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Salt Lake City, Utah Medium-High Risk Clause

Late Fee Clause
in Your Lease

LDWritten by LeaseDecoded Research Team
Last reviewed: October 2026
Not legal advice
How this page is sourced

Statutes verified against primary state sources

Every statute cited here was read in its published text before this page went live: on the state's own site where that site can be reached, otherwise on a republished copy of the code. Court decisions are quoted from the published opinion and linked to it, so you can read the original yourself.

Primary sourcesNot legal advice

Content verified against primary state statutes before publicationLast updated: October 2026

Location: Salt Lake City, Utah
Read time: 8 minutes

What it actually means, what Utah law says, what's specific to Salt Lake City - and exactly what to do. In plain English.

No required grace
Grace period before a late fee in Salt Lake City
Utah caps a late fee. Under Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(a), an owner may not charge one above the greater of 10% of the rent in your rental agreement or $75. No section we read in the Utah Fit Premises Act or the Salt Lake City Code sets a grace period, which leaves your lease to name the day the fee starts.

Quick Summary - What You Need to Know

  • A late fee may not exceed the greater of 10% of the agreed rent or $75.
  • No section we read sets a grace period, which leaves your lease to name the day the fee starts.
  • A charge above the agreed amount, or not in your lease, needs a month-to-month agreement and 15-day notice.
  • A renter may not use a breach of the cap to stop following the lease or to sue the owner.
  • Falling behind on payments can cost you the state's repair remedies under § 57-22-6(4)(b).

Try your numbers

Is your late fee over the limit?

Most allowedThe greater of $75 or 10% of the rent
Your charge

Applies to any late fee an owner charges a renter, measured on the rent agreed to in the rental agreement; a renter may not use a breach of the cap to excuse the renter's compliance with the rental agreement or to bring a cause of action against the owner (§ 57-22-4(9)) (Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(a)). Arithmetic only, not legal advice.

Copy and send: As soon as a late fee on your ledger looks larger than the cap or a charge appears that your lease does not include

Ask for a late fee to be corrected

Fill in the brackets and keep a copy of what you send.

Section 01

Understanding the Late Fee Clause

This page is for Salt Lake City renters checking a late fee clause, either before signing or after a fee shows up on the ledger. Utah law sets how large the fee can be, and the sections we read leave the day it starts to your lease.

To check a fee you need three things: your lease, the rent it states, and the fee you were charged. The statute also limits what a renter can do when an owner charges more than the cap.

What renters assume

A late fee is whatever the lease says, and the only open question is how many days of grace Utah gives.

What is actually true

It works the other way round. § 57-22-4(5)(a) caps the fee at the greater of 10% of the agreed rent or $75, and no section we read sets a grace period. That leaves the day the fee starts to the paragraph you signed.

Salt Lake City is one of 16 rows on the comparison on this page with no grace figure. The others are Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, Phoenix, Atlanta, Columbus, Newark, Detroit, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Indianapolis, Louisville, Oklahoma City and Philadelphia, where the row reads no statute.

The other 11 rows carry a wait. Boston sits at 30 days, Baltimore at 10 under a city rule, and Denver at 7. New York City, Seattle, Nashville, Washington and Charlotte sit at 5, Portland at 4, Las Vegas at 3 and Austin at 2.

A blank bar measures days of grace and nothing else. It cannot show the ceiling in § 57-22-4(5)(a), the greater of 10% of the agreed rent or $75, which Utah's label carries in brackets, as Minnesota's carries an 8% cap.

Clause decoder

Late Fee Clause Example - What the Wording Looks Like in Salt Lake City, UT

The sample clause below is real lease language - a court quoted it word for word, and then ruled on it. What the judge decided is at the bottom of this block.

Real clause - quoted in a published court opinion

Find the equivalent paragraph in your own lease and read the two side by side. The wording will differ; the moving parts rarely do.

you must pay your rent on or before the 1st day of each month (due date) with no grace period. . . . If you don't pay all rent on or before the 3rd day of the month, you'll pay an initial late charge of $75.00 plus a daily late charge of $15.00 per day after that date until paid in full.

Quoted from the published opinion in Cleven v. Mid-America Apartment Communities, Inc., 20 F.4th 171 (5th Cir. 2021). Judicial opinions are not subject to copyright; the lease language is reproduced in limited part for commentary under 17 U.S.C. § 107.

What the 4 highlighted phrases mean
1

“with no grace period”

A lease that disclaims a grace period meets nothing in the Utah sections our record read: the Utah Fit Premises Act, as we read it, sets none, and our record of the Salt Lake City chapters we opened finds no city one either. Other rows on this page write a count, Oregon at 4 days and Baltimore at 10 under a city rule. Utah's statute spends its words on the size of the fee instead, which leaves the paragraph you signed as the document that answers when it starts.

