Colorado Landlord Law Changes: The Full January 1, 2026 Checklist

Three separate pieces of Colorado legislation take effect on the same day — January 1, 2026 — and together they touch almost every dollar figure and disclosure in a standard lease. Reading about them one at a time makes each change feel manageable. Seeing them on one list is what actually tells you how much of your template needs a look before the deadline.

This is a checklist, not a summary of any one law. Each item links to the fuller explanation.

Security deposits: the cap and the deductions

• Deposit cap drops to one month’s rent (HB25-1249). See Colorado Security Deposit Rules for Landlords.
• “Normal wear and tear” has a broader, more tenant-favorable definition — ordinary use without negligence or abuse no longer supports a deduction.
• Carpet specifically cannot be charged as damaged if it hasn’t been replaced with new carpet in the 10 years before the tenancy ends, regardless of its condition. See The New 10-Year Carpet Rule.
• Either party can now request a pre-move-out walk-through inspection, in person or virtual, before the lease ends. See Pre-Move-Out Inspections: What Colorado Now Requires.
• On request, a tenant can pay the deposit in installments over at least 6 months — and a landlord can’t evict or withhold possession over a missed installment. See Security Deposit Installments: What Colorado Now Requires.

Fees: the new “no junk fees” rule

• A separate law, HB25-1090, bans hidden or padded fees statewide and requires a single, all-in “total price” in ads and leases — this is new for 2026 and not part of the deposit law. See Colorado’s Junk Fee Ban: What Landlords Can No Longer Charge.
• Payment-processing fees, common-area-maintenance passthroughs, and fees for services not actually provided are now restricted or prohibited outright.
• Any third-party service markup that survives is capped at 2% of actual cost or $10/month, whichever is less.

Lease clauses: what’s now void outright

• Automatic cleaning-fee clauses, property-tax passthrough clauses, and payment-processing-fee clauses without a free alternative are void under the 2026 changes.
• Jury-trial-waiver and one-way attorney-fee clauses remain flatly prohibited (this predates 2026, under C.R.S. § 38-12-801, but is still one of the most common findings in an unreviewed template).
• Late fees still cap at the greater of $50 or 5%, with a 7-day grace period — unchanged this cycle, but worth re-checking alongside everything else. See Lease Clauses That Became Void on January 1, 2026.

Renewals and non-renewal: no change this cycle, still worth checking

HB24-1098’s for-cause and 90-day non-renewal-notice requirements took effect in 2024, not 2026 — but they’re still one of the most commonly missed items in an older template, since most templates predate the law entirely. See Colorado Lease Renewal Compliance Checklist.

Why one date matters more than usual

Most statutory changes in Colorado phase in gradually, or apply only to leases signed after a certain date. HB25-1249 and HB25-1090 don’t work that way — both apply based on the date of the conduct (charging a fee, retaining a deposit, advertising a price), not the date the lease was signed. A lease you wrote in 2022 is judged against 2026 law the moment you act on it in 2026. Old paper doesn’t grandfather you out of new rules.

The bottom line

Five separate legal changes, one deadline, and most landlords have exactly one lease template doing all the work. A Lease Compliance Report checks a template against the current version of all of these at once — deposits, fees, clauses, renewals — and hands back corrected language rather than a list of citations to go research yourself.

LeaseCheck for Landlords is an educational lease-compliance screening tool. It is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice. Colorado rental laws change; confirm specifics for your situation with a licensed attorney.