Landlord Atlas

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

Verified July 9, 2026 All Minnesota topics →

Minnesota landlords must make a good-faith effort to give at least 24 hours' advance notice before entering a rental unit, the notice must state a time or anticipated window of entry, and the entry itself may occur only between 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. unless the tenant agrees to a different hour.

Entry is allowed only for a reasonable business purpose — the statute lists showings, maintenance, code inspections, disturbances, suspected lease violations or unauthorized occupancy, senior-housing housekeeping, and vacated units — and no notice is required when the landlord reasonably suspects immediate entry is needed to prevent injury to persons or property, to determine a tenant's safety, or to comply with local ordinances on unlawful activity, though the landlord must then disclose the entry in writing. A tenant may accept shorter notice but can never be required to waive prior notice as a lease condition, and each violation exposes the landlord to a civil penalty of up to $500 plus reasonable attorney fees, rent reduction up to full rescission, and recovery of the deposit. These rules took effect January 1, 2024 — anything still describing Minnesota as a bare 'reasonable notice' state is out of date.

Minnesota entry notice at a glance

Advance notice required 24 hours
Notice standard Minn. Stat. 504B.211 subd. 2 (as amended by the 2023 housing omnibus, 2023 Session Laws ch. 52, effective Jan. 1, 2024): entry only for a reasonable business purpose and after a good-faith effort to give the tenant 'reasonable notice under the circumstances of not less than 24 hours in advance' — 24 hours is the floor, and more may be required where circumstances demand. The notice must specify a time or an anticipated window of time of entry. The tenant may voluntarily permit entry on shorter notice, but may not be required to waive the right to prior notice as a condition of getting or keeping the lease.
Permitted reasons Statutory reasonable-business-purpose list (subd. 3): showing the unit to prospective tenants before the lease ends; showing to prospective buyers or insurance representatives; performing maintenance work; allowing state, county, or municipal inspections for health, housing, building, or fire codes; a tenant causing a disturbance within the unit; reasonable belief the tenant is violating the lease; prearranged housekeeping in senior housing where 80% or more of residents are 55+; reasonable belief the unit is occupied without authorization; and a unit the tenant has vacated.
Emergency exception Yes
Time-of-day restrictions Entry is permitted only between 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m., unless the landlord and tenant agree to an earlier or later time (subd. 2).

Notes and caveats

PRIMARY STALE-SOURCE TRAP for Minnesota: before 2023 Session Laws ch. 52 (effective 2024-01-01), 504B.211 required only 'reasonable notice' with no fixed period, and a large share of circulating summaries, form-notice generators, and fifty-state charts still say 'reasonable notice — no set hours.' Current text (double-read 2026-07-09) sets a 24-HOUR MINIMUM inside a reasonableness standard, adds the time-or-window content requirement, and adds the 8:00 a.m.-8:00 p.m. entry window. Encoding decisions: notice_hours=24 is the statutory floor — render as 'at least 24 hours, and reasonable under the circumstances.' The subd. 6 remedies (up to $500 civil penalty PER VIOLATION plus reasonable attorney fees, rent reduction up to full rescission of the lease, and recovery of the damage deposit less amounts lawfully retained under 504B.178) were double-read and matched. Applicability: the section does not apply to manufactured home parks (separate ch. 327C regime). The emergency exception (subd. 4) is three-pronged (injury to persons/property re maintenance, security, or law enforcement; tenant safety; local unlawful-activity ordinances) — after an emergency or tenant-absent entry the landlord must disclose the entry in writing left in a conspicuous place, a duty the summary carries because it is commonly omitted. The anti-waiver clause (tenant may consent to shorter notice ad hoc but cannot be made to waive notice as a lease condition) was quoted verbatim in verification.

Common questions: Minnesota entry notice

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

How many hours' notice must a landlord give before entering in Minnesota?
24 hours. Minn. Stat. 504B.211 subd. 2 (as amended by the 2023 housing omnibus, 2023 Session Laws ch. 52, effective Jan. 1, 2024): entry only for a reasonable business purpose and after a good-faith effort to give the tenant 'reasonable notice under the circumstances of not less than 24 hours in advance' — 24 hours is the floor, and more may be required where circumstances demand. The notice must specify a time or an anticipated window of time of entry. The tenant may voluntarily permit entry on shorter notice, but may not be required to waive the right to prior notice as a condition of getting or keeping the lease.
What reasons allow a landlord to enter a rental in Minnesota?
Statutory reasonable-business-purpose list (subd. 3): showing the unit to prospective tenants before the lease ends; showing to prospective buyers or insurance representatives; performing maintenance work; allowing state, county, or municipal inspections for health, housing, building, or fire codes; a tenant causing a disturbance within the unit; reasonable belief the tenant is violating the lease; prearranged housekeeping in senior housing where 80% or more of residents are 55+; reasonable belief the unit is occupied without authorization; and a unit the tenant has vacated.
Can a landlord enter without notice in an emergency in Minnesota?
Yes — Minnesota recognizes an emergency exception to the entry-notice requirement.
Are there time-of-day limits on when a landlord can enter in Minnesota?
Entry is permitted only between 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m., unless the landlord and tenant agree to an earlier or later time (subd. 2).

Statute citations

How this record was verified: Direct read of statute text on the official Minnesota Revisor of Statutes site (revisor.mn.gov, Minnesota Statutes 2025 edition): Minn. Stat. 504B.178, 504B.177, and 504B.211 each fetched twice in independent calls — the 1% interest rate, three-week/five-day return deadlines, $500 bad-faith punitive cap, 8%-of-overdue-rent late-fee cap, 24-hour entry notice, 8:00 a.m.-8:00 p.m. window, and $500-per-violation entry penalty all matched verbatim across reads. 504B.135 and 471.9996 read twice each (HTML fetch plus the Revisor's official PDF read in full). 504B.147 and 504B.120 read once each. MN Attorney General landlord-tenant handbook (ag.state.mn.us) read for the 'one rental period plus one day' rent-increase derivation. 2026 enactment sweep on revisor.mn.gov: SF 4171 bill status and enrolled text read directly (Laws 2026 ch. 81, signed 2026-05-12, effective 2026-08-01 — flagged as pending, not incorporated, since the Statutes-2025 pages predate it); HF 3245 status read (died in House committee at sine die 2026-05-18, not flagged).