Does Montana have rent control?

No — Montana has no statewide rent control or stabilization. Montana has no statewide rent control, and state law bars it locally twice over.

Does Montana preempt local rent control ordinances?

Montana law denies self-governing cities and counties any power to control the amount of rent charged for private residential or commercial property, except for property in which the local government itself holds an interest.

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

Rent is fixed for the lease term as a matter of contract, and no section of the act addresses mid-term or renewal increases.

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

Verified October 1, 2026 All Montana topics →

A Montana landlord may change the rent on a month-to-month lease by written notice given at least 15 days before the end of the month, and the new rent takes effect at the end of that month if the tenant stays (Mont. Code Ann. 70-26-109, an 1895 statute that applies to residential and commercial leases).

Cited to Mont. Code Ann. § 70-26-109 (month-to-month letting: change of terms, rent and conditions on 15 days' notice; 1895, unrepealed) and 5 more cited sources · Verified October 1, 2026

The Residential Landlord and Tenant Act itself says nothing about rent increases: the 30-day figure often quoted is its notice to end a month-to-month tenancy (70-24-441(2); 7 days for week-to-week), which either side may give, so a tenant who will not pay the new rent can leave on 30 days' notice. There is no limit on the size or frequency of increases: Montana has no rent control, a 2023 statute (7-1-111(26), effective October 1, 2023) expressly strips every self-governing city and county of the power to control rents on private residential or commercial property, and a companion 2023 act makes the state landlord-tenant statutes an exclusive statewide regulatory standard that self-governing local governments may not deviate from or add to. For fixed-term leases rent is locked by contract, and a statutory default caps either side's damages for a no-cause early termination at one month's rent.

Montana rent increase notice at a glance

Notice — month-to-month	15 days
Varies by increase size	Not addressed by statute
Fixed-term leases	Rent is fixed for the lease term as a matter of contract, and no section of the act addresses mid-term or renewal increases. Related default: if either party terminates a fixed-term agreement early without cause, damages are capped at 1 month's rent or a lease-agreed amount not exceeding 1 month's rent (70-24-201(2)(f), added effective 2021-05-14).
Statewide rent control / stabilization	No
Rent control details	Montana has no statewide rent control, and state law bars it locally twice over. Mont. Code Ann. 7-1-111(26) (added by SB 105, Ch. 319, L. 2023, effective 2023-10-01) denies self-governing local government units 'any power to control the amount of rent charged for private residential or commercial property,' excepting property in which the local unit has a property interest or an interest through a housing authority. Independently, 7-1-111(13) (as rewritten by HB 283, Ch. 572, L. 2023, effective on approval 2023-05-18) denies self-governing units any power to license or regulate landlords beyond Title 70 chapters 24, 25, and 33, or to 'deviate from or add to the exclusive application' of those chapters, and 70-24-102(2)(c) declares the act's purpose to 'create an exclusive regulatory standard throughout the state and its political subdivisions.' Local governments without self-government powers have the powers provided or implied by law, liberally construed (Mont. Const. art. XI, sec. 4). None of the codes of Billings, Missoula, Bozeman, Great Falls, Butte-Silver Bow or Livingston contains a rent-control provision.
Local rent regulation	Montana law denies self-governing cities and counties any power to control the amount of rent charged for private residential or commercial property, except for property in which the local government itself holds an interest.
Frequency limits	Not addressed by statute

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Montana Rent Increase Notice Laws (verified October 1, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/rent-increase-notice/montana/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Everything above is cited in the citations section below.

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

Notes and caveats

The figure shown is 15 days; the 30 days is the termination notice — The 15 days shown is the written notice in 70-26-109 for changing the terms, rent included, of a month-to-month lease: it must be given at least 15 days before the month expires, and the change takes effect when the month expires. The 30-day figure is different: 70-24-441 addresses only termination of a periodic tenancy (30 days month to month, 7 days week to week) and never mentions rent increases.
The 30 days run to the date named in the notice — Unlike Nebraska, Montana has no periodic-rental-date anchor — the notice period runs to 'the date designated in the notice' — and 70-24-441(3) makes rent apportionable day to day.
Nothing was added between 2021 and 2025 — No rent-increase notice rule was enacted in the 2021, 2023 or 2025 sessions; 70-24-441 was last amended in 2007 (Ch. 267).
High-traffic debunk: the rent-control ban is SB 105, not HB 463 — Many secondary sources, national landlord and industry guides among them, attribute Montana's rent-control ban to 'HB 463 (2023), signed March 2, 2023.' The official HB 463 of 2023 is a food-procurement bill amending 18-4-132, and it died in committee. The preemption act is SB 105 (Fitzpatrick), Ch. 319, L. 2023, signed May 1, 2023; with no effective-date clause it took effect October 1, 2023 under the 1-2-201(1)(a) default — the first day of October following passage and approval.
For history-line readers: the 2025 amendment to 7-1-111 is unrelated — Ch. 537, L. 2025 (HB 809) amended 7-1-111 but only added subsection (31), on gun laws. It carries no landlord content.
How far the preemption reaches — By its terms 7-1-111 binds local governments with self-government powers. Local governments without those powers have the powers provided or implied by law, liberally construed (Mont. Const. art. XI, sec. 4), and 70-24-102(2)(c) makes the landlord and tenant act an exclusive regulatory standard throughout the state and its political subdivisions. None of the codes of Billings, Missoula, Bozeman, Great Falls, Butte-Silver Bow or Livingston contains a rent-control provision.
Mobile-home lots run on a separate scheme — Out of scope here but adjacent: Title 70 ch. 33 governs lot rentals, those tenancies are month to month by default, and they have their own termination grid at 70-33-433.
A second Montana statute speaks to changing rent, on 15 days — Section 70-26-109, in the chapter titled Landlord and Tenant Residential and Commercial, lets a landlord of a month-to-month letting change the terms, rent and conditions of the lease by written notice given at least 15 days before the month ends, to take effect at the end of the month, and the notice becomes part of the lease if the tenant stays on. It dates from 1895 and has never been repealed. The Residential Landlord and Tenant Act of 1977 does not mention it and no statute reconciles the two; a landlord ending a month-to-month tenancy works from the 30-day notice in section 70-24-441.