Tenant-favourable“No late charge applies to rent received by the 5th of the month”
What this lease said“with no grace period”
Landlord-favourable“Rent is late at 12:01 a.m. on the 2nd, and no holiday, weekend or bank delay extends the due date”
2

“or before the 3rd day of the month, you'll pay”

The day this clause names does two jobs in Utah. It is the day the fee lands, and it is also a day you are behind: § 57-22-5(1)(g) requires each renter to “be current on all payments required by the rental agreement”. Under § 57-22-6(4)(b), a renter not in compliance with § 57-22-5 “is not entitled to a renter remedy”, and those remedies are the Act's repair route.

See the example
A late month and an open repair dispute are a poor mix under this Act. Keep a dated receipt for every payment, so you can show the day you were current again.
Tenant-favourable“Rent paid by the 5th is treated as timely for every purpose under this lease”
What this lease said“or before the 3rd day of the month, you'll pay”
Landlord-favourable“Rent unpaid after the due date is a default under this lease and under the Utah Fit Premises Act”
3

“an initial late charge of $75.00”

This is the figure Utah writes into its own cap. § 57-22-4(5)(a) bars a late fee that exceeds the greater of 10% of the rent agreed to in the rental agreement or $75. On any rent where 10% comes to $75 or less, the $75 is the ceiling and this opening charge sits exactly on it. On a higher rent, the percentage sets a higher ceiling and leaves room above it.

See the example
Do the sum before you sign. On rent of $1,400 a month, 10% is $140, so the ceiling is $140 and a $75.00 opening charge leaves $65 of room for anything else called a late fee.
Tenant-favourable“A single late charge of $50 applies to rent unpaid after the 5th”
What this lease said“an initial late charge of $75.00”
Landlord-favourable“An initial late charge equal to 15% of the monthly rent applies to rent unpaid after the 1st”
4

“daily late charge of $15.00 per day after that”

A daily charge is where a Utah renter should add, not read. The statute caps “a late fee”, and our record does not say how it treats a fee that grows by the day, so total the opening charge and every daily line and compare that total with the ceiling. If it passes, read § 57-22-4(9) first: a renter may not use an owner's failure to comply with subsection (5) “to excuse the renter's compliance with a rental agreement” or “to bring a cause of action against the owner.”

See the example
On rent of $1,000 a month, the ceiling is $100, the greater of 10% or $75. Two daily charges on top of the $75.00 opening charge make $105.00, past it if the daily lines count toward the cap. Put that arithmetic in a dated letter asking for a correction.
Tenant-favourable“Daily charges stop once total late charges reach the limit set by Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)”
What this lease said“daily late charge of $15.00 per day after that”
Landlord-favourable“A further $15 accrues each day, without limit, until every sum owed under this lease is received”
What the court did with it

The clause survived - and the reasoning is the part worth knowing. Tenants argued a landlord must actually work out its damages before setting a late fee. The Fifth Circuit disagreed: there is no requirement to go through that process, so long as the fee itself is a reasonable estimate. The burden sits on the fee's size, not on the landlord's paperwork.

How this state's law treats this clause
The Utah sections our record read name no grace period before a late fee, and our record of the Salt Lake City Code finds no city one. What Utah writes down is a ceiling: no late fee above the greater of 10% of the rent agreed to in the rental agreement or $75. The text was read on an Internet Archive copy of the Legislature's file, so read the current section on le.utah.gov, in: Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(a); Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(b); Utah Code § 57-22-4(8); Utah Code § 57-22-4(9); Utah Code § 57-22-5(1)(g); Utah Code § 57-22-6(4)(b); Utah Code § 57-22-7(1); Utah Code § 57-20-1; Salt Lake City Code § 18.96.060(J)

One court, one lease, one state. That answer is not automatically yours, and your lease may be worded to land differently. Use this to know what to look for and what to ask - your state's tenant hotline or a local tenant attorney can answer it for your document.

