How long does a landlord have to return a security deposit in Minnesota?

21 days. The clock runs from termination of the tenancy AND from receipt of the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions, so it does not start until the landlord has somewhere to send the money (Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subd. 3). If the tenant must leave because the building is legally condemned for reasons not due to the tenant's own willful, malicious, or irresponsible conduct, the deadline drops to five days from the date the tenant leaves.

What happens if a landlord does not return the deposit on time in Minnesota?

Missing the deadline makes the landlord liable for the portion of the deposit withheld plus interest, PLUS a penalty in an equal amount — roughly double the wrongfully withheld sum (504B.178 subd. 4). Bad-faith retention adds punitive damages of up to $500 for each deposit.

Do landlords have to pay interest on security deposits in Minnesota?

Yes — Minnesota requires interest on the security deposit to be paid to the tenant. The rate is ONE PERCENT per year, simple and noncompounded, and interest amounts under $1 are excluded (504B.178 subd. 2). No escrow or separate-account requirement accompanies the interest duty.

What are the security deposit rules in Minnesota?

Verified October 1, 2026 All Minnesota topics →

Check your municipality. Minnesota does not preempt local rent regulation — city or county ordinances may impose rent caps, notice periods, and fee limits that are stricter than the state law on this page. Verify your municipality's ordinances before relying on any figure below. Verified local pages: St. Paul.

What the state record says

Local rent control is not flatly barred. Minn. Stat. 471.9996 subd. 1 stops any city, county, or town from adopting or renewing rent control on private residential property, but subd. 2 expressly permits it where the ordinance, charter amendment, or law is approved in a GENERAL ELECTION. The exception is live, not theoretical: St. Paul voters approved a 3% annual rent-stabilization cap in November 2021 (effective May 2022), which the city council has since narrowed — most recently on 2025-05-07 (4-3 vote, changes effective 2025-06-13) to permanently exempt units first receiving a certificate of occupancy after 2004-12-31. Minneapolis voters in 2021 authorized their council to draft a rent-stabilization ordinance, but none has been enacted.

Minnesota sets no cap on the size of a residential security deposit, but the deposit earns 1% simple annual interest and must be returned — with interest and a written statement of any specific withholding reasons — within three weeks after the tenancy ends and the landlord receives the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions (five days if the tenant must leave because the building is legally condemned for reasons not due to the tenant's own conduct).

Cited to Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subds. 1-8 and 4 more cited sources · Verified October 1, 2026

Deductions are limited to unpaid rent or other money owed and restoring the unit to its move-in condition, ordinary wear and tear excepted. A landlord who misses the deadline or skips the itemization owes the withheld amount plus interest plus an equal penalty, and bad-faith retention adds punitive damages of up to $500 per deposit. When the building is sold, the deposit must be transferred to the new owner or returned to the tenant within 60 days. Tenants cannot legally treat the deposit as last month's rent.

