Lease Acceleration Clause
in Your Lease
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
What it actually means, what Utah law says, what's specific to Salt Lake City - and exactly what to do. In plain English.
Quick Summary - What You Need to Know
- Reid (1989) requires a landlord seeking unpaid rent to take commercially reasonable steps to relet. Waiting for offers falls short.
- If the trial comes after the lease ends, the landlord must prove its damages and its mitigation efforts.
- If the trial comes before the lease ends, the judgment cannot include rent that has not yet accrued.
- § 78B-6-816(1) names the entire remaining rent as one measure after abandonment, and a rerenting measure as the other.
- Woodhaven (1997) held a termination fee of one and one-half months' rent a penalty as applied to that tenant.
Step by step
How it plays out
- You leave earlyLandlord must try to reletUnder Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co. a landlord seeking unpaid rent must take commercially reasonable steps to relet, not just wait for offers.
- Trial before term endsNo judgment for future rentA judgment cannot be entered for rents that have not yet accrued. Later rent needs a supplemental proceeding.
- Trial after term endsLandlord proves its mitigationThe landlord carries the burden of proving both the amount of its damages and its mitigation efforts.
- Unit is rerentedOne measure stops runningUnder § 78B-6-816(1), one measure after abandonment is rent until rerenting, plus any shortfall, a reasonable commission and restoration costs.
Copy and send: When your landlord bills you for rent after you moved out early
Ask what was done to re-rent the unit
Fill in the brackets and keep a copy of what you send.
How Utah compares
Landlord duty to mitigate after an early lease break, state by state
No figureGuide coming soonYou are here
See all 27 cities as a chart
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.
Understanding the Lease Acceleration Clause
This page is for Salt Lake City renters whose lease has an acceleration clause: the paragraph that makes all the remaining rent due at once if you default or leave early. On paper it looks like simple math, months left times the rent.
In Utah the bill also depends on what the landlord did to re-rent the unit, and on when the case is tried. Those are the facts that shape how much you can owe.
What renters assume
If my lease says all remaining rent is due when I leave early, my landlord can collect every month without trying to re-rent.
What is actually true
Utah case law asks for more. Under Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co. a landlord seeking unpaid rent must take commercially reasonable steps to relet, and a judgment entered before the lease ends cannot include rent that has not yet accrued.
None of the 27 rows in the comparison on this page carries a figure; each is a short label. Salt Lake City's reads Case law; landlord proves.
Sixteen of the 27 labels open with Mandatory. Five name case law: Denver and Columbus read "No statute; case law", Charlotte reads "Case law; tenant proves", Indianapolis reads "Case law duty to re-let", and Salt Lake City's is the fifth.
Miami and Philadelphia read "No duty to re-rent", Atlanta reads "Likely no duty", and Kansas City reads "No general duty; deposit rule".
Four labels name who proves the point. Los Angeles and Charlotte read tenant proves, and Newark and Salt Lake City read landlord proves.
Utah's half of that comes from Reid, where a landlord whose trial follows the end of the lease must prove both its damages and its mitigation efforts.
Rent Acceleration 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.
Find the equivalent paragraph in your own lease and read the two side by side. The wording will differ; the moving parts rarely do.
Below is the Crestview paragraph as the Montana opinion quotes it, minus its last sentence. That sentence, not printed here, sets late charges and interest running on any amount after acceleration:
If any monthly installment under this agreement is not paid when due and remains unpaid after a date specified by a notice to Tenant, the entire principal rent amount owed for the full lease term shall at once become due and payable at the option of the Landlord and judgment may be had for all said amounts due. The foregoing provision shall not relieve the Landlord of its obligation to mitigate damages. In the event the rental premises is re-rented to another for full value prior to expiration of the lease term, Landlord shall file Notice of Partial Satisfaction of any judgment entered to the extent of the third party rental agreement.
[…]
Quoted from the published opinion in Summers v. Crestview Apartments, 2010 MT 164, 357 Mont. 123, 236 P.3d 586 (No. DA 09-0489). 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
“owed for the full lease term”
This is the acceleration itself: every month left becomes one debt. Utah's abandonment statute names that figure as one of two measures. § 78B-6-816(1) makes a tenant who abandoned liable “for the entire rent due for the remainder of the term”, or for rent accrued until rerenting plus any shortfall, a reasonable commission and restoration costs. It adds that the second measure applies “if less than Subsection (1)(a), notwithstanding that the owner did not rerent the premises.”
See the example
“judgment may be had for all said amounts”
The lease promises a judgment for the whole accelerated sum. Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co. limits when that can happen: “if the trial occurs before the end of the lease term, a judgment cannot be entered for rents that have not yet accrued”. To recover later rent, “the landlord must bring a supplemental proceeding or proceedings” proving that the rent accrued and that reasonable mitigation efforts were made.
See the example
“of its obligation to mitigate damages”
This sentence concedes the duty, but in Utah the duty comes from the Supreme Court rather than from the lease. Reid held that a landlord seeking unpaid rent “has an obligation to take commercially reasonable steps to mitigate its losses, which ordinarily means that the landlord must seek to relet the premises.” The test is what a reasonable landlord letting a similar property in the same market would do. A landlord merely “passively receptive to opportunities to relet” falls short of it.
