Montana HOA Short-Term Rentals

Quick-Reference Table

Last verified: July 17, 2026

Section 1: Overview — Can an HOA restrict short-term rentals in Montana?

Yes. A Montana condominium restricts short-term rentals through its declaration under the Montana Unit Ownership Act, and a planned community does so through its recorded covenants. The Montana Unit Ownership Act (Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-101 et seq.) governs condominiums, while planned communities (non-condominium homeowners associations) operate under a covenant-primary framework with corporate governance supplied by the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act (§ 35-2-113 et seq.) and Montana common law.¹²

The Unit Ownership Act is a traditional, condominium-only statute enacted in 1965; it predates the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act and contains no modern rental owner-protection provision of its own.³ Rental authority in both settings is therefore driven by the governing documents, but with one important qualification: Montana has enacted a general statute, § 70-17-901, that limits an association's ability to enforce newly adopted, more-onerous use restrictions (expressly including limits on the ability to rent) against owners who could rent when they acquired.⁴

Montana does not appear to preempt local short-term-rental regulation, and no statewide STR statute has been enacted; Whitefish, Bozeman, and Big Sky each regulate locally.⁵⁶ Contested rental disputes proceed through the Montana District Court and are appealed directly to the Montana Supreme Court, because Montana has no intermediate appellate court.⁷ The sections below set out the framework, the operational mechanics, and recent activity.

Section 2: The legal framework for HOA short-term rental restrictions

2A. The Unit Ownership Act and the CC&R-primary planned-community framework

The Montana Unit Ownership Act (Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-101 et seq.) is the statute that governs condominiums. It is a traditional unit-ownership statute, enacted in 1965 (En. Sec. 1, Ch. 120, L. 1965), and it is not based on the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act.³ The Act is condominium-only: property becomes subject to it only when an owner records a declaration submitting the property to the chapter (§§ 70-23-102(7), 70-23-103).¹ The Act sets basic scaffolding for declarations, bylaws, common elements, assessments, and liens, and it confirms that a unit may be individually conveyed or leased (§ 70-23-401), but it does not itself impose or prohibit short-term rentals. That question is left to the declaration.¹

Planned communities (non-condominium homeowners associations) have no comprehensive Montana statute. They are governed by their recorded covenants, conditions, and restrictions; by the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act (§ 35-2-113 et seq.) for corporate formalities where the association is incorporated as a nonprofit, which is the case with most Montana associations; and by Montana common law on covenant interpretation.² There is no separate planned-community act to import. In both settings the recorded instrument (the declaration for condominiums, the covenants for planned communities) is the primary source of authority over rentals.

Montana law distinguishes between the general power to restrict leasing and the specific treatment of short-term or transient use. Long-term leasing is an ordinary incident of unit ownership. Short-term or transient rental, by contrast, has been treated by the Montana Supreme Court as potentially commercial in character, so a covenant barring commercial or business use can reach it even without naming short-term rentals expressly, depending on the document read as a whole.⁸

2B. Restricting rentals, amendments, and grandfathering

An association adds or strengthens a rental restriction by amending its governing documents. For condominiums, the mechanism is an amendment to the declaration or bylaws; the Unit Ownership Act requires a 75% vote of unit owners to amend the bylaws (§ 70-23-307(3)), while the threshold to amend the declaration is set by the declaration's own amendment clause rather than by a general statutory percentage.⁹ For planned communities, amendment follows the covenants' own amendment clause and Montana common law; there is no statutory threshold.²

Because the Unit Ownership Act predates the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, it contains no built-in rental owner-protection provision within Chapter 23. What Montana does have, and what distinguishes it from a purely declaration-driven state, is a general statute at § 70-17-901 (enacted by Senate Bill 300 in 2019, with statutory history "En. Sec. 1, Ch. 339, L. 2019," effective May 9, 2019). That section provides that a homeowners association may not enter into, amend, or enforce a covenant, condition, or restriction that imposes more-onerous restrictions on the types of use of a member's real property than existed when the member acquired the property, unless that member agrees in writing.⁴ The defined "types of use" expressly include "the ability to rent the real property, including the land and structures on the real property, for any amount of time."⁴ The statute defines "homeowners' association" to include both a covenant-governed association and "an association of unit owners as defined by 70-23-102 subject to the Unit Ownership Act," so it reaches condominiums and planned communities alike.⁴

