Does the deposit have to be in an interest-bearing account in Maine?

No statute addresses whether the account must bear interest. During a tenancy a security deposit "may not be treated as an asset to be commingled with the assets of the landlord or any other entity or person", and every deposit received after October 1, 1979 "must be held in an account of a bank or other financial institution under terms that place the security deposit beyond the claim of creditors of the landlord or any other entity or person, including a foreclosing mortgagee or trustee in bankruptcy, and that provide for transfer of the security deposit to a subsequent owner of the dwelling unit or to the tenant" (14 M.R.S. § 6038(1)). On a tenant's request the landlord must disclose the name of the institution and the account number where the deposit is held.

What happens if a landlord does not pay deposit interest in Maine?

No penalty reaches deposit interest, because no interest is owed. The custody duty has a remedy of its own: on a court finding that § 6038 has been violated, the tenant recovers from the landlord actual damages, $500, or the equivalent of one month's rent, whichever is greatest, together with the aggregate costs and expenses reasonably incurred in the action, and the court may also award reasonable attorney's fees (§ 6038(2)).

Does a landlord have to pay interest on a security deposit in Maine?

Verified August 28, 2026 All Maine topics →

Check your municipality. Maine 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: Portland, South Portland.

What the state record says

Maine does not preempt local rent control, and two cities regulate rents. Portland has run voter-initiated rent control since 2021, allowing 2.2% for calendar 2026, one increase per 12 months, and 90 days' notice; South Portland caps annual increases at 10% for buildings of 16+ commonly owned units. There is no statewide rent control or percentage cap (§6016's habitability bar is a condition on increases, not a cap). Portland's ordinance is Portland City Code ch. 6, secs. 6-231 to 6-239: an annual Allowable Increase Percentage published each September 1 (2.2% for calendar 2026), one increase per 12 months, +5% of base rent on voluntary turnover, banked increases, a hard 10% ceiling per increase, Rent Board review, and 90 days' written notice, plus a local one-month deposit cap and application-fee ban. South Portland's is a council-enacted rent stabilization ordinance (March 2023; 10% annual cap for buildings of 16+ commonly owned units; sunsets 2030). The former state enabling chapter (30-A ch. 167, 'Municipal Rent Control') was repealed in 1995 with nothing enacted in its place; municipalities act under home rule (30-A §3001).

Maine does not require landlords to pay tenants interest on a security deposit, and its deposit chapter never uses the word in a money sense.

Cited to 14 M.R.S. § 6038 (treatment of security deposit — account terms and remedy) 1, 2 and 3 more cited sources · Verified August 28, 2026

Maine does impose one of the country's stricter custody duties: the deposit may not be commingled with the landlord's assets, and must be held in a bank or financial-institution account on terms that put it beyond the claim of the landlord's creditors, a foreclosing mortgagee or a trustee in bankruptcy, and that provide for its transfer to a later owner of the unit or to the tenant (14 M.R.S. § 6038(1)). Those qualifying terms are about creditor-remoteness and transferability, not about earnings — the statute never says the account must bear interest and never says who would own what it earned. A landlord may pool every tenant's deposit in one escrow account, and on request must tell a tenant the name of the institution and the account number.

Maine deposit interest at a glance

Interest owed to the tenant	No — no statute addresses it
How the rate is set	No rate exists — there is no interest duty
Current figure	No published figure exists
Rate rules	No rate rules — no duty exists
Accrual and payment	No payment duty exists
Who and what is covered	No statutory conditions stated — see the summary and notes
Statute controls where or how the deposit is held	Yes
Interest-bearing account required	No statute addresses whether the account must bear interest
Custody rules	During a tenancy a security deposit "may not be treated as an asset to be commingled with the assets of the landlord or any other entity or person", and every deposit received after October 1, 1979 "must be held in an account of a bank or other financial institution under terms that place the security deposit beyond the claim of creditors of the landlord or any other entity or person, including a foreclosing mortgagee or trustee in bankruptcy, and that provide for transfer of the security deposit to a subsequent owner of the dwelling unit or to the tenant" (14 M.R.S. § 6038(1)). On a tenant's request the landlord must disclose the name of the institution and the account number where the deposit is held. Pooling is expressly allowed: a landlord may use a single escrow account for all tenants, and for tenants in separate buildings owned by different entities where those entities are substantially controlled or owned by a single landlord. The qualifying terms the statute imposes are creditor-remoteness and transferability — it never says the account must be interest-bearing and never allocates earnings to anyone. The chapter does not apply to a tenancy in a structure of no more than five dwelling units where one is occupied by the landlord, and its deposit provisions yield where they conflict with the terms of a federally guaranteed mortgage held by a lessor who is the mortgagor (§ 6037); any lease provision waiving a tenant protection in the chapter is against public policy and void (§ 6036).
Penalty for violation	No penalty reaches deposit interest, because no interest is owed. The custody duty has a remedy of its own: on a court finding that § 6038 has been violated, the tenant recovers from the landlord actual damages, $500, or the equivalent of one month's rent, whichever is greatest, together with the aggregate costs and expenses reasonably incurred in the action, and the court may also award reasonable attorney's fees (§ 6038(2)).
Local rules	None noted for this state

Cite this page: "Landlord Atlas, Maine Security Deposit Interest Laws (verified August 28, 2026), landlordatlas.com/laws/deposit-interest/maine/" — free to cite and quote with a link (how these records are verified). Everything above is cited in the citations section below.