See the example
“re-rented to another for full value”
The credit for a new tenant is the lease's own accounting. Utah's abandonment section measures it by fair rental value: the owner may retake the premises and “attempt to rent them at a fair rental value”. The rerenting measure then counts rent accrued while the unit is rerented, the gap between fair rental value and the old rent, a reasonable commission, and restoration costs less normal wear and tear.
See the example
The Montana Supreme Court struck this paragraph down, and its conclusion is one sentence: “Thus, we conclude that the accelerated rent provision is unconscionable and therefore unenforceable.” The tenants had moved out of their apartment on October 13, 2006, and Crestview answered with a Statement of Deductions from the Security Deposit charging rent through the end of the lease in June - $6,505.75 billed against a $2,170 deposit. Two reasons carried the court. Acceleration undermines the landlord's duty to mitigate and reduces the incentive to re-rent promptly, because a landlord already holding a judgment for the whole term has little reason to fill the unit. And Crestview drafted the lease while these tenants had no meaningful choice and no opportunity to negotiate any of it. The case was reversed and remanded, and two justices wrote separately - their objection being that the majority had gone as far as treating acceleration clauses as unenforceable in themselves. So read the holding narrowly, as the majority wrote it: this provision, in this residential lease, unconscionable and unenforceable. It is a Montana decision and it binds no other state's courts. What travels is the reasoning, and the reasoning is about mitigation - which is exactly the question the statute in your own city's decode answers.
How this state's law treats this clause
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.
Utah Law on Lease Acceleration Clause
- Reid states the duty and the standard.
Read the law's words
The court held that "the standard is one of objective commercial reasonableness" and that "A landlord is obligated to take such steps as would be expected of a reasonable landlord letting out a similar property in the same market conditions." It rejected a landlord who is merely "passively receptive to opportunities to relet", preferring courts "that have required that the landlord take positive steps reasonably calculated to effect a reletting of the premises." Reid itself concerned a five-year office lease, but the court reasoned that "Growing seasons are irrelevant to the leasing of residential premises and commercial buildings." - Reid also limits how far ahead a landlord can collect.
Read the law's words
If the trial "occurs after the end of the lease agreement, the landlord then has the burden of proving both the amount of damages and the fact that it took appropriate mitigation efforts." But "if the trial occurs before the end of the lease term, a judgment cannot be entered for rents that have not yet accrued", and to recover later rent "the landlord must bring a supplemental proceeding or proceedings" proving that the rent accrued and that reasonable mitigation efforts were made. Costs reasonably incurred in readying and reletting the property may be added to what the tenant owes. - Two statutes describe what the tenant still owes.
Read the law's words
Section 78B-6-811(1)(c) and (d) say an eviction judgment for breach or unpaid rent declares the lease forfeited, that the forfeiture "does not release a defendant from any obligation for payments on a lease for the remainder of the lease's term", and that this "does not change any obligation on either party to mitigate damages." Section 78B-6-816(1), on abandonment, lets the owner retake the premises and "attempt to rent them at a fair rental value" and makes the tenant liable either "for the entire rent due for the remainder of the term" or for rent accrued until the unit is rerented plus any shortfall in the new rent, a reasonable commission and restoration costs, adding that "This Subsection (1) applies, if less than Subsection (1)(a), notwithstanding that the owner did not rerent the premises." - Woodhaven applied the same reasoning to an apartment lease.
Read the law's words
In Woodhaven Apartments v. Washington the Supreme Court of Utah described Reid as "adopting the rule that a landlord is required to take steps to mitigate its loss after a tenant breaches a lease" and held a "termination fee" of one and one-half months' rent unenforceable on that record because it was not shown to be a reasonable forecast of the landlord's costs, concluding that "the liquidated damages provision as applied to Washington constituted a penalty." Check the current text of § 78B-6-811 and § 78B-6-816 before relying on them.
Sources include Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Ins. Co., 776 P.2d 896 (Utah 1989); Utah Code § 78B-6-811(1)(c), (d); Utah Code § 78B-6-816(1); Woodhaven Apartments v. Washington, 942 P.2d 918 (Utah 1997); Utah Code § 57-22-7; Utah Code § 57-20-1 - statutes change; verify the current text for your situation.
Two Utah cases and two statutes apply.
- Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co., 776 P.2d 896 (Utah 1989). A landlord seeking unpaid rent must take "commercially reasonable steps to mitigate its losses, which ordinarily means that the landlord must seek to relet the premises."
- Timing and proof. If trial follows the lease's end, the landlord proves its damages and mitigation efforts. If earlier, later rent needs a supplemental proceeding.
- Woodhaven Apartments v. Washington, 942 P.2d 918 (Utah 1997). The court held an apartment lease's termination fee a penalty as applied, because it was not shown to be a reasonable forecast of the landlord's costs.
