Landlord Atlas

What are the security deposit rules in Montana?

Verified July 11, 2026 All Montana topics →

Montana puts no cap on security deposits, but the landlord must return the deposit with a written list of any rent due, damage, and cleaning charges within 30 days after the tenancy ends or the premises are surrendered and accepted, whichever comes first — and within just 10 days if an inspection shows no damage, no cleaning needed, no unpaid rent, and the tenant can show no unpaid utilities.

Montana's distinctive trap is the cleaning rule: a landlord may not deduct a dime for cleaning until after giving the tenant written notice of exactly what cleaning remains, and the tenant then has 24 hours to do the cleaning personally (this notice duty drops if the tenant vacated without giving notice, and it does not apply while a court eviction claim is pending). Miss the 30-day list and you forfeit every damage and cleaning deduction; skip the required move-in condition statement and you cannot recover for damage or cleaning at all without clear and convincing proof the tenant caused it. There is no double- or treble-damages penalty — a tenant suing under 70-25-204 recovers the amount wrongfully withheld plus discretionary attorney fees. Since May 2025 refunds may be sent by electronic transfer, cash, or check, not just mail, and deposit-related notices can go by e-mail under the statute's notice rules. Nonrefundable cleaning or damage fees do not work in Montana: any fee for cleaning and damages, however labeled, is presumed to be a refundable security deposit.

Montana security deposits at a glance

Maximum deposit No statutory cap
Return deadline 30 days
Deadline conditions Within 30 days after termination of the tenancy or after surrender and acceptance of the premises, whichever occurs FIRST, the landlord must deliver a written list of rent due, damage, and cleaning charges together with the refund of the balance (70-25-202(1)(a)). The deadline shortens to 10 days if, after inspection, there are no damages, no cleaning required, and no unpaid rent, and the tenant can demonstrate that no utilities are unpaid (70-25-202(1)(b)). Since 2025-05-12 (HB 444) the refund may be delivered by electronic fund transfer, cash, check, or other form of refund, or mailed to the tenant's new address or, if none was provided, to the tenant's last-known address; the written list is noticed under 70-24-108 (hand delivery, mail with certificate of mailing or certified mail with a 3-days-after-mailing service rule, or e-mail if the rental agreement provides an address). The section does not apply if the rental agreement was terminated under 70-24-427 and the landlord has a claim pending in court (70-25-202(2)).
Itemization required Yes
Itemization rules The written list must state any rent due and any damage and cleaning charges the landlord alleges are the tenant's responsibility, and may be delivered only after the 70-25-201 preconditions (including the cleaning-notice procedure) have been followed (70-25-202(1)(a)). A landlord who fails to provide the list forfeits ALL rights to withhold any portion of the deposit for damages or cleaning (70-25-203). Deductions are limited to damage, unpaid rent, late charges, utilities, lease penalties, other money owing (including post-termination rent under 70-24-441(3)), and actual cleaning expenses including a reasonable charge for the landlord's own labor; withholding for any other purpose is prohibited (70-25-201(1), (4)).
Separate account required No
Interest owed to tenant No
Account & interest rules No section of Title 70 ch. 25 requires interest on deposits or a separate, trust, or escrow account (negative check run twice against the complete chapter section list, 70-25-101 through 70-25-206).
Pet deposits No separate pet-deposit statute and no cap. Any pet deposit falls within the broad 70-25-101(4) definition of 'security deposit,' so the same 30/10-day return, itemization, forfeiture, and wrongful-withholding rules apply.
Non-refundable fees allowed No
Penalty for violation No statutory multiplier. A person who wrongfully withholds any portion of a deposit is liable in a civil action for the amount wrongfully withheld, with attorney fees to the prevailing party at the court's discretion, and the landlord bears the burden of proving tenant-caused damage (70-25-204(1)). The act's real teeth are forfeitures: no written list within the deadline forfeits all deduction rights for damages and cleaning (70-25-203), and failure to give the move-in condition statement bars recovering ANY sum for damage or cleaning unless the landlord proves tenant causation by clear and convincing evidence (70-25-206(3)). Suit ripens on the landlord's written denial or on expiry of the 30-day (or 10-day no-issues) period (70-25-204(2)).
Tenant forwarding-address duty None that forfeits the refund: failure to furnish a new address in writing does not bar recovery (70-25-205). Mailing the refund to the last-known address of a departed tenant who gave no new address is not wrongful withholding, but the landlord remains liable for the amount due (70-25-202(1)(c)).

Notes and caveats

No-cap: verified negative — full sweep of Title 70 ch. 25 (all nine sections) and ch. 24; no amount limit exists. nonrefundable_fees_allowed encoded false on the strength of 70-25-101(4) ('A fee or charge for cleaning and damages, no matter how designated, is presumed to be a security deposit') plus 70-25-103 (contrary lease provisions and waivers invalid) and 70-25-201(4) (no withholding for unlisted purposes) — a 'nonrefundable cleaning fee' is treated as deposit money subject to the return rules; the act does not address unrelated fee types (e.g., application fees). Cleaning-charge mechanics (70-25-201(3)): no charges for cyclical normal maintenance unless forced by tenant negligence; written notice listing the uncompleted cleaning is a precondition to any cleaning deduction; tenant has 24 hours after delivery (per 70-24-108/70-33-106; certified mail = served 3 days after mailing) to complete it; carve-outs (both added by HB 488, Ch. 383, L. 2023, immediate effective date, signed 2023-05-03): no notice needed while an eviction-related court claim is pending after termination under 70-24-427, and a tenant who vacates without notice loses the right to notice (or the landlord may post the notice conspicuously in the unit and notify by e-mail, phone, or text). Stale-source traps: (1) HB 488 (2023) also struck the old public-housing-authority exclusion and extended ch. 25 to mobile-home lot rentals (70-25-102) — pre-2023 charts show both wrong; (2) HB 444 (Ch. 656, L. 2025, effective on approval 2025-05-12 per the official bill-status history) added EFT/cash/check refund delivery and 70-24-108 noticing of the list — 'must mail the refund' is stale since 2025-05-12; (3) sources claiming a Montana double-damages deposit penalty are wrong — 70-25-204 has had no multiplier since enactment in 1974 (lead sheet also mis-cited the penalty as 70-25-205; it is 70-25-204). Dead-bill debunk: HB 304 (2025, 'revise security deposit laws to provide tenants more information and time') died in its first committee in the 2025 regular session — not law. All load-bearing figures double-read on the official MCA page plus the HB 488/HB 444/HB 541 enrolled texts.

Statute citations

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 load-bearing section fetched twice in independent reads (WebFetch pass + raw HTML pass) 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 corroborated via Montana Free Press Capitol Tracker for 2021/2023 bills. Negative checks (no deposit cap, no interest or separate-account rule, no rent-increase notice statute, 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, HB 306 died in committee; 69th Legislature adjourned, next regular session January 2027; no on-topic special-session activity.