Landlord Atlas

Can a landlord charge for a pet in Missouri, and what does the law require for an assistance animal?

Verified September 21, 2026 All Missouri topics →

Missouri is the state that names a pet deposit in order to put it outside the law: money denominated as a deposit for a pet is not a security deposit, so it does not count toward the two-month cap, no statute limits its size, and none of the return, itemization or doubling rules reaches it.

Cited to Mo. Rev. Stat. § 535.300 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8 and 16 more cited sources · Verified September 21, 2026

The label has to be honest, because any deposit that secures performance is a security deposit whatever it is called. Nothing in Missouri law addresses pet rent or a one-time pet fee. A landlord may not charge extra for a guide dog, a hearing dog or a service dog, and the tenant stays liable for damage the dog does; that bar covers trained dogs only, so an animal kept for emotional support reaches a Missouri landlord through the reasonable-accommodation duty in the Human Rights Act instead, and that duty exempts more small landlords than the dog rule does. Missouri tells a landlord almost nothing about what to ask for, but it does say the documentation must come from a qualified professional as permitted under the federal acts, and it makes faking an assistance animal, or lying to a clinician to get a letter, a misdemeanor.

Missouri pets & assistance animals at a glance

Which law governs Missouri splits the answers across three titles. The money rules are in the deposits chapter: section 535.300 caps the security deposit at two months' rent and, in the same section, puts a deposit denominated for a pet outside the definition of a security deposit altogether, while section 441.005 supplies the landlord and premises definitions for chapters 441, 534 and 535. The assistance-animal answers are in the disabilities title, chapter 209: section 209.190 gives a person with a guide, hearing or service dog full and equal access to housing and bars an extra charge for the dog, and section 209.204 carries both the documentation-source rule and the offense of misrepresenting an animal. The reasonable-accommodation duty itself is the Missouri Human Rights Act at section 213.040. Local power over these questions is limited by section 441.043, rewritten in 2025.
Where in the state the answers differ Two exemption chains run side by side and do not match, so which Missouri landlord is bound depends on which rule is asked about. The charge bar and housing right for a guide, hearing or service dog exempt only a single-family residence whose occupants rent out not more than one room. The Human Rights Act's accommodation duty exempts, in addition, a private individual owner who has an interest in no more than three single-family houses and rents without a broker or advertising, and rooms or units in a building of no more than four families where the owner lives in one of them. An owner-occupied four-unit Missouri landlord is therefore outside the accommodation duty but still inside the charge bar for a trained dog. The money rules in chapter 535 carry no exemption of either kind and expressly reach manufactured homes and mobile trailer homes.
Which landlords are covered Every residential landlord for the money rules. A landlord is the owner or lessor of the premises or a person authorized by the owner to exercise any aspect of the management of the premises, and premises includes structures fixed or mobile, temporary or permanent, manufactured homes and mobile trailer homes used primarily as a dwelling (section 441.005, subdivisions 1 and 4). The deposits chapter sets no unit threshold and no owner-occupied exemption; the one scope qualifier is that a housing authority or other government entity acting as a landlord is outside the requirement to hold deposits in a federally insured institution, and nothing else. The assistance-animal rules bind a different and narrower set of landlords, stated above and under assistance animals below.
Pet deposit

Yes — a pet deposit is allowed, with no ceiling of its own.

Missouri names a pet deposit in its deposit statute in order to put it outside the statute. A security deposit means any deposit of money or property, however denominated, furnished by a tenant to secure the performance of any part of the rental agreement, including damages to the dwelling unit, and the term does not include any money or property denominated as a deposit for a pet on the premises (section 535.300, subsection 8). So a genuine pet deposit does not count toward the two-month cap, is not bound by the thirty-day return, the itemized list, the federally insured holding rule or the move-out inspection notice, and carries no doubling remedy. There is no ceiling on it at all; it is a contract term. The label cuts both ways: a general damage deposit that happens to cover pet damage is still a security deposit, because the definition catches any deposit however denominated that secures performance. Manufactured homes and mobile trailer homes sit inside the same chapter, so this is the answer for a manufactured home too. Note for anyone reading older decisions: before 2018 the definition and the pet carve-out sat at subsection 7 of the same section.

