The statute that ends a Minnesota month-to-month tenancy is two sentences long, and I still see it botched from both sides of the relationship — landlords who give “30 days’ notice” on the tenth of the month, tenants who text their landlord mid-month and mail the keys, and, lately, landlords relying on a 14-day nonpayment notice to quit that the legislature deleted from the statute effective January 1, 2024. The notice length is the easy half. The counting rule — when the notice must take effect — is the half everyone gets wrong, and it has been settled law since 1891.
How much notice does § 504B.135 require?
Here is the entire statute:
“A tenancy at will may be terminated by either party by giving notice in writing. The time of the notice must be at least as long as the interval between the time rent is due or three months, whichever is less.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.135.
A “tenancy at will” is “a tenancy in which the tenant holds possession by permission of the landlord but without a fixed ending date.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.001, subd. 13. That is your classic month-to-month arrangement — no lease term, or a lease that expired while everyone kept paying and accepting rent.
Three consequences fall straight out of the text. The notice must be in writing; a phone call or a conversation in the hallway terminates nothing. The notice period equals the rent interval: one month for month-to-month, one week for week-to-week. And the period is capped at three months — a tenant at will who pays annually is owed three months’ notice, not twelve.
What the text does not say is when the notice period may end. For that, you need the case law.
The counting rule: the notice must end with a rental period
The Minnesota Supreme Court settled this in Hunter v. Frost, 47 Minn. 1 (1891), and the facts should sound familiar. A tenant held over after his lease expired and kept paying $45 on the first of every month. Several days before October 30, he served written notice that he would vacate on November 30, and he did. The landlord sued for the rent that kept accruing, and won. The court held that the notice statute “has reference only to the length of notice,” not to when the notice may take effect — and under the common-law counting rule, which the statute left standing, a periodic tenancy can only be ended as of the last day of a rental period. For a month-to-month tenancy, “the notice must still terminate with the quarter or month.” Hunter, 47 Minn. at 6. The tenant’s notice was long enough, yet it was “wholly ineffectual, because not terminating at the end of a year” — his holdover tenancy ran year to year, so only a notice ending on the anniversary would do. Id.
Run the math on the ordinary case. Rent is due the first of the month, so the rental period runs the first through the last day of the month:
- Notice delivered August 10, purporting to end the tenancy September 10: invalid. Thirty days long, but it ends mid-period.
- Notice delivered August 10, purporting to end the tenancy August 31: invalid. It ends with a period, but 21 days is shorter than the one-month interval.
- Notice delivered August 10 (or any day before September 1), ending the tenancy September 30: valid. At least a full month of notice, ending on the last day of a rental period.
In short: deliver the notice before the final rental period begins, effective on the last day of that period. A notice given mid-month does not fail — it just does not work until the end of the following month, and the rent obligation runs with it. That is the trap. The “30 days’ notice” habit imported from other states produces a notice that is either too short or aimed at the wrong day, and under Hunter the consequence is not a 20-day adjustment — the termination simply has not happened.
What happened to the 14-day notice to quit for unpaid rent?
Until 2024, § 504B.135 had a second paragraph: “If a tenant neglects or refuses to pay rent due on a tenancy at will, the landlord may terminate the tenancy by giving the tenant 14 days notice to quit in writing.” The legislature struck it. 2023 Minn. Laws ch. 52, art. 19, § 97. The repeal is “effective January 1, 2024,” and applies “to leases entered into or renewed on or after January 1, 2024.” Id., § 102. A month-to-month tenancy renews with every rental period — that is what makes it month-to-month — so I treat the old paragraph as dead for any at-will tenancy still collecting rent today. Citing it in 2026 is citing a ghost.
What replaced it is broader and runs through the eviction statute instead. Since January 1, 2024, “[b]efore bringing an eviction action alleging nonpayment of rent or other unpaid financial obligation in violation of the lease, a landlord must provide written notice to the residential tenant specifying the basis for future eviction action.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.321, subd. 1a(a); 2023 Minn. Laws ch. 52, art. 19, §§ 105, 116 (effective for actions filed on or after January 1, 2024). The notice must state the total amount due; itemize it across unpaid rent, late fees, and other charges; identify by name and address the person authorized to receive payment; and carry three verbatim statements — the legal-help statement, the financial-assistance statement, and the warning that an eviction can be filed if the tenant does not pay or move within 14 days. Minn. Stat. § 504B.321, subd. 1a(a)(1)–(6). Delivery is personal or by first-class mail. Id., subd. 1a(b). Only “[i]f the residential tenant fails to correct the rent delinquency within 14 days of the delivery or mailing of the notice” — longer where a local ordinance says so — may the landlord file. Id., subd. 1a(c).