Minnesota security deposits at a glance

Maximum deposit	No statutory cap
Return deadline	21 days
Deadline conditions	The clock runs from termination of the tenancy AND from receipt of the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions, so it does not start until the landlord has somewhere to send the money (Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subd. 3). If the tenant must leave because the building is legally condemned for reasons not due to the tenant's own willful, malicious, or irresponsible conduct, the deadline drops to five days from the date the tenant leaves. The statute writes the deadline as three weeks (21 days). Within that window the landlord must return the deposit with interest or furnish the written withholding statement. The mailing-address condition is one most secondary sources omit.
Itemization required	Yes
Itemization rules	A landlord who withholds any portion must provide a written statement showing the specific reason for the withholding (504B.178 subd. 3). Withholding is limited to amounts reasonably necessary (1) to remedy tenant defaults in the payment of rent or other funds due to the landlord, or (2) to restore the premises to their condition at the commencement of the tenancy, ordinary wear and tear excepted.
Separate account required	No
Interest owed to tenant	Yes
Account & interest rules	The rate is ONE PERCENT per year, simple and noncompounded, and interest amounts under $1 are excluded (504B.178 subd. 2). No escrow or separate-account requirement accompanies the interest duty. Interest is computed from the first day of the next month following full payment of the deposit to the last day of the month in which the landlord in good faith complies with the return/itemization duty. Stale-source alert: the rate has stepped down over the decades (it was 3% for deposits held before 8/1/2003), and old 3% figures still circulate in fifty-state charts — current law is 1%.
Pet deposits	A pet deposit is expressly allowed, with no ceiling of its own. The pet-deposit rule, pet rent and fees, and the assistance-animal rules are on the pets and assistance animals page.
Non-refundable fees allowed	Not addressed by statute
Penalty for violation	Missing the deadline makes the landlord liable for the portion of the deposit withheld plus interest, PLUS a penalty in an equal amount — roughly double the wrongfully withheld sum (504B.178 subd. 4). Bad-faith retention adds punitive damages of up to $500 for each deposit. The liability is triggered by failure to provide the deposit, the interest, or the written withholding statement within the statutory window; by failure to transfer or return the deposit when the landlord's interest in the property ends (subd. 5); and, for leases signed on or after January 1, 2024, by failure to give the tenant notice of the initial and move-out inspections required by Minn. Stat. 504B.182 and to complete them when the tenant asks (subd. 4). The punitive damages for bad-faith retention sit on top of the subd. 4 damages, and the trigger expressly reaches bad-faith retention of the interest alone, not just the deposit (subd. 7). Bad faith is presumed where the landlord missed the return-or-statement duty or the transfer duty — but the presumption lifts if the landlord returns the deposit within two weeks after the tenant sues to recover it, a statutory cure window many summaries omit.
Tenant forwarding-address duty	The three-week return clock runs only after the landlord's receipt of the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions (504B.178 subd. 3), so a tenant who never supplies one suspends their own refund. Separately, the tenant may NOT apply the deposit to the last month's rent — withholding final-period rent 'on the grounds that the deposit should serve as payment' is expressly prohibited (subd. 8).

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Minnesota Security Deposit Laws (verified October 1, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/security-deposits/minnesota/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Everything above is cited in the citations section below.

Generate a Minnesota security-deposit return letter — free, no signup, built on the same verified Minnesota law as this page.

Editable Minnesota deposit kit — the deposit disposition letter, the move-in receipt with the custody and interest statements, a deposits-held register with the return deadline computed, and the rules fact sheet built on the verified Minnesota rules on this page, in Word, fillable PDF and Excel.

Notes and caveats

No state cap — but local ordinances do cap deposits — Minn. Stat. 504B.178 imposes no amount cap in any subdivision. Local law is a different story: Minneapolis generally caps security deposits at one month's rent (Minneapolis Code of Ordinances section 244.2040), and since May 14, 2026 St. Paul also caps them at one month's rent, with one additional month allowed for an applicant whose application could otherwise be denied under the city's screening rules (Saint Paul Legislative Code section 193.02). State law separately caps a manufactured-home park lot deposit at two months' rent (Minn. Stat. 327C.03, subd. 4). Read the 'no cap' answer as no STATE cap for ordinary residential rentals.
Three weeks (21 days) — and the clock needs a mailing address — The statute writes the deadline as 'three weeks,' the same 21 days most guides quote. But the period runs from termination of the tenancy AND receipt of the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions. Most summaries state a bare 21-days-from-move-out rule and drop that condition.
Nonrefundable move-in fees: no general statute either way — Outside manufactured-home parks, no Minnesota statute squarely authorizes or bans nonrefundable move-in fees. What controls is function, not the label: anything held to secure performance is a refundable 504B.178 deposit however it is named. In a manufactured-home park, no fee other than the periodic rent may be charged for the right to obtain or retain a lot (Minn. Stat. 327C.03, subd. 1).
The fee-disclosure rule carries treble damages — Separately from the deposit statute, Minn. Stat. 504B.120 (enacted by 2023 ch. 52, for leases signed on or after January 1, 2024) requires ALL nonoptional fees to be disclosed in the lease and in advertisements, with a first-page 'Total Monthly Payment.' It is enforceable by treble damages and attorney fees.
When the building is sold, and the 20-day window to object — The deposit must be transferred to the new owner with notice of the transfer and of the new owner's name and address, or returned to the tenant, within 60 days. The new owner then has all of the rights and obligations of the old one, with one limit that cuts against the tenant: if the tenant does not object to the stated amount within 20 days after written notice of the amount being transferred or assumed, the new owner only has to return the amount stated in that notice. The notice must include a stamped envelope addressed to the new owner and may be given by mail or by personal service.
Stale-source trap: the 3% interest figure — 3% interest figures from pre-2003 law still circulate. The current rate is 1%.
Move-out utility billing: the estimated final bill (new for 2026) — Laws of Minnesota 2026, ch. 81, secs. 1 and 4 (Minn. Stat. 216B.023 subd. 3a for submetered service; 504B.216 subd. 7a for apportioned service) let a landlord who has not received the actual utility bill by the date the tenant vacates issue an estimated final utility bill, computed from the immediately preceding billing period and prorated to the vacate date. No additional fees or charges may ride on it beyond the administrative billing charge those sections already allow and a late-payment charge limited to unpaid charges from the immediately preceding billing period. The two sections state no effective date of their own, so Minnesota's default rule for 2026 regular-session laws puts them in force from August 1, 2026 (Minn. Stat. 645.02). A utility charge is not a deposit deduction — the note sits here because it bounds what a vacating tenant can be billed at move-out.