Refundability: Not required by statute. Because money denominated as a deposit for a pet is not a security deposit, the three grounds for withholding, the thirty-day return and the itemized list do not reach it, and whether it comes back is whatever the lease says. Money taken to secure performance is a different matter: it is a security deposit whatever it is called, and the Court of Appeals has held that the withholding rules are mandatory and may not be varied by contract.

The general deposit cap it sits against: Two months' rent for the ordinary security deposit (section 535.300, subsection 1). The security-deposits page carries that cap, the thirty-day return, the itemized list and the doubling remedy.
Pet rent and pet fees

Yes — no statute caps, authorizes or forbids pet rent or a pet fee.

Missouri has no statute on pet rent and no statute on a pet fee, and no general bar on non-refundable fees either. What it has instead is a definition that catches money by what it does: anything furnished to secure the performance of the rental agreement is a security deposit whatever it is called, may be withheld only for unpaid rent, for restoring the unit to its condition at the start of the tenancy with ordinary wear and tear excepted, or for actual damages from inadequate termination notice, and the Court of Appeals has held those withholding rules mandatory and not variable by contract. Money that is not security is unregulated. Missouri sets no reasonableness standard for a pet charge of any kind.

Monthly pet rent: Unaddressed. The words pet rent and household pet return nothing anywhere in Missouri law, no section caps a recurring pet charge, and no chapter gives any agency power to make one.

A one-time pet fee: Unaddressed as such, but the money's character decides it. A one-time payment that is really taken to secure performance is a security deposit however it is labeled, so it may be kept only on the three grounds the deposits section allows and cannot be made non-refundable. A charge that is not security at all, a true one-time pet fee, sits outside the deposits section entirely and no Missouri statute limits it.
Pet policy in the lease, and changing it mid-tenancy

No — no statute requires a lease to state a pet policy, and no written-rules provision governs one.

Nothing in Missouri law requires a lease to address pets, supplies a default when the lease says nothing, limits the number of pets, or governs a change to a pet rule in the middle of a term. Missouri did not adopt the uniform residential landlord and tenant act and its landlord-tenant chapter has no written-rules section at all, so there is no statutory machinery for adopting or amending a house rule; the lease governs, and section 441.120 bars oral evidence of a renewal or a change. No housing class in Missouri must allow pets. The one adjacent duty falls on the State rather than on a landlord: the governor's council on disability must prepare and make available online a brochure for landlords and tenants on the law of service dogs, assistance animals and housing (section 209.204, subsection 5). That brochure exists and is online; it describes federal doctrine rather than Missouri statute, and the answers on this page come from the statutes.
Breed, size and weight restrictions

Yes.

No Missouri statute bans, limits, authorizes or preempts a landlord's breed, size or weight rule, in any housing class. The word breed appears in ten sections of the Revised Statutes, every one of them in animal health, dog merchandising, a specialty license plate, racing, agisters' liens or animal abuse, and none in a housing, landlord-tenant, civil-rights or insurance chapter. Cities, towns and villages may regulate animals running at large and keep pounds, but no Missouri statute mentions breed in that grant, so a local breed ordinance is neither authorized nor barred by name. There is no assistance-animal carve-out from a breed rule because there is no breed rule in housing to carve out of.
Assistance animals: the state instrument and who it binds

Yes — a state statute or rule sets what a landlord may request or what a certifier must meet for an assistance animal in housing. The operative rules are statutory. State law incorporates a federal statute or codified regulation by reference.

Two separate rules. A blind or visually handicapped person, a deaf or partially deaf person and a physically disabled person are entitled to full and equal access to all housing accommodations offered for rent, lease or compensation in the state (section 209.190, subsection 1), and a person with a guide dog, a hearing dog or a service dog is entitled to the same access without paying extra compensation for the dog, while remaining liable for damage the dog does to the premises (subsection 4). Separately, the Missouri Human Rights Act makes it discrimination to refuse to make reasonable accommodations in rules, policies, practices or services when they may be necessary to afford a person with a disability equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling (section 213.040, subsection 2, subdivision 2), which is how an animal that is not a trained dog reaches a Missouri landlord at all. Chapter 213 contains no animal word of any kind. Missouri sets no presumption, no interactive-process rule and no deadline for a landlord's answer.

