Does Maryland preempt local rent control ordinances?

Maryland law does not preempt local rent regulation, and Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County each operate rent stabilization programs under local home-rule powers.

Can a landlord raise the rent during a fixed-term lease in Maryland?

Rent is fixed for the term unless the lease provides otherwise. For tenancies with a term LONGER than one month, including year leases rolling over, § 8-209 requires at least 90 days' advance notice of an increase.

How much notice is required to raise the rent in Maryland?

Verified July 9, 2026 All Maryland topics →

Check your municipality. Maryland does not preempt local rent regulation — city or county ordinances may impose rent caps, notice rules, and fee limits that are stricter than the state-level rules on this page and are not covered here. Verify your municipality's ordinances before relying on any figure below. Verified local pages: Montgomery County , Prince George's County , Takoma Park .

What the state record says

Maryland does not preempt local rent control, and three sizable programs are active: Takoma Park (rent stabilization since 1981, CPI-based annual allowance), Montgomery County (cap of CPI+3% up to a 6% maximum), and Prince George's County (cap of the lower of 6% or CPI-U+3%). There is no statewide rent control. Montgomery County's program is Bill 15-23, effective 2024-07-23, and exempts buildings under 23 years old; Prince George's County's is the Permanent Rent Stabilization and Protection Act of 2024, effective 2024-10-17. RP § 8-209.1 acknowledges local rent-limit laws and imposes state reporting duties on jurisdictions that adopt them, while its subsection (e) says the section itself may not be construed to AUTHORIZE local rent caps — a no-new-authorization clause, not a preemption. Local ordinances are outside the scope of this page but are flagged here.

Maryland requires true statewide advance notice of rent increases — since October 1, 2023, RP § 8-209 makes a landlord give a month-to-month tenant at least 60 days' written notice of any increase, and tenants on terms longer than a month get 90 days; only weekly tenancies drop to 7 days (21 without a written lease).

Cited to RP § 8-209 and 3 more Maryland statutes · Verified July 9, 2026

Notice travels by first-class mail with a certificate of mailing, or electronically (email, text, or portal with proof of transmission) if the tenant opts in — and a landlord may not condition accepting an application on that election. The section yields where the landlord has already given a termination notice, and it expressly preserves stricter local laws. Maryland has no statewide rent cap, but unlike most states it does not preempt local rent control: Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County all run active rent-stabilization programs, so the county code matters as much as the state code here. Any pre-2023 source saying Maryland has no rent-increase notice statute is out of date.

Maryland rent increase notice at a glance

Notice — month-to-month	60 days
Varies by increase size	Not addressed by statute
Fixed-term leases	Rent is fixed for the term unless the lease provides otherwise. For tenancies with a term LONGER than one month, including year leases rolling over, § 8-209 requires at least 90 days' advance notice of an increase. Shorter periodic tenancies use 60 days (over a week up to a month), 7 days (a week or less, written lease), or 21 days (a week or less, no written lease).
Statewide rent control / stabilization	No
Rent control details	Maryland does not preempt local rent control, and three sizable programs are active: Takoma Park (rent stabilization since 1981, CPI-based annual allowance), Montgomery County (cap of CPI+3% up to a 6% maximum), and Prince George's County (cap of the lower of 6% or CPI-U+3%). There is no statewide rent control. Montgomery County's program is Bill 15-23, effective 2024-07-23, and exempts buildings under 23 years old; Prince George's County's is the Permanent Rent Stabilization and Protection Act of 2024, effective 2024-10-17. RP § 8-209.1 acknowledges local rent-limit laws and imposes state reporting duties on jurisdictions that adopt them, while its subsection (e) says the section itself may not be construed to AUTHORIZE local rent caps — a no-new-authorization clause, not a preemption. Local ordinances are outside the scope of this page but are flagged here.
Local rent regulation	Maryland law does not preempt local rent regulation, and Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County each operate rent stabilization programs under local home-rule powers.
Frequency limits	Not addressed by statute

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Maryland Rent Increase Notice Laws (verified July 9, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/rent-increase-notice/maryland/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Every figure above is cited to the Maryland statute in the citations section below.

Create a Maryland rent-increase notice — free, no signup, built on the same verified Maryland rules as this page.

Notes and caveats

60 days comes from a true rent-increase statute, not a derivation — The 60-day figure is § 8-209, an actual rent-increase notice statute (like Washington's, unlike states such as Texas, Georgia, or North Carolina where the number is derived from termination law). The month-to-month bucket covers terms over one week up to one month; the 90-day tier for terms longer than a month is carried under the fixed-term rules.
Increases can't be laundered through termination-and-reoffer — § 8-209 deliberately mirrors the § 8-402(c)(2) termination-notice periods (60-day month-to-month landlord termination, 90-day year-to-year), so an increase cannot be pushed through a shorter termination-and-reoffer.
Baltimore City variance and stale pinpoints — § 8-402's tenant-side 30-day notice does not apply in Baltimore City, and old sources citing § 8-402(b)(3) are using pre-renumbering pinpoints.
Unlike most states, Maryland does not preempt local rent control — Maryland sits in the New Jersey camp of non-preemption states — which is why active local rent-stabilization programs can exist here.
The good-cause eviction bill died again in 2026 — The 2026 local-option good-cause eviction bill (SB 462/HB 774) died again in the Senate. It is adjacent to this topic but is an eviction measure, not a rent measure.

Common questions: Maryland rent increase notice

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

How many days' notice must a landlord give before raising rent in Maryland?: 60 days.
Does Maryland have rent control?: No — Maryland has no statewide rent control or stabilization. Maryland does not preempt local rent control, and three sizable programs are active: Takoma Park (rent stabilization since 1981, CPI-based annual allowance), Montgomery County (cap of CPI+3% up to a 6% maximum), and Prince George's County (cap of the lower of 6% or CPI-U+3%).
Does Maryland preempt local rent control ordinances?: Maryland law does not preempt local rent regulation, and Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County each operate rent stabilization programs under local home-rule powers.
Can a landlord raise the rent during a fixed-term lease in Maryland?: Rent is fixed for the term unless the lease provides otherwise. For tenancies with a term LONGER than one month, including year leases rolling over, § 8-209 requires at least 90 days' advance notice of an increase.
How often can a landlord raise the rent in Maryland?: Not addressed by statute.

Statute citations

RP § 8-209 (verified 2026) Official source
HB 151 (2023), Ch. 146 (verified 2026) Official source
RP § 8-209.1 (c)-(e) (verified 2026) Official source
RP § 8-402 (c)(2) (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Maryland General Assembly site (mgaleg.maryland.gov): Real Property §§ 8-203 (read in full twice — independent reads matched verbatim), 8-203.1, 8-208, 8-209 (read twice), 8-209.1, 8-221 (read twice), and 8-402. Session-law provenance verified on official mgaleg bill pages: HB 693 (2024) / Ch. 124 (deposit cap cut, eff. 2024-10-01), HB 151 (2023) / Ch. 146 (§ 8-209 rent-increase notice, eff. 2023-10-01), HB 1076 (2025) / Ch. 564 (§ 8-221 entry notice, eff. 2025-10-01), and HB 80 (2026) status. § 8-208 re-read three times on 2026-07-09 to resolve the (d)(3) scope question (see late_fees notes). Interest mechanics cross-checked against the Maryland DHCD official deposit-interest calculator page; local rent-stabilization programs confirmed on official Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County government pages.