The sanction has teeth: the complaint must attach the notice, and “[t]he court shall dismiss an action without prejudice for failure to provide a notice as described in subdivision 1a and grant an expungement of the eviction case court file.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.321, subd. 1(d). Not may — shall. A landlord who skips the notice buys a dismissal, an expungement, and a restarted 14-day clock.
So the two tracks now divide cleanly. Ending the tenancy itself — no cause needed — is § 504B.135 notice, full rental period, in writing. Collecting or evicting over unpaid rent is § 504B.321, subd. 1a: 14-day itemized pre-eviction notice, then an eviction complaint. The 14-day termination shortcut in the tenancy statute no longer exists.
Does the same math bind tenants?
Yes. Section 504B.135 says “either party,” and Hunter itself was a judgment against a tenant whose notice was long enough but ended on the wrong day — he moved out, and the rent kept accruing anyway. A tenant who hands back the keys on the 15th has not terminated anything; the obligation runs to the end of the next full rental period at least. A tenant under a fixed-term lease has a different and harder problem — the lease, not § 504B.135, controls — and I walk through those exits, including the statutory ones, in my guide to breaking a lease early in Minnesota. Tenants on the receiving end of a proper notice should also know the deposit statute keeps running: the landlord’s obligations on the security deposit after any termination are covered in my security deposit article.
One caution for landlords: a termination notice served on the heels of a tenant’s complaint to an inspector or a repair demand invites a retaliation fight. That doctrine has its own article — landlord retaliation under § 504B.285 — and it is worth reading before serving notice on a tenant with a pending complaint.
The notice expired and the tenant is still there. Now what?
Eviction — and only eviction. The statute lists as a ground that “any tenant at will holds over after the termination of the tenancy by notice to quit.” Minn. Stat. § 504B.285, subd. 1(a)(3). The complaint must attach a copy of the notice to quit. Minn. Stat. § 504B.321, subd. 3(5). What a landlord may never do is retake the unit by changing the locks, hauling property to the curb, or killing the utilities; Minnesota’s lockout statute makes self-help expensive, and I cover exactly how expensive in the tenant lockout article. The eviction case itself — timeline, hearing, writ, and the tenant’s options along the way — is mapped in my eviction timeline guide.
The whole subject rewards precision over speed. A landlord who serves a clean § 504B.135 notice on August 20, effective September 30, files a straightforward holdover eviction on October 1 if needed. A landlord who serves “30 days’ notice” on August 20 and files September 22 has served an invalid notice, filed a defective case, and donated a month to the other side. The statute is two sentences. Read both, then count.
Madgett Law, LLC advises landlords and tenants across Minnesota on tenancy terminations, pre-eviction notices, holdover evictions, and lease disputes — including reviewing a termination notice before it goes out, when fixing it costs nothing. Call 612-470-6529 or send us a message.
Sources: Minn. Stat. § 504B.135 (written notice; period equal to the rent interval, capped at three months; “either party”); Minn. Stat. § 504B.001, subd. 13 (definition of tenancy at will); Hunter v. Frost, 47 Minn. 1, 2, 6 (1891) (statute governs length of notice only; notice must terminate at the end of a rental period; tenant’s compliant-length notice ineffective and rent liability continued); 2023 Minn. Laws ch. 52, art. 19, § 97 (striking former § 504B.135, para. (b) — the 14-day nonpayment notice to quit), § 102 (effective January 1, 2024, for leases entered into or renewed on or after that date), §§ 105, 116 (rewriting § 504B.321, effective for actions filed on or after January 1, 2024); Minn. Stat. § 504B.321, subd. 1(d) (mandatory dismissal without prejudice plus expungement where the notice is missing), subd. 1a(a)–(c) (pre-eviction notice contents, delivery, and 14-day cure period), subd. 3(5) (notice to quit attached to a holdover complaint); Minn. Stat. § 504B.285, subd. 1(a)(3) (holdover after notice to quit as an eviction ground). A 2026 session law (2026 Minn. Laws ch. 81, § 5) amended § 504B.321, subd. 2 (expedited evictions), effective August 1, 2026; it does not touch the notice provisions discussed here. This article is general legal information about Minnesota law, not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship with Madgett Law, LLC, and no outcome is promised or implied.