Who it binds: It depends which rule is asked about, because Missouri's two routes exempt different landlords. The housing right and charge bar for a guide, hearing or service dog reach every housing accommodation except a single-family residence whose occupants rent, lease or furnish for compensation not more than one room in it (section 209.190, subsection 2), and the same section adds that nothing requires a landlord to modify the property in any way or to provide a higher degree of care (subsection 3). The Human Rights Act's accommodation duty exempts the sale or rental of a single-family house by a private individual owner who has no interest in more than three such houses at a time and rents without a broker and without advertising, and rooms or units in a building of no more than four families where the owner lives in one of them (section 213.040, subsection 13). So an owner-occupied four-unit landlord is outside the accommodation duty but inside the charge bar for a trained dog.
What counts as an assistance animal Missouri runs two vocabularies and they are deliberately unequal. Assistance animal appears in exactly one section of the Revised Statutes, the criminal section 209.204, and it is broad: an animal that works, provides assistance, or performs tasks, or is being trained to do so, for the benefit of a person with a disability, or that provides emotional support that alleviates one or more identified effects of a person's disability, with the section adding that while dogs are the most common type, other animals can also be assistance animals. Service dog, the term the charge bar hangs on, is a dog that is being or has been individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability, with seven named sub-types including a mental health or psychiatric service dog, which is still a dog trained to perform tasks (section 209.200, subdivision 2). The whole definitional set for sections 209.150 to 209.204 is capped by the chapter's own words, not to exceed the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The terms service animal, support animal and companion animal appear nowhere in Missouri law. Disability for the Human Rights Act is a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits a major life activity, a record of one or being regarded as having one, which with or without reasonable accommodation does not interfere with occupying the dwelling in question (section 213.010, subdivision 5).
Documentation a landlord may request, and what a certifier must meet

No state text lists the questions a landlord may ask; what the state regulates is the documentation and its source.

The source must be a professional as permitted under the federal acts.

Who may certify: Missouri sets a standard rather than a list: all documentation for an assistance animal shall be from a qualified professional as permitted under the Fair Housing Act or the Rehabilitation Act (section 209.204, subsection 3, closing sentence). No license class is named. The offense in the same subsection separately assumes that the document comes from a health care provider, because one of its forms is lying to that provider to obtain the document.

Missouri regulates where the document comes from and nothing else. All documentation for an assistance animal must be from a qualified professional as permitted under the Fair Housing Act or the Rehabilitation Act, which points the standard outward rather than fixing it in state law. Missouri says nothing about what a landlord may ask, what the document must say, how long a treating relationship must have run, whether a landlord may require a form or proof of vaccination, whether documentation may be re-requested each year, or how quickly a landlord must answer, and it places no duty at all on the professional who writes the letter. What it does instead is unusual: lying to that professional in order to get the document is itself an offense. An online certificate bought from a website is not documentation from a qualified professional as permitted under those acts, and creating or supplying a false assistance-animal document is one of the enumerated forms of the offense, so the point is reached from the penalty side rather than by a sufficiency clause. One adjacent rule is disability-general rather than animal-specific: the Commission on Human Rights' fair-housing rules make it unlawful to ask whether an applicant for a dwelling has a disability or about its nature or severity, subject to five listed inquiries that must be put to every applicant.
Charges for an assistance animal

Under state law, yes — the state bar reaches only a trained service, guide, hearing or assistance dog, or a certified animal; the federal rules still govern an emotional support animal; the bar is an express no-extra-charge clause, in a statute.

