What late fees can a landlord charge in Maryland?

Verified July 9, 2026 All Maryland topics →

Check your municipality. Maryland does not preempt local rent regulation — city or county ordinances may impose rent caps, notice rules, and fee limits that are stricter than the state-level rules on this page and are not covered here. Verify your municipality's ordinances before relying on any figure below.

What the state record says

No statewide rent control — but Maryland is a non-preemption state, and three sizable local programs are active: Takoma Park (rent stabilization since 1981, CPI-based annual allowance), Montgomery County (Bill 15-23, eff. 2024-07-23, cap of CPI+3% up to a 6% max, buildings under 23 years old exempt), and Prince George's County (Permanent Rent Stabilization and Protection Act of 2024, eff. 2024-10-17, cap of the lower of 6% or CPI-U+3%). RP § 8-209.1 acknowledges local rent-limit laws and imposes state reporting duties on jurisdictions that adopt them, while its subsection (e) says the section itself may not be construed to AUTHORIZE local rent caps — a no-new-authorization clause, not a preemption. Local ordinances are out of scope v1 but flagged on-page.

Maryland caps residential late fees at 5% of the unpaid rent due for the period the payment is delinquent — and for tenants who pay weekly, at $3 per week with a $12 monthly ceiling.

The cap is written as a limit on lease provisions, so a fee must be in the lease to be charged at all, and a clause purporting to charge more is void. Note the precise base: 5% of the DELINQUENT amount, not flatly 5% of a month's rent — a tenant who has paid half the month's rent can only be charged 5% of the unpaid half. There is no statewide grace period; timing is left to the lease, though local codes can add protections. Fee-disclosure legislation (itemized up-front fee lists with treble damages) passed the House in 2026 but died in the Senate, so watch for a refile.

Maryland late fees at a glance

Statutory cap	5% of the amount of unpaid rent due for the rental period for which the payment was delinquent; for weekly-rent leases, $3 per week up to $12 per month (RP § 8-208(d)(3))
Mandatory grace period	None mandated statewide
Must be in the lease	Yes
Daily fees	Not as a structure that exceeds the cap: § 8-208(d)(3) voids any lease penalty exceeding 5% of the delinquent amount for the period, which forecloses accruing daily fees beyond that ceiling.
Reasonableness standard	The 5% cap is the operative limit; § 8-208(d)(2) separately voids lease provisions waiving tenant rights or remedies, and a lease provision violating the late-fee cap is unenforceable.

Notes and caveats

statutory_cap quotes the current text base — 'unpaid rent due for the rental period for which the payment was delinquent' — because older sources render it as '5% of rent due,' overstating the base when partial payment was made. grace_period_days is null (no statutory grace; encode the contrast with MA's 30 days on the comparison table). One unresolved nuance flagged rather than asserted: § 8-208's written-lease mandates key off landlords offering 5+ units, while the (d) prohibitions speak of 'a lease' generally — encoded must_be_in_lease=true on the contract-law baseline that an uncontracted fee has no basis, without claiming the 5-unit threshold limits the cap. HB 80 (2026 fee disclosure, new § 8-212.5, treble damages) passed the House 94-35 and died in Senate Judicial Proceedings at Sine Die — likely 2027 refile, not pending now.

Statute citations

RP § 8-208 (d)(2)-(3) Official source

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Maryland General Assembly site (mgaleg.maryland.gov): Real Property §§ 8-203 (read in full twice — independent fetches matched verbatim), 8-203.1, 8-208, 8-209 (read twice), 8-209.1, 8-221 (read twice), and 8-402. Session-law provenance verified on official mgaleg bill pages: HB 693 (2024) / Ch. 124 (deposit cap cut, eff. 2024-10-01), HB 151 (2023) / Ch. 146 (§ 8-209 rent-increase notice, eff. 2023-10-01), HB 1076 (2025) / Ch. 564 (§ 8-221 entry notice, eff. 2025-10-01), and HB 80 (2026) status. Interest mechanics cross-checked against the Maryland DHCD official deposit-interest calculator page; local rent-stabilization programs confirmed on official Takoma Park, Montgomery County, and Prince George's County government pages.