The practical effect is a statutory grandfathering rule that operates against new restrictions. An association may still adopt a rental restriction by valid amendment, but it generally cannot enforce that new restriction against an owner who could rent when the owner bought, unless the owner consented in writing; the owner may record an exception with the county clerk.⁴ The protection is personal: a successor-in-interest who buys after the restriction is in place cannot claim it (§ 70-17-901(2)), and the section does not invalidate covenants that existed when the owner acquired.⁴ This is Montana's own statutory shield; it is not the Florida-style or California-style model and should not be described as one. It matters most for restrictions adopted after May 9, 2019.

2C. State law, the distinctive tax posture, and the local layer

Montana does not appear to have enacted a statewide statute preempting local short-term-rental regulation, and a 2025 bill that would have classified short-term rentals as a residential use statewide (Senate Bill 336) did not become law.¹⁰ Regulation is therefore primarily local and is contested in the resort and gateway markets. Whitefish confines short-term rentals to designated resort and business zones and requires a permit and business registration (Whitefish Municipal Code § 11-3-35); Bozeman classifies rentals into three types and, under Ordinance 2149, bars new non-owner-occupied (Type 3) rentals while grandfathering existing permitted units; and Big Sky rentals are governed by Gallatin County and Madison County zoning plus a local resort tax.⁵⁶¹¹

Montana's tax posture is distinctive. The state has no general sales tax, but it taxes short-term lodging through two components: a 4% lodging facility use tax (§ 15-65-111), commonly called the bed tax, and a 4% accommodations sales tax (§ 15-68-102), together totaling 8%.¹²¹³ The taxes apply to accommodations offered for periods of fewer than 30 days; stays of 30 continuous days or more to the same guest are exempt.¹⁴ Montana has extended collection to short-term-rental marketplaces and online hosting platforms, which must register and collect and remit both taxes as sellers of accommodations (§ 15-68-111).¹⁵¹⁶

The critical distinction for associations is that local regulation and the lodging tax govern the owner-to-government relationship. They neither grant nor remove association authority. An owner can hold a valid Whitefish or Bozeman permit and remit the 8% lodging tax and still violate the governing documents; conversely, an owner can satisfy the documents and still fail a local zoning or tax rule. Compliance in one channel is not compliance in the other.

Section 3: Operational mechanics and enforcement

A. Adopting a valid restriction (the tools)

The most common and most defensible tool is a minimum-lease-term or use restriction written into the declaration or covenants. Montana has no statewide statutory minimum lease term for associations, so the operative number is whatever the documents specify; the 30-day line that appears in the lodging tax and in local ordinances is a useful reference point but is not an association default.¹⁴ Because the Montana Supreme Court construes restrictive covenants strictly, a restriction that names short-term or transient rentals and defines the threshold in days is more enforceable than a bare "residential use only" clause.⁸

Rental caps by percentage of units are neither authorized nor prohibited by the Unit Ownership Act; they are governed by the documents. Any cap, minimum-term rule, or registration requirement adopted by amendment is subject to § 70-17-901, meaning it may not be enforced against an owner who could rent at acquisition without that owner's written consent.⁴ An association may also impose internal owner-information, registration, and lease-filing requirements; the Act itself contemplates lease filing, treating a lessee whose lease is filed with the presiding officer as a unit owner for voting purposes (§ 70-23-102).¹

B. Enforcement

The Unit Ownership Act does not prescribe a notice-and-opportunity-to-be-heard procedure before an association imposes a fine; that process is governed by the governing documents and, for incorporated associations, the Nonprofit Corporation Act.² Fining authority itself must come from the documents. Available remedies include fines where authorized, injunctive relief, and assessment liens. Injunctive relief is the remedy the Montana Supreme Court affirmed in the leading recent case, where the trial court enjoined short-term rental use for periods of less than 30 days.⁸ For condominiums, unpaid common-expense assessments give rise to a lien against the unit under the Act (§ 70-23-601 et seq.); planned communities rely on the lien authority in their covenants.¹⁷

