or the landlord received notice of the complaint or report from the board, agency or authority); the landlord completed repairs or otherwise successfully remedied the violation; the landlord received notice that the tenant had begun an action under RSA 540-A; or the landlord discovered the tenant meeting or gathering with other tenants. The second trigger is the distinctive one, because it restarts the clock at the end of the repair rather than at the complaint, so a landlord who takes five months to fix a defect faces a presumption running about eleven months from the original complaint. The presumption does not arise at all where the court finds the tenant's report, complaint, action or organizing was primarily intended to prevent an eviction. — The protection is an affirmative defense to a possession action rather than a separate claim, and it comes with an arrears gate that has no parallel in most states: except where the tenant owes the landlord the equivalent of one week's rent or more, retaliation is a defense to any possessory action as to residential property. A tenant past that line has no retaliation defense at all, not a weakened one. The presumption then shifts the burden to the landlord in the cases it covers. New Hampshire also carries a second, separate six-month device that is a prohibition rather than a presumption: where a tenant proves a violation of the prohibited-practices section, the landlord may not maintain a possession action against that tenant within six months of the tenant's action under that subdivision — except for nonpayment of rent, violation of a substantial obligation of the rental agreement, or violation of the subdivision itself — and may not take any other action in reprisal. The two devices have different triggers and different mechanics and are commonly treated as one. — Reporting a violation, or reporting in good faith what the tenant reasonably believes to be a violation of the prohibited-practices chapter or an unreasonable and substantial violation of a regulation or housing code, either to the landlord or to any board, agency or authority with powers of inspection, regulation or enforcement over the reasonable fitness of the property for health or safety — note that a complaint made to the landlord counts, which is not the case in most states; beginning an action in good faith under the prohibited-practices chapter, or using the fitness-defense procedure; and meeting or gathering with other tenants for any lawful purpose.
Damages, penalties, and defenses	The practical New Hampshire remedy is the tenant's petition under RSA 540-A:4, and it is missing from most summaries of this state. The court must hold a hearing within 30 days of the filing or within 10 days of service of process on the defendant, whichever occurs later, and the relief it may grant expressly includes damages for violations of the prohibited-practices chapter, for breach of warranty of habitability, for breach of the covenant of quiet enjoyment, and for any other claim arising out of the facts alleged. The damages figures come in by reference to the Consumer Protection Act remedy, and the usual shorthand for them is wrong twice over. Recovery is actual damages or $1,000, whichever is greater — a floor, not a cap. Where the court finds the violation was willful or knowing, it shall award as much as three times but not less than two times that amount, so the minimum on a willful violation is $2,000 or twice actual damages, whichever is greater. Costs and reasonable attorney fees go to a prevailing plaintiff, and an attempted waiver of these damages is void. Daily accrual is real but late: each day a violation continues after a temporary order issues is a separate violation, so the per-day framing does not apply before a court has acted. Four carve-outs shrink the remedy, and one of them matters greatly here — violations of the seven-day duty to investigate a reported infestation, of the two access paragraphs, and of the electronic-payment paragraph are excluded from these damages entirely; a violation of the post-tenancy property-storage paragraph carries actual damages only; the application-fee paragraph is limited to returning the applicant's money plus court costs; and good-faith petitions to decide whether a requested entry is reasonable are excluded. Where a landlord unlawfully dispossesses or locks out a tenant and has re-let the premises or installed a new tenant, damages are not less than $3,000, and above that floor the award may not exceed what the ordinary provision would give. Alongside all of this, Kline's common-law measure is the difference between the agreed rent and the fair rental value of the premises as they were during the tenant's occupancy in the unsafe, unsanitary or unfit condition — the tenant's rent liability becomes the reasonable rental value of the premises in their actual condition. The landlord's defenses are the four conditions inside the fitness defense: the tenant must not have been in arrears when notice was given, the violations must not have been caused by the tenant's side, and repairs must not have been prevented by extreme weather or by the tenant's refusal of reasonable access.
Can the duty be waived or shifted	The law says nothing either way
Waiver and delegation rules	New Hampshire law does not say whether the habitability duty itself may be waived. No provision of RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A makes the duty or the warranty non-waivable. The one express non-waiver text reaches a narrower thing: the consumer-protection damages provision that RSA 540-A:4 imports says any attempted waiver of the right to those damages is void and unenforceable. Kline v. Burns is often cited for the proposition that a New Hampshire habitability waiver is unenforceable, and the opinion does not say that — it lists whether the tenant waived the defects among the factors bearing on whether the warranty was breached at all, which points the other way. The honest statement is that the question is open, that a waiver of the statutory damages right is void, and that a lease term cannot alter the RSA 540:13-d defense's own conditions because they are set by statute.
