Maryland SB 335 / HB 315 rent reporting law: the complete landlord compliance guide

On this page

1. SB 335 / HB 315 at a glance
2. Who is covered
3. What the law requires
4. Deadlines and timeline
5. What the offer must include
6. How the offer must be delivered
7. The fee cap
8. Opt-outs and re-enrollment
9. The voucher-screening rule
10. Enforcement and penalties
11. Compliance checklist
12. Doing it yourself vs. using a service
13. How Prompt Renter handles it
14. FAQ
15. Sources

SB 335 / HB 315 at a glance

Bill numbers

Senate Bill 335 and House Bill 315, cross-files in the 2026 session, enacted as Chapter 773 and codified at Real Property Article § 8-208.4

Effective date

October 1, 2026

Who's covered

Landlords that own six or more residential rental units in Maryland, counted statewide

The requirement

Offer each tenant the option of having their positive rental payment history reported to at least one consumer reporting agency (Equifax, Experian or TransUnion)

When to offer

At lease signing and at least once a year after. Tenants on leases signed before October 1, 2026 must receive the offer by January 1, 2027

The fee

Capped at the lesser of the landlord's actual cost or $10 per month. The fee is not rent and can never itself be reported

Tenant's choice

Always optional. Written opt-out any time; six-month wait to re-enroll; reporting may stop if the fee is 30 days unpaid

Also in the bill

Landlords may not reject an applicant who pays with an income-based housing subsidy (such as a Housing Choice Voucher) because of credit score or credit history

Who is covered

The duty falls on a landlord that owns six or more residential rental units in Maryland. The count is by ownership across the state, not per building: an owner with two triplexes in Baltimore and a duplex in Frederick has eight units and is covered. The obligation sits with the owner, but in practice the management company performs it as part of leasing and renewals.

Owners of five or fewer units are not required to make the offer. Nothing stops them from offering rent reporting voluntarily, and many do because tenants ask for it.

What the law requires

A covered landlord must offer each tenant the option of having the tenant's positive rental payment history reported to at least one consumer reporting agency. Three words in that sentence do most of the work:

• Offer. The tenant decides. The landlord cannot enroll tenants automatically and cannot make participation a condition of the lease.
• Positive. Only on-time, full payments are reported. Late and partial payments are excluded by definition. This is a credit-building measure, not a collections tool.
• At least one consumer reporting agency. Reporting to one bureau satisfies the law. Reporting to all three gives tenants the most benefit, because lenders pull different bureaus.

The tenant's rent must actually reach a bureau every month in the bureau's data format (Metro 2), through a furnisher that has a data-reporting agreement with that bureau. That is the part most landlords cannot do themselves, which is why the market has settled on rent reporting services.

Deadlines and timeline

For most portfolios the January 1, 2027 deadline is the hard part: it means a documented mailing or email campaign to every current tenant during the fourth quarter of 2026, with proof of delivery kept on file.

What the offer must include

The statute lists the contents of the offer. Each item must be present:

1. A statement that participation is optional.
2. The name of each consumer reporting agency the rent will be reported to.
3. The fee, if any.
4. How to submit the election to participate.
5. A statement that the tenant may opt in at any time after the initial offer.
6. A statement that a tenant who stops participating must wait six months before re-enrolling.
7. How to opt out.
8. A dated signature block for the tenant's election.

How the offer must be delivered

Delivery has to be provable. The permitted methods are:

• First-class mail with a certificate of mailing, enclosing a self-addressed stamped envelope so the tenant can return the election.
• A tracked delivery service.
• Email, but only if the tenant has elected to receive notices electronically.

Keep the certificate of mailing, tracking record or sent email for every tenant. If a tenant later claims they never received the offer, that record is your compliance.

The fiscal and policy note reads the delivery requirement as applying to every offer, not only the catch-up offers to existing tenants, and that is the safe way to operate.

The fee cap

A landlord may charge a participating tenant a fee for rent reporting, but no more than the lesser of the landlord's actual cost to provide the service or $10 per month. Three rules follow from that:

• If the service costs the landlord nothing, the landlord cannot charge the tenant. The cap is actual cost.
• The fee is not rent. It cannot be added to the rent ledger as rent, and unpaid reporting fees are not grounds for a failure-to-pay-rent action.
• Payment or nonpayment of the fee may never be reported to a bureau.

If the fee goes unpaid for 30 days, the landlord may stop reporting. A tenant whose reporting stops for nonpayment must wait six months before re-enrolling.