A contested enforcement action is filed in the Montana District Court, the trial court of general jurisdiction. An appeal goes directly to the Montana Supreme Court; Montana has no intermediate appellate court, so there is no "Montana Court of Appeals" in the path.⁷ Association enforcement runs on a separate track from local-government enforcement: a city or county can cite an owner for operating without a permit while the association separately sues to enforce the covenants, and the outcomes are independent.

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills (past 24 months)

B. Recent rulings (past 36 months)

The 2020 decision the Court distinguished, Craig Tracts Homeowners' Ass'n v. Brown Drake, LLC, 2020 MT 305, falls outside the 36-month window and is background rather than a recent ruling.¹⁹

C. Active legislative or local debates

Property-rights proposals continue to surface: Senate Bill 431 (2025) would have broadened § 70-17-901 but did not pass, and Whitefish and Bozeman continue to tighten enforcement of their existing short-term-rental permit regimes as they touch owners and, indirectly, associations.⁵⁶

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Montana sits toward the covenant-primary end of the national spectrum. It has a traditional, non-UCIOA condominium statute and no comprehensive planned-community statute, so rental authority rests mainly on the governing documents. Unlike Florida and Arizona, Montana does not appear to preempt local short-term-rental bans, and unlike California and Arizona it does not limit association rental authority in the manner of Civil Code § 4741 or A.R.S. § 33-1806.01. Montana's own limit, § 70-17-901, works differently: it protects existing owners against new, more-onerous use restrictions rather than capping what associations may adopt going forward. Local regulation and the 8% lodging tax restrain local governments and owners, not associations. For a multi-state operator entering Montana, the practical implications are document-driven association authority, a distinctive lodging tax layered on top of a state with no general sales tax, and a court system with no intermediate appellate court.

HOA Weekly's Montana Short-Term Rentals coverage updates quarterly as the Legislature, the Montana Supreme Court, and local governments act. Federal frameworks (the FHA, ADA, FDCPA, SCRA, and OTARD) also apply to Montana associations regardless of the state framework.

Footnotes

1. Montana Unit Ownership Act, Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-101 et seq. ↩
2. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-101, Short title (En. Sec. 1, Ch. 120, L. 1965) ↩
3. Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act, Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-113 et seq. ↩
4. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-901, Homeowners' association restrictions — real property rights (En. Sec. 1, Ch. 339, L. 2019) ↩
5. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-307, Bylaws — adoption, recording, and amendment ↩
6. Brandt v. R&R Mountain Escapes, LLC, 2025 MT 155, 423 Mont. 100, 572 P.3d 809 (Mont. July 22, 2025) ↩
7. Craig Tracts Homeowners' Ass'n v. Brown Drake, LLC, 2020 MT 305 (Mont. 2020) ↩
8. Mont. Code Ann. § 15-65-111, Lodging facility use tax rate ↩
9. Mont. Code Ann. § 15-68-102, Imposition and rate of sales tax on accommodations ↩
10. Mont. Code Ann. § 15-68-101, Definitions (accommodations; under 30 days) ↩
11. Mont. Code Ann. § 15-68-111, Short-term rental marketplace registration and collection ↩
12. Montana Department of Revenue, Lodging Facility Sales and Use Tax ↩
13. Montana Judicial Branch, About Us (no intermediate appellate court; direct appeals to the Montana Supreme Court) ↩
14. Whitefish Municipal Code § 11-3-35, Short-Term Rental Standards ↩
15. City of Bozeman, Short Term Rentals (Ordinance 2149) ↩
16. Gallatin County, Short-Term Rental FAQs (Big Sky) ↩
17. Montana SB 336 (2025), Revise laws related to short-term rentals (died in committee) ↩
18. Montana HB 231 (2025), Revise property tax rates for certain property (signed) ↩
19. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-601 et seq., Conveyances, Liens, and Common Expenses ↩