Section 02

Utah Law on Late Fee Clause

The law in Utah
  • The cap is the state's only late fee number in the sections we read.
    Read the law's wordsUtah Code § 57-22-4(5) provides that "An owner may not charge a renter: (a) a late fee that exceeds the greater of: (i) 10% of the rent agreed to in the rental agreement; or (ii) $75". The section measures the fee, not the timing, so the day a fee may first be charged is a term of the rental agreement rather than a statutory figure.
  • Charges beyond the lease are restricted too.
    Read the law's wordsSection 57-22-4(5)(b) bars an owner from charging "a fee, fine, assessment, interest, or other cost" in an amount greater than the amount agreed to in the rental agreement, or one that is not included in the rental agreement, unless the agreement is on a month-to-month basis and "the owner provides the renter a 15-day notice of the charge." Section 57-22-4(8) adds that "Nothing in this section prohibits any fee, fine, assessment, interest, or cost that is allowed by law or stated in the rental agreement."
  • The statute limits how a renter may use a breach of the cap.
    Read the law's wordsSection 57-22-4(9) provides that "A renter may not use an owner's failure to comply with a requirement of Subsection (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), or (7) as a basis: (a) to excuse the renter's compliance with a rental agreement; or (b) to bring a cause of action against the owner." Subsection (5) is the late fee cap, so a Salt Lake City renter facing a fee above it should read that sentence before planning a response.
  • Paying late can also cost a renter the state repair remedies.
    Read the law's wordsUtah Code § 57-22-5(1)(g) requires each renter to "be current on all payments required by the rental agreement", and § 57-22-6(4)(b) provides that "A renter is not entitled to a renter remedy if the renter is not in compliance with all requirements under Section 57-22-5." The history line of § 57-22-4 reads Amended by Chapter 98, 2021 General Session.

Sources include Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(a); Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(b); Utah Code § 57-22-4(8); Utah Code § 57-22-4(9); Utah Code § 57-22-5(1)(g); Utah Code § 57-22-6(4)(b); Utah Code § 57-22-7(1); Utah Code § 57-20-1; Salt Lake City Code § 18.96.060(J) - statutes change; verify the current text for your situation.

The Utah late fee rules we read sit in the Utah Fit Premises Act, and no section we read sets a grace period. Utah Code § 57-22-4 sets these terms:

  • A ceiling. An owner may not charge "a late fee that exceeds the greater of: (i) 10% of the rent agreed to in the rental agreement; or (ii) $75" (§ 57-22-4(5)(a)).
  • Charges outside the lease. Under § 57-22-4(5)(b), an owner may not charge a fee, fine, assessment, interest or other cost above the amount agreed in the rental agreement, or one it does not include, unless the agreement is month-to-month and the owner gives a 15-day notice of the charge.
  • Charges the law allows. § 57-22-4(8) adds that the section does not prohibit a fee or cost allowed by law or stated in the rental agreement.
  • A limit on your response. Under § 57-22-4(9), a renter may not use an owner's breach of subsection (5) to excuse the renter's compliance with the rental agreement or to sue the owner.

§ 57-22-5(1)(g) requires each renter to be current on all payments required by the rental agreement, and under § 57-22-6(4)(b) a renter not in compliance with § 57-22-5 is not entitled to a renter remedy.

Read the current § 57-22-4 on le.utah.gov before relying on it.

Section 03

What's Specific to Salt Lake City

Grace period before a late fee

Same clause, 27 cities, different rules. Tap any city for its own guide.

Boston, Massachusetts
30-day grace
Baltimore, Maryland
10-day gracecity
Denver, Colorado
7-day grace
New York City, New York
5-day grace
Seattle, Washington
5-day grace
Nashville, Tennessee
5-day grace
Washington, District of Columbia
5-day grace
Charlotte, North Carolina
5-day grace
Portland, Oregon
4-day grace
Las Vegas, Nevada
3-day grace
Austin, Texas
2-day grace
Los Angeles, California
No required grace
Miami, Florida
No required grace
Chicago, Illinois
No required grace
Phoenix, Arizona
No required grace
Atlanta, Georgia
No required grace
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
No statute
Columbus, Ohio
No required grace
Newark, New Jersey
No required gracebenefit exception
Detroit, Michigan
No required grace
Minneapolis, Minnesota
No required grace8% cap
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
No required grace
Kansas City, Missouri
No required grace
Indianapolis, Indiana
No required grace
Louisville, Kentucky
No required grace
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
No required grace
Salt Lake City, Utah
No required grace10% or $75 cap

Figures are the state rule, or the stronger city ordinance where one exists. Verify the current law for your own situation before relying on it.

Our record of the Salt Lake City Code finds no city grace period and no city limit on a late fee in the six chapters it covers, which do not span the whole code. § 18.96.060(J) requires a tenant to "Be current on all payments required by the rental agreement and this chapter". Utah Code § 57-22-7(1) bars a city ordinance "inconsistent with this chapter", and § 57-20-1(1) bars a city ordinance that would control rents or fees on private residential property without the Legislature's express approval. We predict nothing about how either applies.