Check the verified Maine answer — and every state and city that differs — in the deposit interest calculator — free, no signup, built on the same verified Maine law as this page.

Notes and caveats

What the account terms actually require — The qualifying words in § 6038(1) are "under terms that place the security deposit beyond the claim of creditors of the landlord or any other entity or person, including a foreclosing mortgagee or trustee in bankruptcy, and that provide for transfer of the security deposit to a subsequent owner of the dwelling unit or to the tenant". Two conditions, both about safety and portability of the principal. Neither is a yield condition, and the words "interest-bearing" appear nowhere in the chapter.
Pooling is expressly allowed — The same subsection provides that a landlord may use a single escrow account to hold security deposits from all tenants, and may use a single escrow account for tenants in separate buildings owned by different entities so long as those entities are substantially controlled or owned by a single landlord. The word "escrow" appears twice in § 6038 and both times it is permitting pooling, never imposing an interest-bearing character.
The remedy behind the duty — Section 6038(2) gives the tenant actual damages, $500, or one month's rent, whichever is greatest, plus the costs and expenses reasonably incurred in the action, with attorney's fees at the court's discretion. Subsection 3 applies that remedy to all deposits collected after June 1, 2010, and, from October 1, 2010, to all deposits held by or on behalf of a landlord.
The return formula has no interest term — Section 6033(2) requires the landlord to return "the full security deposit" or, where there is actual cause to retain part of it, a written statement itemizing the reasons "accompanied by a full payment of the difference between the security deposit and the amount retained" — within the time stated in a written rental agreement, not to exceed 30 days, or within 21 days after a tenancy at will ends or the premises are surrendered and accepted, whichever is later. The wrongful-retention remedy in § 6034 is double the portion wrongfully withheld. No accretion enters either formula.
Who the chapter does not cover — Section 6037 exempts a tenancy for a dwelling unit in a structure containing no more than five dwelling units where one of them is occupied by the landlord, and disapplies deposit provisions that conflict with the terms of a mortgage guaranteed by the United States or an authority created under its laws, where the lessor is the mortgagor.
Currency — The Maine Revised Statutes as published reflect changes through the First Special Session of the 132nd Legislature and are current through October 1, 2025. The Second Regular Session of the 132nd Legislature amended no section of chapter 710-A — the sections of title 14 it reached are §§ 6021, 6025, 6025-B, 6111 and 6203-H, all outside the chapter — so §§ 6031 through 6039 stand as published.

Common questions: Maine deposit interest

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

What is the Maine security deposit interest rate right now?: No published figure exists.
When must a landlord pay or credit deposit interest in Maine?: No payment duty exists.
Does the deposit have to be in an interest-bearing account in Maine?: No statute addresses whether the account must bear interest. During a tenancy a security deposit "may not be treated as an asset to be commingled with the assets of the landlord or any other entity or person", and every deposit received after October 1, 1979 "must be held in an account of a bank or other financial institution under terms that place the security deposit beyond the claim of creditors of the landlord or any other entity or person, including a foreclosing mortgagee or trustee in bankruptcy, and that provide for transfer of the security deposit to a subsequent owner of the dwelling unit or to the tenant" (14 M.R.S. § 6038(1)). On a tenant's request the landlord must disclose the name of the institution and the account number where the deposit is held.
What happens if a landlord does not pay deposit interest in Maine?: No penalty reaches deposit interest, because no interest is owed. The custody duty has a remedy of its own: on a court finding that § 6038 has been violated, the tenant recovers from the landlord actual damages, $500, or the equivalent of one month's rent, whichever is greatest, together with the aggregate costs and expenses reasonably incurred in the action, and the court may also award reasonable attorney's fees (§ 6038(2)).
Do any cities or counties in Maine have their own deposit-interest rules?: None noted for this state.

Citations

14 M.R.S. § 6038 (treatment of security deposit — account terms and remedy) · 1, 2 (verified 2026) Official source
14 M.R.S. § 6033 (return of the security deposit) · 2 (verified 2026) Official source
14 M.R.S. § 6037 (exemptions) (verified 2026) Official source
14 M.R.S. ch. 710-A, security deposits on residential property (chapter contents) (verified 2026) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of all nine sections of 14 M.R.S. chapter 710-A — §§ 6031, 6032, 6033, 6034, 6035, 6036, 6037, 6038 and 6039 — each read in full on the Legislature's statute service, with § 6038 ("Treatment of security deposit") read subsection by subsection; every occurrence of "interest", "escrow", "commingle" and "account" across the nine sections examined in context, the eight "interest" hits all being the property sense in §§ 6035 and 6039 and the account and escrow hits all being § 6038's holding rule and the verb "accounting" in § 6035; the site's own currency statement read, which places the published text at October 1, 2025 and the First Special Session of the 132nd Legislature; and, to close the 2026 gap, the published session-law volume for the Second Regular Session of the 132nd Legislature read together with its cross-reference table of sections affected, in which no section of chapter 710-A appears and the phrase "security deposit" appears nowhere in the volume.