A person with a guide dog, a hearing dog or a service dog may not be required to pay extra compensation for the dog in housing, and has not been able to be since 1988 (section 209.190, subsection 4). That reaches a pet deposit, a pet fee and pet rent for such a dog. The bar is dog-only and training-only: an animal kept for emotional support is outside the definition the bar hangs on, so no Missouri statute bars a charge for one, and the tenant's route is the reasonable-accommodation duty in the Human Rights Act instead. The state's own broad term, assistance animal, appears only in the criminal section and is not the term the charge bar uses, which is the asymmetry that defines Missouri on this question. The section states no penalty for charging; a refusal to accommodate is pursued through the Commission on Human Rights and the courts under chapter 213.

The definition it hangs on: Service dog means "a dog that is being or has been individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability", including a guide dog, a hearing dog, a medical alert or response dog, a mental health or psychiatric service dog, a mobility dog, a professional therapy dog and a search and rescue dog, under a chapter preamble applying the definitions "not to exceed the provisions of the Americans With Disabilities Act" (section 209.200, subdivision 2). The bar is limited to a dog, and to a dog individually trained to do work or perform tasks.
Damage caused by an assistance animal

The tenant is liable for damage the animal causes like any other tenant, by express words.

Expressly preserved, three times over. A person with a guide, hearing or service dog in housing is not required to pay extra compensation for the dog but shall be liable for any damage done to the premises by the dog (section 209.190, subsection 4). The same words appear for public accommodations (section 209.150, subsection 3) and for a trainer or service-dog team member (section 209.152). Otherwise animal damage is handled like any other damage, through the restoration ground for withholding a security deposit (section 535.300, subsection 4) and the lease.
Misrepresenting an assistance animal

An offense or sanction that reaches a misrepresentation made to obtain housing: a misdemeanor and civil damages, reaching the person claiming the animal and a person who lies to a provider to obtain documentation. Penalty terms: Class C misdemeanor for a first violation; Class B misdemeanor for a second or subsequent violation; and civil liability for actual damages, with no figure stated in the section.

Section 209.204 carries three offenses, and the third is the housing one. No person may knowingly misrepresent any animal as an assistance animal for the purpose of receiving the accommodations regarding assistance animals under the Fair Housing Act or the Rehabilitation Act, and the section names four forms of doing so: knowingly creating documents that falsely represent an animal as an assistance animal, knowingly providing such documents to another person, knowingly fitting an animal that is not an assistance animal with a harness, collar, vest or sign of the type commonly used, and knowingly and intentionally misrepresenting a material fact to a health care provider in order to obtain the documentation needed to designate an animal as an assistance animal. That last form is rare among the states: Missouri punishes deceiving the clinician, and the clinician is the victim rather than the defendant. The other two offenses in the section are anchored to the Americans with Disabilities Act rather than to housing: impersonating a person with a disability, and misrepresenting a dog as a service dog. Every one carries the same ladder, a class C misdemeanor on a first violation, a class B misdemeanor on a second or later one, and civil liability for actual damages. There is no warning element. No Missouri offense, civil action or licensing sanction reaches the professional who writes an assistance-animal letter.

Who enforces it: Each offense is prosecuted as a misdemeanor, and the person who suffers the misrepresentation may also sue for actual damages; section 209.204 states both consequences for each of its three offenses. The section states no fine figure, only the offense class.
Can cities add their own rules

In part — state law preempts the kinds of local rule named as barred, and any power named is one state law grants.

Missouri preempts local rules on the money, though not by name on pets. The preemption section, rewritten with effect from August 28, 2025, bars a county or city, expressly including a charter city, from regulating rent and from four named subjects, one of which is limiting the amount of security deposit a landlord may require. Nothing in the section reaches pets, pet rent, pet fees, breed or an assistance animal, and the list of four is closed. One question the section leaves open matters here: it does not define a security deposit, and the only Missouri definition of that term is written for the deposits section alone and expressly excludes a deposit denominated for a pet, so whether a local cap aimed at pet deposits would survive has not been decided and should not be stated either way. Cities, towns and villages may regulate animals running at large and establish pounds, a grant that says nothing about breed or about a landlord's lease terms. A charter city's home-rule powers are held subject to being limited or denied by statute under article VI, section 19(a) of the Missouri Constitution, which is how the preemption section binds them.

