2026-09-12 · Missouri · Legislation

What happened. Missouri preempted a whole category of local rental ordinances. Since 28 August 2025, no Missouri county or city may enact, maintain or enforce an ordinance regulating rent, requiring landlords to accept housing-assistance income, restricting tenant screening, capping security deposits, or granting tenants an automatic right of first refusal.¹

The bill is House Bill 595 (2025), official designation CCS SS HCS HBs 595 & 343, sponsored by Representative Schroer. The Governor signed it on 14 July 2025. It repeals and re-enacts sections 339.780 and 441.043, RSMo.

The statute

“441.043. 1. No county or city, or county or city with a charter form of government may enact, maintain, or enforce any ordinance or resolution which regulates the amount of rent to be charged for privately-owned, single-family, or multiple-unit residential or commercial rental property.

2. No county or city, or county or city with a charter form of government, shall enact, maintain, or enforce any ordinance or resolution that:

(1) Prohibits landlords from refusing to lease or rent a privately owned, single-family, or multiple-unit residential or commercial rental property to a person because the person's lawful source of income to pay rent includes funding from a federal or other housing assistance program;

(2) Restricts a landlord's ability to use or consider income-qualifying methods, credit scores, credit reports, eviction or property damage history, or criminal history, according to such landlord's own customarily applied criteria, or prohibits landlords from requesting such information, to determine whether to rent or lease a property to a prospective tenant;

(3) Limits the amount of security deposit a landlord may require from a prospective tenant; or

(4) Requires tenants to automatically receive the right of first refusal.”

The carve-outs, in subsections 3 and 4, preserve a city's ability to regulate its own property, to enter voluntary agreements regulating rent on subsidised properties, to restrict rent on properties assisted with community development block grant funds, and to prohibit discrimination against a tenant “solely on the basis that such tenant is a recipient of veterans' benefits.”

What it actually kills

The most visible casualty is Kansas City's source-of-income ordinance. A Missouri city can no longer require a landlord to accept a housing voucher.

What it does not touch — and this is the part that gets misread

This is a preemption of local government, not a rule about associations. Section 441.043 restrains counties and cities. It says nothing about deed restrictions, declarations, indentures or association rules.

A homeowners association's leasing restrictions, rental caps, minimum lease terms and tenant-registration rules are unaffected by it. They live or die on the recorded instrument and on Missouri covenant law, exactly as they did before 28 August 2025.

1. CCS SS HCS HBs 595 & 343 (2025), truly agreed and finally passed text — §§ 441.043 and 339.780, RSMo ↩
2. Official House summary of CCS SS HCS HBs 595 & 343 (2025) ↩
3. SS HCS HBs 974, 57, 1032 & 1141 (2025), truly agreed text — §§ 379.1900–379.1970, RSMo, Peer-to-Peer Car-Sharing Program Act ↩
4. HB 1768 (2026) bill page — short-term rental property-tax classification, referred to Fiscal Review on the last day ↩