- The statutes. An eviction forfeiture under § 78B-6-811(1)(c) and (d) leaves lease payments for the rest of the term owed and "does not change any obligation on either party to mitigate damages." After abandonment, § 78B-6-816(1) lets the owner retake and try to rent the unit "at a fair rental value", and names either "the entire rent due for the remainder of the term" or rent until rerenting plus any shortfall, a reasonable commission and restoration costs. The second applies "if less than Subsection (1)(a), notwithstanding that the owner did not rerent the premises."
This page does not decide how a court would fit Reid and § 78B-6-816(1) together. Check both sections on le.utah.gov and current case law.
What's Specific to Salt Lake City
Our record of the Salt Lake City Code finds no city rule on rent acceleration or a landlord's duty to relet. It covers Chapter 18.96 (Fit Premises Ordinance), Chapter 5.14 (Rental Dwellings) and Chapter 5.15 (Landlord/Tenant Initiative) in full. § 18.96.080(D)(4) gives an owner a right of access once a tenant has abandoned the premises.
Our record of that section is about access and does not reach what the tenant owes. For Reid's reasonable landlord test, keep the date you returned the keys, any listing and the date a new tenant moved in.
Under Reid, a trial held before the lease ends cannot produce a judgment for rent that has not yet accrued.
That matches Reid, which asks for commercially reasonable steps to relet, judged against a reasonable landlord in the same market.
The Woodhaven fee was held a penalty as applied, because it was not shown to be a reasonable forecast of the landlord's costs.
One measure in § 78B-6-816(1) runs until the unit is rerented, plus any shortfall in the new rent, a reasonable commission and restoration costs.
Sources
The law this guide relies on, and where to read it. Statutes change, so confirm the current text before you act on it.
- Reid v. Mutual of Omaha Ins. Co., 776 P.2d 896 (Utah 1989); Utah Code § 78B-6-811(1)(c), (d); Utah Code § 78B-6-816(1); Woodhaven Apartments v. Washington, 942 P.2d 918 (Utah 1997); Utah Code § 57-22-7; Utah Code § 57-20-1, read on courtlistener.com. Reid and Woodhaven were read in full on CourtListener. Section 78B-6-811 was read in the enrolled copy of H.B. 591 (2026 General Session), archived by the Wayback Machine on April 7, 2026, which the Legislature's passed-bills list records as Laws of Utah 2026, chapter 401, effective May 6, 2026; § 78B-6-816 was read in the Legislature's own page for the version effective May 9, 2017, archived June 23, 2023, which an archived copy of the section page dated January 10, 2026 still lists as the current version. le.utah.gov could not be reached directly. The Salt Lake City Code was read on American Legal Publishing as current through Ord. 40-26, passed June 16, 2026 (2026 S-21); confirm the current text before relying on it.
Red Flags to Watch Out For
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Every remaining month in one judgment
Under Reid, a trial held before the term ends cannot produce a judgment for rent not yet accrued. Question a demand for every month at once.
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A landlord waiting for calls
Reid rejected a landlord merely "passively receptive to opportunities to relet" and asked for positive steps reasonably calculated to relet the unit.
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A termination fee stacked on the term
Woodhaven held a termination fee a penalty where it was not shown to be a reasonable forecast of the landlord's costs. Ask what any fee covers.
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Re-letting costs with no account
Reid lets costs reasonably incurred in readying and reletting the unit be added to what you owe. Ask in writing what each charge was for.
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A promise of no duty to re-rent
Reid states the duty as Utah law, and § 78B-6-811(1)(d) says a forfeiture does not change it. Our record of Utah decisions holds none on a residential lease waiving it.
Your Rights as a Salt Lake City Tenant
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Real efforts to relet first
A landlord seeking unpaid rent must take steps a reasonable landlord in the same market would take, not just wait for offers.
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The landlord carries the proof
When the trial follows the end of the lease, the landlord must prove both its damages and its mitigation efforts (Reid).
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No judgment for rent not yet due
Rent for months after an early trial needs a later, supplemental proceeding showing it accrued and that reasonable mitigation efforts were made.
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A measure that stops at rerenting
§ 78B-6-816(1) names rent accrued until rerenting, plus any shortfall, a reasonable commission and restoration costs, as one measure after abandonment.
What To Do - Step by Step
Read the clause and its figure
Find the acceleration paragraph and the amount it demands, and any separate termination fee. Note whether the lease says anything about re-renting.
Write down the day you left
Keep the date you moved out and returned the keys, with photographs of the unit's condition, because restoration costs can enter the account.
Watch what happens to the unit
Save any listing you see and note when a new tenant moves in. Reid measures the landlord against a reasonable landlord in the same market.
Ask for the account in writing
Ask what each charge is for, including any costs of readying and reletting, and whether a judgment is sought for rent that has not yet accrued.
Check the law today
Read current Utah case law and the current text of § 78B-6-811 and § 78B-6-816 on le.utah.gov, and confirm the current city code.
Get local advice before agreeing to a figure
Take the lease, the demand and your own notes to a Salt Lake City tenant lawyer or legal aid office before you pay or sign anything.
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Lease Acceleration rules near Utah
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