Local deposit or fee rules barred: Since August 28, 2025 no county or city, including one with a charter form of government, may enact, maintain or enforce an ordinance or resolution that limits the amount of security deposit a landlord may require from a prospective tenant (section 441.043, subsection 2, subdivision 3). Whether that reaches an ordinance aimed specifically at a pet deposit is unsettled, because section 441.043 defines nothing and Missouri's only definition of a security deposit is confined to another section and excludes a pet deposit. Text: Mo. Rev. Stat. § 441.043 · 2(3).

Local rent control barred: No county or city, including one with a charter form of government, may enact, maintain or enforce an ordinance or resolution regulating the amount of rent charged for privately owned single-family or multiple-unit residential or commercial rental property (section 441.043, subsection 1), subject to three carve-outs: property the locality or its authority owns, voluntary agreements on subsidized properties, and properties assisted with community development block grant funds. Text: Mo. Rev. Stat. § 441.043 · 1, 3.
Housing classes with their own pet rule No manufactured-home park, publicly financed, public-housing or senior-housing rule departs from the answers above
Insurance and dog breeds No statute restricts an insurer's use of dog breed in underwriting
How state law refers to the federal rules Missouri's assistance-animal law is defined by reference to federal law at the points that decide a case. The offense of misrepresenting an assistance animal exists for the purpose of receiving the accommodations regarding assistance animals under the Fair Housing Act or the Rehabilitation Act, and the documentation rule in the same subsection requires the document to come from a qualified professional as permitted under those same two acts, so Missouri's documentation standard has no independent state content: if the federal standard moves, Missouri moves with it. The other two offenses in the section are anchored to the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the definitions for sections 209.150 to 209.204 apply only to the extent that they do not exceed the provisions of that Act, a ceiling clause. On the fair-housing side, the accommodation duty reproduces the federal wording almost exactly, the design and construction requirements adopt a national accessibility standard by reference, and the human rights fund provision refers to federal housing regulations for the dual-filing machinery. No Missouri statute and no Missouri rule incorporates any HUD notice; the federal section of the 50-state page carries the status of the federal instruments.
Changes already signed into law No signed act is waiting to change these answers
Leading court decisions Younker v. Investment Realty, Inc., 461 S.W.3d 1 (Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District; 2015; residential setting; bears on the pet deposit): The security deposit withholding requirements imposed by the deposits section are mandatory and may not be varied or altered by contract between the landlord and the tenant. The court read the section's definition of a security deposit, including its carve-out for money denominated as a deposit for a pet, and held that the legislature's silence about contracting out supported an intent not to allow it. The judgment for the landlords was reversed. The opinion quotes the definition at its pre-2018 numbering.

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Missouri Pet & Assistance Animal Laws (verified September 21, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/pets/missouri/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Everything above is cited in the citations section below.

Missouri assistance-animal documentation at a glance

Each row is what the state's own statute or rule says about that slot; a row that reads not stated is a slot no state text addresses. The full text of each slot, with its section, is in the table above.

Slot What the state's text says
Who may certify, and on what test The source must be a professional as permitted under the federal acts.
The certifier's minimum relationship period Not stated
Telehealth Not stated
Online registration or certificate Not stated
Form Not stated
Medical records Not stated
Written answer from the landlord Not stated
Annual re-evaluation Not stated
Proof of vaccination or licensing Not stated

Federal law on pets and assistance animals, in every state

The federal layer for the pets and assistance-animals topic, carried once for the whole site. It is a dated history rather than a single rule: the Fair Housing Act's accommodation duty has not changed since 1988 and the regulation under it has never contained the word animal, while the HUD guidance that most writing on this subject still quotes was withdrawn in September 2025, permanently rescinded in May 2026, and replaced by an enforcement position that governs HUD's own cause determinations and nothing else. Every row names who it binds, and most of the rows that carry real figures bind only federally assisted, public or rural-development housing. No state record restates these rows; a state record says only where its own law references or extends them. Each row below says who it binds before it says what it does. The full text of each row, with its citations, is on the 50-state page.