Leading court decisions	Kline v. Burns, 111 N.H. 87, 276 A.2d 248 (1971) — Held that in the rental of an apartment as a dwelling unit, under a written or oral lease, for a specified time or at will, there is an implied warranty of habitability that the apartment is habitable and fit for living: at the inception of the rental there are no latent defects in facilities vital to the use of the premises for residential purposes, and those essential facilities will remain in a livable condition throughout the term. The warranty is imposed by law on grounds of public policy and arises by operation of law, making the ordinary contract remedies of damages, reformation and rescission available, with damages measured by the difference between the agreed rent and the fair rental value of the premises as they were during the tenant's occupancy in the unsafe, unsanitary or unfit condition.
Local rules	Which municipality the property sits in decides which standards apply, and New Hampshire is unusual in that. RSA 48-A:14's list binds only landlords renting in a municipality that has not adopted its own ordinances, codes or bylaws under that chapter, so the statewide list is a floor for uncoded towns rather than the standard everywhere. Where a municipality has adopted a housing code, that ordinance governs the condition of the building. The tenant's defense works the same either way, because RSA 540:13-d reaches a substantial violation of the standards set out in RSA 48-A or in local codes, ordinances or bylaws established under it. A New Hampshire reader's first question is therefore whether their town has adopted a code, and the local ordinance belongs beside the state rules on this page.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, New Hampshire Habitability & Repair Laws (verified August 29, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/habitability/new-hampshire/" — 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

Restricted property is the protected class — New Hampshire's terminology runs opposite to the intuitive reading, and most secondary sources have it backwards. Restricted property is not carved out of protection — it is residential property where the landlord is restricted in why it may terminate a tenancy, and nonrestricted property is the small-landlord and commercial class where no cause is needed. In any event neither term touches this topic: they appear in the definitions section, the agent-for-service section and the termination section, and nowhere in the fitness defense, the retaliation sections or the minimum standards. The real coverage limits are the chapter-wide exclusions for transient rooming, hotels and vacation lodging, licensed care facilities and dormitories, an owner's own single-family home occupied without a lease, and a few others, plus the fitness defense's own exclusion of premises rented for vacation or recreation.
The $1,000 figure is a floor, and the per-day framing starts late — The damages the tenant's petition carries are actual damages or $1,000, whichever is greater, doubled to tripled where the violation was willful or knowing — so the willful minimum is $2,000 or twice actual damages. Summaries that describe a flat $1,000 per violation understate it, and summaries that describe $1,000 per day overstate it: a continuing violation counts as a separate violation for each day only after a court has issued a temporary order.
The seven-day duty to investigate an infestation carries no damages — A landlord must investigate a tenant's report of an insect, bed bug or rodent infestation within seven days of notice from the tenant or from a municipal health or housing code authority, and must take reasonable measures to remediate. That paragraph is one of the four the damages provision expressly excludes, so the most habitability-relevant prohibited practice in the chapter carries no statutory damages of its own. Bed-bug remediation costs are allocated separately: the landlord bears the reasonable costs but may recover them where the tenant is responsible, with the landlord carrying the burden of proving responsibility and of having offered a reasonable repayment agreement.
Kline did not hold habitability waivers unenforceable — A quotation calling lease waivers of habitability unconscionable and contrary to public policy is widely attributed to Kline v. Burns. It is not in the opinion, which never uses that word, and the decision runs the other way on the point: whether the tenant waived the defects is listed among the factors bearing on whether the warranty was breached. New Hampshire's only express non-waiver text voids an attempted waiver of the imported damages right, which is a different thing.
Two six-month clocks, not one — The rebuttable presumption of retaliation lives in RSA 540:13-b and covers a possessory action, a rent increase or a substantial alteration in the terms of the tenancy. The outright six-month bar on bringing a possession action after a tenant proves a prohibited-practice violation lives in RSA 540-A:4, XI and has its own exceptions. Sources that put the presumption in the retaliation-defense section have the wrong provision, and sources that describe one six-month rule are describing half the protection.
The pay-into-court order follows the continuance — The statute's verb is mandatory — the court shall require the tenant to pay withheld and accruing rent into court — but the sentence is tied to the moment the continuance is ordered, and the continuance itself is discretionary and capped at one month. A tenant does not have to deposit rent to raise the fitness defense. If the landlord does not remedy the violation within the continuance, judgment goes to the tenant and every dollar deposited is refunded to the tenant.