Common questions: Montana 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 Montana?: 15 days.
Does Montana have rent control?: No — Montana has no statewide rent control or stabilization. Montana has no statewide rent control, and state law bars it locally twice over.
Does Montana preempt local rent control ordinances?: Montana law denies self-governing cities and counties any power to control the amount of rent charged for private residential or commercial property, except for property in which the local government itself holds an interest.
Can a landlord raise the rent during a fixed-term lease in Montana?: Rent is fixed for the lease term as a matter of contract, and no section of the act addresses mid-term or renewal increases.
How often can a landlord raise the rent in Montana?: Not addressed by statute.

Citations

Mont. Code Ann. § 70-26-109 (month-to-month letting: change of terms, rent and conditions on 15 days' notice; 1895, unrepealed) (verified 2026) Official source
Mont. Code Ann. § 70-24-441 · (1)-(3) (verified 2026) Official source
Mont. Code Ann. § 7-1-111 · (13), (26) (verified 2026) Official source
Mont. Code Ann. § 70-24-102 · (2)(c) (verified 2026) Official source
SB 105, 2023 Mont. Laws ch. 319 (chapter number from the official Senate bill-to-chapter table) · sec. 1 (verified 2026) Official source
HB 283, 2023 Mont. Laws ch. 572 (chapter number from the official House bill-to-chapter table) · secs. 1-2 (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Montana Code Annotated site (mca.legmt.gov, MCA 2025 edition): all nine sections of Title 70 ch. 25 and sections 70-24-103, -108, -201, -202, -312, -403, -404, -410, -422, -441 plus 7-1-111 and 1-2-201, each section behind a figure here read twice independently with all figures matching verbatim (30-day/10-day deposit return, 24-hour cleaning cure window, certified-mail 3-day service rule, 24 hours' entry notice, 30-day/7-day periodic termination notice, rent-control preemption text). Every amendment claim additionally pinned character-for-character from official enrolled bills downloaded via the Legislature's document API (docs.legmt.gov): HB 444 (2025, Ch. 656) and HB 488 (2023, Ch. 383) for 70-25-201/-202, HB 810 (2025, Ch. 768) for 70-24-103/-201, HB 541 (2021, Ch. 536) for 70-24-312/70-24-201/70-25-201, SB 105 (2023, Ch. 319) and HB 283 (2023, Ch. 572) for 7-1-111; chapter numbers pinned from the official bill-to-chapter tables (archive.legmt.gov MCA Supplements). Bill status/signing dates read from the official api.legmt.gov bill-status history for 2025 bills (HB 444 signed 2025-05-12; HB 810 signed 2025-06-09) and from the Legislature's archive for the 2021 and 2023 bills. Negative checks (no deposit cap, no interest or separate-account rule, no late-fee cap or grace period) run twice against the complete section indexes of ch. 24 parts 1-4 and ch. 25 parts 1-2. 2025 session sweep: HB 444 and HB 810 enacted and effective (incorporated); HB 304, HB 277, HB 305 and HB 306 did not pass; 69th Legislature adjourned, next regular session January 2027; no on-topic special-session activity. On October 1, 2026 every section the security deposit, rent increase, late fee, entry and eviction answers rest on was read again on mca.legmt.gov (Montana Code Annotated 2025, which carries the 2025 session; no session was held in 2026): Title 70, chapters 24, 25, 27 and 33, section 70-26-109 on changing the terms of a month-to-month lease, section 7-1-111, Title 25, chapters 23 and 33 on justice court appeals, and Article XI, section 4 of the Montana Constitution, with the 2025 chapter laws on the Legislature's archive and the codes of Billings, Missoula, Bozeman, Great Falls, Butte-Silver Bow and Livingston for rent regulation.