Texas Lease Agreement: No Deposit Cap, 30-Day Return, Required Disclosures (2026)

Why Texas is structurally different from California or New York

The Texas Legislature has historically resisted both deposit caps and rent control. Property Code Chapter 92, the central residential landlord-tenant statute, runs to roughly 30 sections and reads as a series of narrow rules rather than a comprehensive code. There is no general implied warranty of habitability written into the statute (Texas courts have implied a limited warranty under Kamarath v. Bennett (1978) for material conditions affecting health and safety, but the statutory remedies sit in section 92.052 and require strict notice procedures). There is no statutory just-cause requirement to non-renew a lease. There is no statutory cap on late fees beyond a general reasonableness standard added by HB 1414 in 2007 and now codified at Property Code section 92.019.

Local Government Code section 214.902 affirmatively prohibits Texas cities from enacting rent control without state approval and a finding of housing emergency. No Texas city currently has rent control. Texas Government Code section 2306.6738 prohibits source-of-income discrimination for housing-choice voucher tenants only in narrowly defined circumstances; most Texas landlords are free to refuse Section 8 vouchers, in sharp contrast to California, New York, Washington, and Massachusetts.

The structural simplicity cuts both ways. Texas landlords have wide latitude on deposit amounts, rent increases at renewal, and screening criteria. In exchange, Chapter 92 imposes strict procedural rules on the few areas it does cover, particularly deposit return and required disclosures. Landlords who miss the 30-day deposit deadline pay three-times damages plus attorney fees, regardless of whether the underlying deductions were valid.

Security deposit rules under Property Code Chapter 92, Subchapter C

Property Code sections 92.101 to 92.110 govern residential security deposits. There is no maximum deposit amount under state law. Cities including Austin, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Fort Worth, El Paso, and Arlington have no local cap. Most professional landlords in Texas set deposits between one and two months of rent, scaling with the tenant's credit profile. Some require an additional pet deposit or last-month's rent; those are permissible if the lease separately identifies them and complies with section 92.108 (which treats anything refundable as a deposit regardless of the lease label).

Section 92.103 requires the landlord to refund the deposit, less itemised deductions, within 30 days after the tenant surrenders the premises and provides a forwarding address in writing. The clock does not start until the tenant provides the forwarding address. A landlord who never receives a forwarding address has no statutory deadline. In practice, tenants who do not provide a forwarding address often forfeit their deposit by inaction. Best practice for landlords is to issue a move-out packet that explicitly requests the forwarding address in writing, ideally on a signed form.

Permitted deductions under section 92.104 include unpaid rent, repair of damages beyond normal wear and tear, cleaning costs, and other charges identified in the lease. Texas does not have a statutory definition of normal wear and tear; the case law treats it as deterioration that occurs without negligence, carelessness, accident, or abuse. Routine carpet wear from foot traffic is not deductible; a burn hole or pet stain is. Repainting after a long tenancy may or may not be deductible depending on the condition at move-in and the length of the tenancy. Landlords who deduct for repainting without strong move-in and move-out evidence routinely lose in small claims.

Section 92.109 is the penalty provision. A landlord who retains the deposit or fails to itemise in bad faith is liable for 100 dollars plus three times the amount wrongfully withheld, plus reasonable attorney fees. Bad faith is presumed if the landlord misses the 30-day deadline. Texas small-claims courts (justice courts) apply the presumption routinely; a Texas landlord who is one day late on a 1,500 dollar deposit can face a 4,600 dollar judgment plus the tenant's attorney fees. The single largest source of avoidable Texas landlord judgments is failure to mail the itemised statement on time.

Required disclosures in a Texas residential lease

Federal lead-based paint disclosure (24 CFR Part 35) applies to any unit built before 1978. The landlord must provide the EPA pamphlet, disclose known lead hazards, and include the standard federal disclosure form. HUD's 2024 penalty adjustment sets the maximum civil penalty per violation at 19,507 dollars; for landlords with many pre-1978 units, this is a meaningful exposure.

State-required disclosures include the name and address of the landlord or property manager under Property Code section 92.201. The disclosure must be provided in writing in the lease or in a separate document. If the landlord changes management mid-tenancy, the new contact information must be provided within a reasonable time. Failure to comply gives the tenant a right to terminate the lease and to recover one month of rent plus 100 dollars per occurrence under section 92.202.