Does it name the day the fee starts?

No section we read sets a grace period, which leaves the clause as the place the day is written.

Does the fee fit under the cap at your rent?

Compare it with 10% of your rent and with $75. The larger figure is the limit in § 57-22-4(5)(a).

Does an opening fee grow by the day?

The cap is written for a late fee. Total a first charge plus daily charges against it before you sign.

Does it allow charges the lease does not list?

A charge the agreement does not include needs a month-to-month agreement and a 15-day notice of the charge (§ 57-22-4(5)(b)).

Sources

The law this guide relies on, and where to read it. Statutes change, so confirm the current text before you act on it.

Section 04

Red Flags to Watch Out For

  • A late fee above the greater of 10% or $75

    § 57-22-4(5)(a) bars a fee that size. Read § 57-22-4(9) before you respond, because it limits how a renter may use that breach.

  • A fee the lease never mentioned

    Unless your agreement is month-to-month and the owner gave a 15-day notice of the charge, § 57-22-4(5)(b) bars it.

  • A fee on the day after rent is due

    No section we read sets a waiting period to count against it. Settle the fee's timing before you sign, while the term is still open.

  • Falling behind while a repair is pending

    A renter not current on all payments can lose the Act's renter remedies (§ 57-22-6(4)(b)). Keep rent paid while you raise a repair.

  • A city code section cited as a late fee rule

    Our record of the city code finds no use of the phrase "late fee" in Chapters 5.14, 5.15, 18.50, 18.96 or 18.99. § 18.96.060(J) covers staying current on payments.

Section 05

Your Rights as a Salt Lake City Tenant

  • A ceiling on the late fee

    No late fee above the greater of 10% of the rent agreed to in the rental agreement or $75 (§ 57-22-4(5)(a)).

  • No charge above the agreed amount

    A fee, fine, assessment, interest or other cost may not exceed the amount agreed in the rental agreement (§ 57-22-4(5)(b)).

  • Notice before a new month-to-month charge

    A charge not included in a month-to-month agreement needs a 15-day notice of the charge from the owner.

  • The Act's repair remedies

    § 57-22-6 holds the state's renter remedies. They require compliance with § 57-22-5, which includes being current on all payments required by the rental agreement.

Section 06

What To Do - Step by Step

1

Read the fee clause word for word

Write down the day the fee starts, the amount, and whether it repeats.

2

Work out the cap at your rent

Take 10% of the rent in your lease and compare it with $75. The greater figure is the ceiling.

3

Check every other charge against the lease

A charge above the agreed amount, or one the lease does not include, needs a month-to-month agreement and 15-day notice of the charge.

4

Rebuild the ledger yourself

List every payment and charge with its date. Mark which entries are rent and which are fees, and find the first fee behind any rolling balance.

5

Keep paying and ask in writing

§ 57-22-4(9) bars using a cap breach to excuse your own lease duties. Keep rent current, put your figures in a dated letter, and ask for a correction.

6

Read the current text, then get help

Read § 57-22-4 on le.utah.gov as it stands today. A Utah legal aid office or tenant lawyer can review your lease and ledger.

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Section 07

Frequently Asked Questions

how many days late can rent be before a late fee in salt lake city utah
No section we read sets a count. Our record of the Utah Fit Premises Act and of the Salt Lake City Code finds no grace period, which leaves your late fee clause to state the day.
what is the maximum late fee in utah
The greater of 10% of the rent agreed to in your rental agreement or $75, under Utah Code § 57-22-4(5)(a). Check the current text on le.utah.gov before relying on it.
can i sue my landlord in utah for a late fee over the cap
§ 57-22-4(9) provides that a renter may not use an owner's failure to follow the late fee cap as a basis to bring a cause of action against the owner, or to excuse the renter's own compliance with the rental agreement.
can a utah landlord add a fee that is not in my lease
Not under § 57-22-4(5)(b), unless your agreement is month-to-month and the owner gives you a 15-day notice of the charge. The same rule bars a fee or other charge above the amount your rental agreement states.

Late Fee rules near Utah

The same clause in the nearest states we cover.

ArizonaPhoenixGrace before a late feeNo required graceRead the guide →CaliforniaLos AngelesGrace before a late feeNo required graceRead the guide →ColoradoDenverGrace before a late fee7-day graceRead the guide →NevadaLas VegasGrace before a late fee3-day graceRead the guide →

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Legal Disclaimer: This guide is for general educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Information reflects general Utah and Salt Lake City law as of October 2026 but may not reflect recent changes. Consult a licensed attorney in Utah for advice about your specific situation.