The heat figure is an average, and only for uncoded towns — The 65 degrees Fahrenheit in the minimum standards is stated as an average in both limbs, not as a per-room minimum, and there is no seasonal window in the statute. It also binds only where the municipality has not adopted its own housing code, so in Manchester, Nashua, Concord and other coded municipalities the local ordinance sets the temperature rule. Describing 65 degrees as New Hampshire's statewide minimum indoor temperature is wrong on both counts.

Common questions: New Hampshire 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 New Hampshire have an implied warranty of habitability?: Statute and a court-recognized implied warranty, each doing independent work. Both limbs do independent work and neither is a fallback for the other. On the statutory side, RSA 48-A:14 sets minimum standards of fitness for health and safety, and RSA 540:13-d bars a possession judgment for nonpayment of rent where the premises are in substantial violation of those standards, or of local codes adopted under the same chapter, and the violation materially affects habitability.
How long does a landlord have to make repairs in New Hampshire?: 14 days. Fourteen days is a deadline to correct the violation, not a window to begin work, and it runs from the landlord's receipt of the tenant's written notice. In an emergency the fourteen days give way to a standard rather than a number: the landlord must correct the violation as promptly as conditions require.
Can a tenant repair and deduct in New Hampshire?: No — no statute or decision authorizes it — No New Hampshire statute authorizes a tenant to repair a defect and deduct the cost from rent. The remedy is absent rather than forbidden: nothing in RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A prohibits the arrangement either, and RSA 48-A's enforcement machinery — the enforcement procedure, the court order, the liens and the fines — runs through municipal code officials and the courts rather than through tenants.
Can a tenant withhold rent for repair problems in New Hampshire?: Only on conditions that commonly defeat it — see this page — How: withholding raised as a defense once the landlord sues — New Hampshire gives no affirmative right to withhold rent. What it gives is a defense: no action for possession based on nonpayment may be maintained for residential premises, other than those rented for vacation or recreation, where the premises are in substantial violation of the fitness standards and the violation materially affects habitability, provided the four conditions on notice, the fourteen-day cure, tenant fault and access are met.
Can a landlord retaliate against a tenant who complains about repairs in New Hampshire?: Protected by a general retaliation statute — The statute counts the window in months: six months. A rebuttable presumption that a landlord's action was retaliatory arises where the landlord brings a possessory action, increases the rent, or substantially alters the terms of the tenancy within six months after any of four events — the landlord received notice of the alleged violation (the tenant mailed it, gave it in hand or left it at the landlord's abode, or the landlord received notice of the complaint or report from the board, agency or authority); the landlord completed repairs or otherwise successfully remedied the violation; the landlord received notice that the tenant had begun an action under RSA 540-A; or the landlord discovered the tenant meeting or gathering with other tenants.
Can a lease make the tenant responsible for repairs in New Hampshire?: The law says nothing either way. New Hampshire law does not say whether the habitability duty itself may be waived. No provision of RSA 540, RSA 540-A or RSA 48-A makes the duty or the warranty non-waivable.

Citations

NH RSA 540:13-d (defenses to violations of fitness) (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540:13-a (defense to retaliation) (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540:13-b (evidence of intent to retaliate) (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540:13-e (infestation of bed bugs; liability for costs of remediation) (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540:1-a (definitions; chapter-wide exclusions) · IV (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540:2 (termination of tenancy; utility-payment bar on nonpayment eviction) · VI (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540-A:3 (certain specific acts prohibited) · I, V-a (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 540-A:4 (petition; hearing; relief; damages; reprisal) · VI, VII(b), IX, XI (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 48-A:14 (minimum standards established) (verified 2026) Official source
NH RSA 358-A:10 (private actions; damages imported by RSA 540-A:4, IX) · I (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct reading of the General Court's official Revised Statutes Annotated: RSA 540:1-a, 540:2, 540:13-a, 540:13-b, 540:13-c, 540:13-d and 540:13-e; RSA 540-A:3 and 540-A:4; RSA 48-A:14; and RSA 358-A:10, each read in full. The complete chapter texts of RSA 540 (42 section entries), RSA 540-A (9 sections) and RSA 48-A (16 sections) were read with every source credit line in them, which is what establishes that no 2024, 2025 or 2026 chapter amended any habitability, repair or retaliation provision. Kline v. Burns, 111 N.H. 87, 276 A.2d 248 (1971), read in full in the New Hampshire Reports text, with its pagination taken from the reporter's own star pages.