Common questions: Minnesota security deposits

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 much can a landlord charge for a security deposit in Minnesota?: No statutory cap.
How long does a landlord have to return a security deposit in Minnesota?: 21 days. The clock runs from termination of the tenancy AND from receipt of the tenant's mailing address or delivery instructions, so it does not start until the landlord has somewhere to send the money (Minn. Stat. 504B.178 subd. 3). If the tenant must leave because the building is legally condemned for reasons not due to the tenant's own willful, malicious, or irresponsible conduct, the deadline drops to five days from the date the tenant leaves.
What happens if a landlord does not return the deposit on time in Minnesota?: Missing the deadline makes the landlord liable for the portion of the deposit withheld plus interest, PLUS a penalty in an equal amount — roughly double the wrongfully withheld sum (504B.178 subd. 4). Bad-faith retention adds punitive damages of up to $500 for each deposit.
Do landlords have to pay interest on security deposits in Minnesota?: Yes — Minnesota requires interest on the security deposit to be paid to the tenant. The rate is ONE PERCENT per year, simple and noncompounded, and interest amounts under $1 are excluded (504B.178 subd. 2). No escrow or separate-account requirement accompanies the interest duty.
Can a landlord charge a non-refundable fee in Minnesota?: Not addressed by statute.

Citations

Minn. Stat. 504B.178 · subds. 1-8 (verified 2026) Official source
Laws of Minnesota 2026, ch. 81, secs. 1, 4 (Minn. Stat. 216B.023 subd. 3a; 504B.216 subd. 7a — estimated final utility bill at move-out) (verified 2026) Official source
Minn. Stat. 504B.113 · subd. 3 (verified 2026) Official source
Minn. Stat. 504B.261 (verified 2026) Official source
Minn. Stat. 327C.03 · subds. 1, 4 (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Minnesota Revisor of Statutes site (revisor.mn.gov, Minnesota Statutes 2025 edition): Minn. Stat. 504B.178, 504B.177, and 504B.211 each read twice independently — the 1% interest rate, three-week/five-day return deadlines, $500 bad-faith punitive cap, 8%-of-overdue-rent late-fee cap, 24-hour entry notice, 8:00 a.m.-8:00 p.m. window, and $500-per-violation entry penalty all matched verbatim across reads. 504B.135 and 471.9996 read twice each (the HTML section page plus the Revisor's official PDF read in full). 504B.147 and 504B.120 read once each. MN Attorney General landlord-tenant handbook (ag.state.mn.us) read for the 'one rental period plus one day' rent-increase derivation. 2026 enactment sweep on revisor.mn.gov: SF 4171 bill status and enrolled text read directly (Laws 2026 ch. 81, signed 2026-05-12, effective 2026-08-01 — flagged as pending while not yet in force; folded into late_fees 2026-08-02 once effective); HF 3245 status read (died in House committee at sine die 2026-05-18, not flagged). October 1, 2026: sections 504B.178, 504B.177, 504B.211, 504B.135, 504B.147, 504B.120, 504B.118, 504B.182, 504B.113, 504B.261 and 471.9996 and chapter 327C were read again on revisor.mn.gov, which still serves the 2025 edition and marks each section the 2026 session changed; the 2026 changes are read from Laws 2026, ch. 81. The Revisor's tables of sections affected for 2025 and 2026 show no other act touching these sections. Attorney General Opinion 430 (June 30, 2021) was read on ag.state.mn.us, and the Saint Paul and Minneapolis deposit sections in each city's published code.