Notes and caveats

Common questions: Missouri pets & assistance animals

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

Can a landlord charge a pet deposit in Missouri, and is there a limit?
Yes — a pet deposit is allowed, with no ceiling of its own. Missouri names a pet deposit in its deposit statute in order to put it outside the statute.
Can a landlord charge pet rent or a non-refundable pet fee in Missouri?
Yes — no statute caps, authorizes or forbids pet rent or a pet fee. Missouri has no statute on pet rent and no statute on a pet fee, and no general bar on non-refundable fees either.
Does a Missouri lease have to state a pet policy?
No — no statute requires a lease to state a pet policy, and no written-rules provision governs one. Nothing in Missouri law requires a lease to address pets, supplies a default when the lease says nothing, limits the number of pets, or governs a change to a pet rule in the middle of a term.
Can a Missouri landlord restrict pets by breed, size or weight?
Yes. No Missouri statute bans, limits, authorizes or preempts a landlord's breed, size or weight rule, in any housing class.
Does Missouri have its own assistance-animal law for rentals?
Yes — a state statute or rule sets what a landlord may request or what a certifier must meet for an assistance animal in housing. The operative rules are statutory.
What documentation can a Missouri landlord ask for when a tenant requests an assistance animal?
No state text lists the questions a landlord may ask; what the state regulates is the documentation and its source. The source must be a professional as permitted under the federal acts.
Can a Missouri landlord charge a pet deposit or pet rent for an emotional support animal?
Under state law, yes — the state bar reaches only a trained service, guide, hearing or assistance dog, or a certified animal; the federal rules still govern an emotional support animal; the bar is an express no-extra-charge clause, in a statute. A person with a guide dog, a hearing dog or a service dog may not be required to pay extra compensation for the dog in housing, and has not been able to be since 1988 (section 209.190, subsection 4).
What is the penalty for falsely claiming an assistance animal in Missouri?
An offense or sanction that reaches a misrepresentation made to obtain housing: a misdemeanor and civil damages, reaching the person claiming the animal and a person who lies to a provider to obtain documentation. Penalty terms: Class C misdemeanor for a first violation; Class B misdemeanor for a second or subsequent violation; and civil liability for actual damages, with no figure stated in the section.

Citations

How this record was verified: Direct reading of the Revised Statutes of Missouri on the Revisor of Statutes' own site, which prints a currency band for each section rather than a code-wide edition: sections 209.150, 209.152, 209.162, 209.190, 209.200, 209.202 and 209.204 of the disabilities title, sections 213.010 and 213.040 of the Human Rights Act, sections 441.005, 441.043 and 441.120 of the landlord-tenant chapter, section 535.300 of the deposits chapter, sections 77.510, 79.400 and 80.090 of the municipal chapters, and article VI, section 19(a) of the Missouri Constitution, each read in full with its credit line, its compiler footnotes and its all-versions table. Full catchline indexes of chapter 441 (76 sections) and chapter 700 (58 sections) read. Eighteen code-wide full-text searches run on the Revisor's own search page, each returning either an enumerated list of matching sections or a no-matches signal, so every negative on this page is a list rather than a count. The Senate's truly-agreed-and-finally-passed lists for 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026 read whole, and the Senate's 2026 statutes-affected cross-reference table (5,487 sections listed) parsed section by section: none of the sections above appears in it. The 2025 enrolled act behind section 441.043 (House Bills 595 and 343, approved July 14, 2025, effective August 28, 2025) read from the House's own enrolled text and compared word for word with the published section. Both 2020 enrolled acts behind section 209.204 (Senate Bills 644 and 656) read from the Senate's own enrolled text: the published section is a merge of the two rolls, and the documentation-source sentence comes from Senate Bill 656 alone; the wording differences between the rolls and the published text are command words with identical effect, so nothing operative differs. All four chapters of the Missouri Commission on Human Rights' rules (8 CSR 60-1 through 60-4) read in full as the Secretary of State's own documents, with no animal term in any of them. The Governor's Council on Disability's statutory landlord brochure read in full. The state appellate opinion archive searched on four queries for assistance-animal, service-dog and deposit decisions, and Younker v. Investment Realty, Inc. read in full.

What was read to state each absence on this page: