How much notice must a landlord give before entering in Louisiana?

Verified July 9, 2026 All Louisiana topics →

Pending legislation — not yet law. The rules on this page reflect current law only. The following bill would change it if enacted:

HB 292 (2026 Reg. Sess.) — Act No. 63 — Amends R.S. 9:3251(A) to extend the itemized-statement window: from August 1, 2026 the lessor may forward the itemization 'within one month after the date the tenancy terminates or within fifteen days after the date that is one month after the tenancy terminates' — effectively one month plus 15 days for the itemized statement. The one-month deadline to return the deposit itself is unchanged, as are R.S. 9:3252-3254. Carry-forward: after 2026-08-01, fold this into security_deposits (itemization_rules / return_deadline_conditions) and re-verify the consolidated statute page on legis.la.gov.Status: Enacted — signed by the Governor May 11, 2026 (House 87-3, Senate 35-0); effective August 1, 2026; not yet reflected on the legis.la.gov consolidated statute page as of the check date (checked 2026-07-09).

Louisiana has no statute requiring a landlord to give any advance notice — 24 hours or otherwise — before entering a rental unit; entry rights come entirely from the lease.

The Civil Code approaches the question from the opposite direction: the lessor owes the lessee peaceful possession for the whole lease (article 2682), so a landlord entering without the tenant's consent or lease authority is breaching the lease rather than exercising a right. The one entry the tenant must tolerate by statute is for repairs that cannot be postponed until the end of the lease — the landlord may make those even over the tenant's objection and inconvenience, and the tenant's remedy is a rent reduction or abatement, or in serious cases dissolution of the lease, not refusal. Practically, Louisiana landlords should put an entry clause in the lease and give reasonable notice anyway, because outside urgent repairs an uninvited entry invites a peaceful-possession claim.

Louisiana entry notice at a glance

Advance notice required	No fixed statutory period (see notice standard)
Notice standard	No Louisiana statute or Civil Code article requires any advance notice before a landlord enters a rental unit, and none enumerates entry rights — entry is governed by the lease. The Civil Code framework runs in the tenant's favor by default: the lessor is bound to protect the lessee's peaceful possession for the duration of the lease (art. 2682(3)), so non-consensual entry without lease authority breaches that obligation. The one statutory intrusion the lessee must tolerate is art. 2693: if the thing requires a repair that cannot be postponed until the end of the lease, the lessor has the right to make it even over the lessee's inconvenience or loss of use, with the lessee's remedy being rent reduction or abatement, or dissolution, depending on the circumstances.
Permitted reasons	Whatever the lease provides (repairs, inspections, showings), bounded by the lessee's right of peaceful possession (art. 2682(3)); plus the statutory right to make repairs that cannot be postponed until the end of the lease (art. 2693), which the lessee is obliged to allow (art. 2683 duties; AG guide, Obligations of the Tenant).
Emergency exception	Not addressed by statute
Time-of-day restrictions	Not addressed by statute

Notes and caveats

notice_hours null: no entry-notice statute exists; the '24 hours' figure circulating on tenant-help and AI-generated sites is practice guidance, never law — page copy must draw the guidance-vs-statute line and distinguish 'no statutory notice' from 'unrestricted entry.' emergency_exception null because no official source articulates an emergency-entry rule; art. 2693's 'repair that cannot be postponed' is the functional analog for urgent situations and is carried in permitted_reasons/notice_standard instead of a bare true. Do NOT describe art. 2693 in URLTA vocabulary ('right of access,' 'entry notice') — it is a repair-tolerance rule with a rent-abatement counterweight unique to the civilian framework. The AG guide's silence on entry notice is itself the confirmation of absence and is cited as such.

Statute citations

La. Civ. Code art. 2693 Official source
La. Civ. Code art. 2682 (3) Official source
La. AG, 'A Guide to Louisiana Landlord & Tenant Laws' (no entry-notice provision; tenant must allow repairs that cannot be postponed) Obligations of the Tenant; Maintenance & Repairs Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Louisiana Legislature site (legis.la.gov Law.aspx section pages) for La. R.S. 9:3251-3254 and 9:3258 and Civil Code arts. 2005, 2011, 2012, 2680-2683, 2693, 2695, 2727, and 2728, with every load-bearing section independently re-read on a second host (codes.findlaw.com; law.justia.com blocked fetches with 403). Enrolled text of 2026 Act No. 63 (HB 292) read in full from the legislature's document server, plus the bill-status page confirming signature 5/11/2026 and 8/1/2026 effective date. Cross-checked against the Louisiana Attorney General's official guide 'A Guide to Louisiana Landlord & Tenant Laws' (La. DOJ Consumer Protection Section), noting that the guide's deposit-penalty figure ($200/actual damages) is stale — superseded by Acts 2018, No. 416. 2026 regular session swept for other relevant bills; none found beyond Act 63.