Opt-outs and re-enrollment

A participating tenant may opt out at any time with a written request. Reporting stops, and the tenant's existing positive history stays on their credit file as a closed, paid-as-agreed account. The tenant must then wait six months before electing to participate again.

Opt-out requests should be logged with the date received and the date reporting stopped. A rent reporting service should close the tradeline on the next bureau file rather than simply deleting the tenant, so the history the tenant earned is preserved.

The other half of the bill: the voucher-screening rule

SB 335 / HB 315 is two laws in one. Most of the testimony at the General Assembly was about the second part, and many searches for "HB 315" are about it.

A landlord who uses financial screening in rental applications may not refuse to rent to an applicant who pays with an income-based housing subsidy, such as a Housing Choice Voucher, because of the applicant's credit score or credit history. The landlord may still verify the applicant's ability to pay the tenant's share of the rent that the subsidy does not cover, and may still rely on references and the applicant's past rental history.

Unlike the rent reporting section, this provision has teeth: a violation is a discriminatory housing practice under Maryland's fair housing law, enforceable through the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights and the courts.

The two halves fit together. Voucher holders are exactly the tenants whose credit files rarely show their rent, and positive rent reporting is how that history gets built.

Enforcement and penalties

The rent reporting section of § 8-208.4 does not state its own penalty. The "discriminatory housing practice" enforcement in the same bill applies to the subsidy-screening provision, not to a missed rent reporting offer.

That does not make it optional. A statutory lease requirement that is not met is a lease-compliance problem: tenants and tenant advocates can raise it, the Attorney General's Consumer Protection Division polices landlord practices under the Consumer Protection Act, and local jurisdictions with rental licensing can fold state requirements into inspections. The practical exposure is a portfolio-wide finding that no tenant was ever offered reporting, which is easy to prove from the absence of records. Documented offers and deliveries make the question go away.

Compliance checklist

• Count your units by ownership statewide. Six or more means you are covered.
• Pick a consumer reporting agency to furnish to, and the furnisher that will send the data every month in Metro 2 format.
• Prepare the offer with all eight required elements, and plan to switch to the DHCD form once it is published.
• Add the offer to every lease packet for signings and renewals from October 1, 2026.
• Send the offer to every existing tenant before January 1, 2027, by certificate-of-mailing first-class mail, tracked delivery, or email where the tenant opted into electronic notices.
• Keep proof of delivery and every signed election, decline and opt-out, tenant by tenant.
• Set the fee at or below the cap: actual cost or $10, whichever is lower. If the service is free to you, the tenant pays nothing.
• Report positive history only, every month, and never report the fee.
• Stop reporting on written opt-out and on 30 days of fee nonpayment; apply the six-month re-enrollment wait.
• Repeat the offer annually to every tenant who has not enrolled.
• Update your screening criteria so voucher applicants are never rejected for credit score or history.

Doing it yourself vs. using a service

The three bureaus do not accept rent data from individual landlords. To furnish directly you need a data-furnisher agreement with each bureau, a Metro 2 reporting system, a compliance program under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and Regulation V for accuracy and dispute handling, and enough volume for a bureau to onboard you. That is realistic for large operators and impractical below several thousand units.

A rent reporting service is the furnisher. It makes the offer, records consent, converts the rent roll into Metro 2 every month, handles disputes, and closes tradelines on opt-out and move-out. For SB 335 the questions to ask any vendor are:

• Does the offer contain all eight statutory elements, and will you adopt the DHCD form when it publishes?
• Can you deliver the offer by a permitted method and give me proof of delivery per tenant?
• Is it positive-only for Maryland, and is the fee at or under the cap?
• Which bureaus do you furnish to, under your own furnisher agreements?
• How do opt-outs and the six-month wait work, and what happens to the tenant's history?
• Can you run the January 1, 2027 catch-up campaign for my existing tenants?

For a broader look at how the service side works, see rent reporting for landlords and property managers and how to report tenants to the credit bureaus.

Sources

• Senate Bill 335, enrolled text (Maryland General Assembly, 2026 Regular Session)
• SB 335 bill page, history and fiscal and policy note
• LegiScan summary of SB 335 (2026)
• Maryland Real Property Article § 8-208.4 (as enacted by Chapter 773 of 2026)
• Regulation V § 1022.42, furnisher accuracy and integrity (CFPB)

This page summarizes Maryland SB 335 / HB 315 for general information and is not legal advice. Consult your attorney about how the law applies to your properties. Last reviewed September 15, 2026.