Montana Late Rent Fee Rules

No section of Montana's Residential Landlord and Tenant Act (Title 70, Chapter 24) caps the dollar amount or percentage of a late fee, and there is no mandatory grace period. Under Mont. Code Ann. § 70-24-201, rent and the terms surrounding it are set by the rental agreement, so any late fee must be written into the lease to be charged. Montana courts apply general contract law: a charge structured as an unenforceable penalty rather than a reasonable estimate of the landlord's loss may not be collected. Because there is no statutory ceiling, a tenant's protection comes from the lease terms and the reasonableness standard, not from a fixed cap.

No specific statutory penalty. A late fee not stated in the lease is uncollectible, and a fee a court finds to be an unreasonable penalty rather than a genuine pre-estimate of loss will not be enforced.