Property Code section 92.0131 requires the landlord to disclose parking and towing policies for multi-family properties. Senate Bill 998, enacted in 2021 and effective for leases signed on or after 1 January 2022, added Property Code section 92.0135. This section requires the landlord to disclose, before the lease is signed, whether the rental unit is located in a 100-year floodplain and whether the unit has flooded at least once during the five years immediately preceding the lease execution. The disclosure must be in bold print in a separate paragraph. A landlord who fails to disclose under section 92.0135 is liable for damages and termination remedies under section 92.0136. The SB 998 disclosure was a direct response to the post-Hurricane Harvey realisation that many Houston-area renters were taking units in floodplains without notice.

Property Code section 92.016, the family violence early-termination provision, requires landlords to include a notice of the tenant's right to terminate the lease under specified family-violence circumstances. The notice must be in a separate paragraph in bold print or underlined. Property Code section 92.0161 adds a similar notice for victims of sexual offences. Property Code section 92.017 covers servicemember terminations under federal SCRA and Texas's analogous statute.

Late fees, termination, and notice periods

Property Code section 92.019 governs late fees. A late fee is enforceable only if the lease provides for it, the fee is a reasonable estimate of uncertain damages caused by late payment, and the rent remains unpaid two full days after the date the rent is due. The statute creates a safe harbour: a fee is presumed reasonable if it does not exceed 12 percent of the rent for units in buildings with four or fewer units, or 10 percent of the rent for units in buildings with more than four units. Higher fees are not automatically void, but the landlord must justify them in court. The 2007 enactment of section 92.019 ended an earlier era when some Texas landlords charged late fees of 100 dollars per day; those fees are now unenforceable as penalties.

Termination of a month-to-month tenancy under Property Code section 91.001 requires 30 days written notice given before the date of termination. Either party may terminate. Notice must align with the rent-payment cycle so termination falls on a rent due date; if it does not, the tenancy continues to the next rent due date. For fixed-term leases, the lease itself controls; neither party need give end-of-term notice unless the lease requires it.

Texas does not have a statutory just-cause requirement. A landlord may decline to renew a fixed-term lease for any reason that is not discriminatory under federal Fair Housing Act, the Texas Fair Housing Act (Government Code Chapter 301), or local civil-rights ordinances. Local protections vary: Austin prohibits source-of-income discrimination for housing-choice voucher tenants in certain circumstances, while most other Texas cities do not.

Eviction in Texas: the three-day notice and the JP court

Texas eviction is among the fastest in the United States. Property Code section 24.005 requires the landlord to deliver a written notice to vacate giving the tenant at least three days to leave, unless the lease specifies a different period. The three-day clock runs from the day the notice is delivered. After the three days expire and the tenant has not vacated, the landlord files a forcible detainer suit in the justice court of the precinct where the property sits.

The JP court typically schedules a hearing 10 to 14 days after filing. If the landlord wins, the tenant has five days to appeal to county court, with appeal bond. If no appeal, the constable executes a writ of possession at least 24 hours after the bonded period expires, typically removing the tenant within three weeks of the original notice. The overall timeline from missed rent to writ execution is commonly 25 to 45 days, faster than California (45 to 75 days) or New York (60 to 210 days).

For step-by-step notice templates and the full state-by-state timeline comparison, see the eviction notice page.

Sample Texas-specific clauses

Security deposit clause

SB 998 flood disclosure

Late fee clause within the section 92.019 safe harbour

How Texas compares

Texas is the polar opposite of California or New York on deposit caps and rent control: no caps, no controls, fast eviction, no just-cause requirement. Florida and Georgia look closest to Texas in their permissive frameworks, while New York's HSTPA framework imposes deposit caps and slow eviction timelines that Texas avoids. See the California page for the strict-state contrast, the Florida page for a comparable permissive state, the state hub for the comparison table, and the 50-state deposit comparison for the full picture.

Frequently Asked Questions

Sources

• Texas Property Code Chapter 92 (residential tenancies): statutes.capitol.texas.gov
• Texas Property Code Chapter 24 (forcible entry and detainer): statutes.capitol.texas.gov
• Texas Property Code section 91.001 (notice for terminating tenancy): statutes.capitol.texas.gov
• SB 998 (88th Legislature) flood disclosure: capitol.texas.gov
• EPA lead-based paint disclosure: epa.gov/lead
• Texas Attorney General consumer protection landlord-tenant guidance: texasattorneygeneral.gov