Is there a legal limit on late fees in North Dakota?

No statutory cap (see reasonableness standard and notes). North Dakota has no late-fee statute, so enforceability runs through general contract law.

Can a landlord charge a daily late fee in North Dakota?

No North Dakota statute addresses daily late charges. A daily charge is a lease term, bounded only by the liquidated-damages rule (9-08-04) and unconscionability review of residential rental agreements (47-16-13.3).

What late fees can a landlord charge in North Dakota?

Verified July 11, 2026 All North Dakota topics →

North Dakota has no statute capping residential late fees and no statutory grace period — a 2025 bill to cap late fees (SB 2236, amending the rent-payment statute) failed in the Senate 7-39, so late charges remain purely a matter of the lease, policed only by North Dakota's liquidated-damages rule (advance damage-fixing clauses are void unless the amount is a reasonable pre-estimate where actual damages would be impracticable to fix) and by unconscionability review of residential rental agreements.

Cited to N.D. Cent. Code ch. 47-16 (complete section list — no late-fee provision) and 5 more North Dakota statutes · Verified July 11, 2026

Absent a contrary agreement, rent for lodgings is payable monthly at the end of each month (47-16-20). What North Dakota does regulate is payment-method fees: a landlord may not charge a tenant any fee for accepting cash, a check, or a money order for rent or any other payment required under the lease (47-16-20.1). The three-day figures in North Dakota law are eviction mechanics, not a grace period: nonpayment becomes an eviction ground three days after rent is due, after which the landlord must serve a three-day written notice of intention to evict.

North Dakota late fees at a glance

Statutory cap	No statutory cap (see reasonableness standard and notes)
Mandatory grace period	None mandated statewide
Must be in the lease	Not addressed by statute
Daily fees	No North Dakota statute addresses daily late charges. A daily charge is a lease term, bounded only by the liquidated-damages rule (9-08-04) and unconscionability review of residential rental agreements (47-16-13.3).
Reasonableness standard	North Dakota has no late-fee statute, so enforceability runs through general contract law. N.D. Cent. Code 9-08-04 voids any contract term fixing damages for breach in advance EXCEPT an amount presumed to be the damage where it would be impracticable or extremely difficult to fix actual damages, and 47-16-13.3 lets a court refuse to enforce, sever, or limit an unconscionable provision of a residential rental agreement.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, North Dakota Late Fee Laws (verified July 11, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/late-fees/north-dakota/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Every figure above is cited to the North Dakota statute in the citations section below.

Check a late fee against the North Dakota rules — free, no signup, built on the same verified North Dakota rules as this page.

Notes and caveats

No cap and no grace period — a real statutory absence, not a gap — Both answers are empty because no such statute exists. Chapter 47-16 carries only three rent-related sections: 47-16-20 (payment timing), 47-16-20.1 (payment-method fee ban), and 47-16-21 (proportionate rent).
Dead-bill debunk: the 2025 late-fee cap failed 7-39 — SB 2236 would have amended 47-16-20 to cap late fees (reported at roughly 8% of monthly rent); it failed the Senate on 2025-02-04, 7-39. SB 2237, which would have given the labor commissioner oversight of landlord-tenant disputes, failed 5-41 the same day. Charts asserting a new North Dakota late-fee cap or complaint process are citing dead bills.
Stale-source trap: SB 2366 was never enacted — A 2025 eviction guide describes SB 2366 (contents of the notice of intention to evict) as enacted. It failed, 8-37.
'Must be in the lease' is contract law here, not statute — That answer is empty rather than a 'Yes' because no statute conditions a late fee on a lease term. The requirement comes from ordinary contract law — and 9-08-04 voids advance damage-fixing clauses except a valid liquidated-damages provision, which by its nature must have been agreed.
The three-day figures are eviction mechanics, not a grace period — 47-32-01(4) makes eviction maintainable when a tenant 'fails to pay rent for three days after the rent is due,' and 47-32-02 requires three days' written notice of intention to evict. Both are eviction procedure; neither is a fee grace period.
The payment-method fee ban reaches late fees too — 47-16-20.1 bars any fee for accepting cash, a check, or a money order for rent or 'any other payment required by the landlord under a lease,' so a surcharge for paying a late fee by check is also barred.

Common questions: North Dakota late fees

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

Is there a legal limit on late fees in North Dakota?: No statutory cap (see reasonableness standard and notes). North Dakota has no late-fee statute, so enforceability runs through general contract law.
Is there a grace period before rent is late in North Dakota?: None mandated statewide.
Does a late fee have to be written into the lease in North Dakota?: Not addressed by statute.
Can a landlord charge a daily late fee in North Dakota?: No North Dakota statute addresses daily late charges. A daily charge is a lease term, bounded only by the liquidated-damages rule (9-08-04) and unconscionability review of residential rental agreements (47-16-13.3).

Statute citations

N.D. Cent. Code ch. 47-16 (complete section list — no late-fee provision) (verified 2026) Official source
N.D. Cent. Code § 47-16-20 (verified 2026) Official source
N.D. Cent. Code § 47-16-20.1 (verified 2026) Official source
N.D. Cent. Code § 47-16-13.3 (1) (verified 2026) Official source
N.D. Cent. Code § 9-08-04 (verified 2026) Official source
SB 2236 (2025) — FAILED late-fee cap bill, official bill overview (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text in the official North Dakota Century Code chapter PDFs on ndlegis.gov (t47c16.pdf read in full, t47c32.pdf sections 47-32-01/-02/-05, t09c08.pdf section 9-08-04), whose official currency page states the posted code reflects all changes approved by the 69th Legislative Assembly, current as of 2025-07-01. Every key figure (1-month deposit cap; 2-month felony and prior-judgment exceptions; pet deposit greater of $2,500 or 2 months; 30-day itemized return; 9-month interest threshold; treble damages; 30-day written change-of-terms notice covering rent; 25-day tenant termination after a change notice; one-calendar-month m2m termination; no entry-hour figure) was read twice independently — official PDF pass plus codes.findlaw.com mirror pass (current through 2024-01-01), reconciled verbatim, with deposit figures additionally matched against the current-law baseline reprinted in introduced HB 1272 (2025). Amendment history pinned from official session-law PDFs: 2015 ch. 312 (HB 1192, pet deposit subsection), 2017 ch. 316 (HB 1220, felony exception), 2019 ch. 379 (HB 1150, prior-judgment exception). 2025 regular-session sweep via official bill-overview pages: HB 1272 (inspections/deposits) failed House 41-47 on 2025-02-07; SB 2236 (late-fee cap amending 47-16-20) failed Senate 7-39 on 2025-02-04; SB 2237 (labor-commissioner oversight) failed 5-41; SB 2366 (notice of intention to evict) failed 8-37; SB 2238 (eviction-record sealing, now 47-32-05) enacted, signed 2025-03-26 — out of v1 topic scope. January 2026 special session (3 days) was Rural Health Transformation Program only; no regular session in 2026, next regular session January 2027. Negative findings (no late-fee statute, no entry-hour figure, no deposit-interest rate figure, no frequency limits) verified against the complete section-heading list of ch. 47-16 read from the official chapter PDF, run twice.